Last week, we were in Tennessee for the first part of Cousin Camp 2010  (Part Two will be here in Pensacola at the end of July).    On Wednesday, Abigail woke up with a fever…sigh…Abigail and fevers generally aren’t fun.  She seemed to be feeling okay and her temp was only 101 (which for the high priestess of high fevers – hers have, on occasion, run above 106 – was not significantly high), so we went ahead and headed out for the day.  Our plan was to go and take Ruby & Emmie’s school pictures, head over to the “water squirty park”, meet my sister for lunch and then take a trip to the Fire Museum.  We made it through pictures and the water squirty park, but by lunch Abigail was looking really puny.  I made a quick run through Kroger and bought an ear thermometer.  Her temp was now registering over 104.  So, I told my sister that I’d take all the girls home and then later in the afternoon if Abigail didn’t seem to be doing better, I’d go ahead and take her to the urgent care center that evening.  I made sure all four of the girls were buckled up, waved goodbye to my sister as she headed back to work, and then drove off in the official Cousin Camp van.  After I got on the interstate, I looked in the rearview mirror and decided to go straight to the urgent care center, with all four girls in tow.  Abigail looked pitiful and miserable and honestly, I was more than a little bit scared.

During my blogging hiatus, Abigail had pneumonia and it was not pretty.  She had a chest x-ray that confirmed the pneumonia and was prescribed an antibiotic, but things got worse before they got better. We ended up having to rush her to the doctor after hours because when she woke up from her nap, her temp was wildly high and she was vomiting uncontrollably.  It was crazy scary, but after some mammoth doses of antibiotic shot into her chubby little toddler legs with needles the size of my index finger and an all-night vigil by her worried parents, the scary part passed.  She was still sick, just not scary sick, for about ten days afterwards.  But, I’ll never forget what she looked like when she was scary sick when she woke up from that nap.

And that’s the look I saw when I looked in my rearview mirror last Wednesday.  Or at least I thought that’s what I saw.  It may have been that I was just worried and far from home and not sure whether I should take her or not.  Maybe I was just gun-shy about the last time she was sick.  But, whatever the reason, I took her on in to the urgent care center.  The big girls were amazingly well-behaved.  I was so proud to be their aunt/mommy.  The urgent care center tested her blood for infection, her throat for strep and her urine for bacteria and everything looked good.  They smiled at me and said it was probably just a summer virus and to give her Tylenol and Motrin and lots of fluids.  And they sent us on our way.

That night Abigail threw up one time.  Her fever raged on.  I remembered that 72 hours is the golden rule for viruses.  A fever from a simple virus will generally run its course in 72 hours – anything longer than that and you’re dealing with some other type of infection. 

Abigail spent the entire next day on the couch, sleeping and reaching out for me.  The big girls were incredible, again.  The squabbling that usually accompanies Cousin Camp was strangely non-existent all day (which leads me to think that Abigail plays more than her equal part in squabble instigating ).  That afternoon my sister took the big girls to see Marmaduke…Abigail refused to go, saying she just wanted to stay home with me.  Her fever raged on.  I remembered that they hadn’t even listed to her chest at the urgent care center.  Then, I calmed myself remembering that we were still within the 72 hour window for a virus.  That night, she threw up on time.  I prayed that she was battling a stomach bug…ummm yeah, I was praying for more vomit…

The next morning, Friday, was the day Gracie, Abigail & I headed home.  Abigail seemed a bit better when we woke up.  Her fever was down a little and she asked for something to eat.  She threw up once but really seemed to perk up afterwards.  I started to breath a bit easier.  I looked in her throat and it was really red.  Craig looked, too, and without hesitation said, “That girl’s got strep”.  I decided that if she still had fever the next morning, I’d take her back to her pediatrician.  Before we headed out of town, we stopped by the stables where Ruby and Emmie are going to horseback riding camp in a few weeks.  Abigail felt good enough to give a horse a treat.  We climbed into the van and settled in for the eight hour trip home.  We stopped about three hours later to get gas and ran into Wal-Mart to pick up Father’s Day cards.  Abigail seemed to be doing well, but by the time we finished shopping, she was begging for a cart to ride in and by the time we got back to the car, she looked miserable.  Her temp was high again.  I kept hearing a voice in the back of my head telling me strep can be really dangerous.  I remembered my best friend’s daughter spent several nights in the hospital because strep caused her to have an abscess on her tonsil.  The trip started to seem unbearably long.  I was at the halfway point…too far to turn around and go back to my sister’s and still way too far from the comfort of home and Steve. 

I gave Abigail some Motrin and within half an hour, she seemed to perk up a little and said in her sweet little voice, “Mama, I’m feeling better now.”  Only, it wasn’t her sweet little voice.  It was the voice of a chipmunk…a chipmunk with fifteen walnuts stuck in her mouth.    That didn’t sound good at all…

I called our pediatrician to see how late they saw patients on Friday nights.  We wouldn’t make it back in time.  I went ahead and made her an appointment for Saturday morning, but was toying with the idea of taking her on to the urgent care center as soon as we hit Pensacola.  Just outside of Mobile, a heavy thunderstorm blew in and we pulled over for about fifteen minutes to ride it out.  I almost decided to wait and take her to the doctor on Saturday morning.  I called Steve to see what he thought and he was leaning toward going ahead and taking her in. 

So, at 7:30 p.m., we pulled into the urgent care center.  Steve met us and within twenty minutes, we were in an exam room.  The kind doctor took one look in Abigail’s mouth (after ribbing Steve about his choice in football teams…Steve had on one of his collection of Alabama shirts) and said, “This girl has strep!”  and a bad case at that.  Her tonsils were so swollen they were almost touching.  He told us to keep a close eye on her because if they got to the point of touching, we were in trouble.  And as soon as he said that, I wanted to cry.  I was so glad that we’d gone ahead and brought her in so she could start her antibiotic sooner.  I was mad at myself for not trusting my mommy instinct earlier and taking her back to the doctor in Tennessee.  I was relieved that the doctor prescribed an antibiotic that would help her.

Now, four days later, Abigail is almost fever free.  (She’s still got a very low-grade one, but I think she might break that today).  Her voice still sounds a little funny, but not as funny as it did on Friday.  And, she finally feels like playing (and fighting) with her sister again.  And, I’m tired…really, really tired.  But, I’m also really, really thankful…