The Velveteen Rabbit

As a child, I loved listening to George Winston and Meryl Streep's recording of The Velveteen Rabbit. As a jilted college freshman, I saw myself in the rabbit, cast aside to be burned while the boy snuggled with a new bunny. Today, I heard Nana's voice as our pediatrician diagnosed Elizabeth with scarlet fever.

Once a dangerous childhood disease, scarlet fever is now easily treatable with antibiotics. In our case, it began with an ingrown toenail that got infected.  For several nights, Elizabeth has been waking up a lot, and the last few days and nights she has complained of pain in her toe. Yesterday we saw how awful it looked and on my dad's recommendation, we started soaking it in hot water for 10-15 minutes at a time.

When Elizabeth woke up last night at 9:30 pm, complaining that her foot hurt, her whole toe was red, tight, and throbbing. She had a fever, and she was shaking. The top of her foot was also red and hot. We soaked her toe again, gave her some Tylenol, and distracted her with her current favorite song while Mr. M lanced the infected area and released a goopy glob of white pus. Fever and chills, a pus-filled toe and what looked like a spreading infection were setting off my alarm bells. I really wanted to call my dad, but it was too late. Somehow he knew to call me. (My mom told me that he was lying in bed and jumped up and said, "I've got to call Erin!") When I told him about Elizabeth, he urged me to take her to the ER. We were both concerned about the dangerous possibility of sepsis.

I opted for Urgent Care, since it was only a mile away and our co-pay was $115 less than the ER. (I hate that money was a factor, but it was.) At Urgent Care, she had no fever (my fault for giving her a dose of Tylenol), but she did have an elevated heart rate - 175 bpm. The doctor washed her toe, tried to numb it with lydocaine, and then used a needle to clean out the whole area around the toenail. Elizabeth did NOT like it at all. The doctor also called in a prescription to the 24 hour pharmacy for an antibiotic, told me to go get it right away, and give it to Elizabeth as soon as possible. She told me to keep her close for the night and if her fever got high or she seemed unlike herself or her appearance changed, to get her to the hospital.

"It will all be fine," I told myself, after dropping off Elizabeth to sleep with Michael at home and on my way to the 24 hour pharmacy. Unfortunately, it was not all fine. The pharmacy DID NOT CARRY the meds prescribed by the doctor. Nor did any of the 24 hour pharmacies that the pharmacist called. What was I supposed to do? Did I need to take her to the ER? I kicked myself for not going there in the first place.

It was well after 1 am when I got home. Elizabeth was asleep, but her fever had risen in an hour from 101.8 (12:30 am  taken by Mr. M under her arm) to 102.4 (1:30 am taken by me). I called the nurse hotline, told the nurse what was going on, and was told to alternate Tylenol and Motrin to bring the fever down.  At 2 am, Elizabeth's temp was up to 102.7. She was burning hot!  I was nervous, but enough time had passed that I could give her a dose of Motrin and some water. At 2:25 am, her temp was down to 101.5. I told myself it was alright to go to sleep and laid down on the bed beside Elizabeth. Sometime in the early morning, I woke up. Elizabeth was drenched in sweat and was cool. The fever had broken. I was so relieved.

She slept until around 8:15 am and woke up extremely cheerful. "Hi Mommy! Hi Daddy!" Her foot was much less red, and she was clearly feeling better. I tried calling the Urgent Care to get the doctor to give us a new prescription, but could only leave a message. Elizabeth was a little edgy all morning, but then, so was I. Lack of sleep tends to do that to us.

At 1:30 pm, we saw our regular pediatrician. He wrote copious notes, asked a lot of questions, and smiled at Elizabeth, who was dancing in circles and singing while I recounted the last 48 hours. He gave me a new prescription. I had a moment of panic when the pharmacy by my house told me, "We don't have it in stock." Luckily, another pharmacy near by had it and we were able to pick it up half an hour later.

Elizabeth has been dosed, bandaged, and send to bed. I'm hoping for a restful night of uninterrupted sleep for all of us.

For those who care, scroll down to the bottom for a picture of ... THE TOE! For those who don't, just enjoy my smiling children.

Our happy girl with big brother Scott.

The amazing Ethan, who cleaned his room tonight!

The toe, looking 100x better