Our Strep Story

So as many of you know we have been passing strep around my house for almost a month now.  Matt started it and thought he was going to die because he was so sick but thank God he got better pretty quickly. I only had a few days with no Daddy help, whew! 

Then Noah got strep, he had a 104 degree fever but was a trooper and did well and recovered fast.  All of this after the Mommy was given a choice by the doctor to do 10 days of oral antibiotics and a slower healing process or a shot in the butt of penicillin (thankfully Noah is not allergic like the rest of us, except Matt) so this was a valid option.  Soooo, the mean old Mommy chose the shot which lasted about 2 seconds and had a super fast healing time but we heard about it for days.  To top it all off we found out that Noah is more frightened of taking off a Band-Aid than anything else in this world, even monsters so we had to wait until it fell off by itself, well sort of.  After bath time one night, about 3 days after the shot, Matt took off the tiny bit that was hanging in there and started a roaring fit but Noah got over it, about a week later. 

Just when we thought we were in the clear, Joshua got this weird blister looking thing on his finger and nose. His finger got really nasty looking so we decided it was time to take him to the doctor because Neosporin was not doing the trick.  Matt took him to Dr. Schulman, who is Joshua's buddy, and he said it was strep in his finger and nose, same virus different location. Essentially,  Joshua contracted the strep virus, picked his nose, bit his finger....you get the picture. GROSS!! So, more antibiotics for the King family. By this point the Target pharmacy staff knows me by name and face, poor guys.

About a week goes by and Hope starts saying her ear has an "owie" and has mild fever but we figure we'll give it a couple of days and see if it clears up. So she is a little cranky and clingy but thats really nothing new for our opinionated 2 year old. Needless to say she kept up with the pulling of the "owie" ear so we figure its an ear infection that is not going to clear on its own and go back to Dr. Schulman. Thank goodness the kids love him as much as we do!  He checks her out and no strep, Hallelujah, but her ear drum is busted. BUSTED, ahhhh, the Mommy freaks out!  Thankfully Dr. Schulman recognized the look on my face and said its ok, when you were a kid that is how ear infections were treated, the filled up and hurt, then they busted and the fluid came out and it stopped hurting, then you got ear drops, right.? I was like, oh yeah, I remember mom heating up the drops on the stove in warm water because it made them feel better. Ok, cool, so she's fine and it will grow back, no problem. But wait, we need antibiotic ear drops and oral ones to prevent a secondary infection, back to Target we go, at least they have a Starbucks. Where everybody knows your name....ok, ok, so Starbucks is my Cheers, so what!

So Hop-e is fine but Mommy starts feeling yucky, oh no, here it comes.  I think I am the most strep/tonsillitis prone person on the face of the earth, why God why? Thankfully I felt it coming on and called the doctor who kindly called in, you guessed it, more antibiotics to Target. By the time Matt picked them up for me I was about half way down the proverbial hill and in bed.  We got everyone to sleep and then I took everything I could think of and went to sleep too. When I woke up this morning, at 10:45 thank you sweetie, my throat was a little better but I felt like I had been run over by a truck! A big truck, bigger than Matt's even!  I drug myself downstairs and did a few errands with Matt and now am writing this blog, which will be followed by a thorough Lysoling of the laptop because I am ALL DONE with strep or any other sickness in my family!!  

Soooooo......we will no longer be sick and we will have Noah's birthday party on Sunday and it will be fun and as nice as the Target pharmacy people are, I really hope I don't have to see them again any time soon.