hey, 98.6, his lovin' is the medicine that saved me, oh I love my baby...

Today was a day I've been looking forward to for some time. It was Ethan's one month well visit with his pediatrician. I was so excited to learn how much he grew and I was also looking forward to discussing his reflux with his doctor in hopes we'd be able to bring him some relief. This morning was especially rough with reflux symptoms, including a projectile vomit session at around 6 a.m. and a mass outpouring of spit-up throughout the day (including all down my back and in my hair seconds before we walked out the door to see the doctor -- go figure).

We arrived at the doctor for our 4:15 appointment and were brought back to our room. The nurse weighed Ethan (9 pounds, 9 ounces) and measured him (21 1/2 inches). Perfect! It was when the nurse went to take his temperature that all of the impending chaos began. Yes, my child decided to urinate all over the place and defecate all over the table for the poor nurse. After I cleaned up the mess, he decided he would top it all off by urinating all over the place again seconds before his diaper was back on! Eventually she took his temperature, which was 100.7. She thought maybe it was high because of the events that had just occurred. We then waited for his doctor to come in.

Cue in the smiles and "take my picture with Ethan at the doctor!" requests as we thought his making a huge mess on the table would be the low point of the visit. Oh, how naive. The doctor came in and asked for a temperature recheck now that Ethan was calmer. She was concerned when that temperature came back at 100.9. I swore my baby wasn't feeling warm at home or showing any symptoms of being sick at home. My husband was more positive with a "well, at least we're in the right place at the right time" kind of attitude. Optimism, my friends, is not in my nature.

In a few short minutes, the visit went from a happy, smiley one worth documenting to one that looked more like this:


(Yeah, I passed him off to my husband. I was crying in the corner. I'll own it.)

The doctor ran a strep test, a CBC and urine on him. We waited for the results for what felt like an eternity but was really only less than ten minutes.










...The results came back perfect. Perfect, normal, wonderful, great. At this point, his temperature was reading 99.4 and we were sent home with the orders to keep a close eye on him (which is easy for me, the paranoid lunatic who admittedly checks the rise and fall of his chest 1,000 times within the night to ensure he's still breathing) and take his temperature every four hours. I totally processed that as "take his temperature every 10 minutes." I'll own that, too.

Since our visit, his temperature has dwindled down and, as I was just feeding him, registered at a perfect 98.6. Insert major sighs of relief all around.

(Oh, and if you're curious, our fabulous pediatrician managed to completely cure Ethan's reflux. I'm saving this miracle for an entry tomorrow because it's too wonderful and miraculous to be cluttered up in this post about excrement, fevers and crying in corners.)

On our way home, I insisted my husband stop at Starbucks.

...a venti quad nonfat iced caramel macchiato? Pretty much mandatory. I have a long night of temperature checking every four hours ten minutes, don't you know.