Blymey

Last weekend, when I was changing Nemo for bed, I noticed a strange rashy area under his left arm. It had a raised bump in the middle, and then an irregular shaped halo about a half-inch away from the spot; it was a total of about an inch in diameter. Despite finding a tick on Little Man earlier in the week, I didn't think much of it, especially since there was no bug to go along with it, but when Nemo started to run a fever on Wednesday, I put one (certain exposure to a tick by another family member) and one (rash in armpit) and three (sleepiness, clinginess, and low-grade fever) together and got:

Lyme disease. Most likely.

We spent most of the morning on Thursday going to the pediatrician, the lab, and the pharmacy. We won't have the results of the blood test back til sometime this week, but the pediatrician said that in cases where there is a clear bullseye rash in a preverbal child, they just treat the child as though they have Lyme disease anyway. In a lot of cases there can still be a negative blood test that later tests positive, especially if it is a recent infection, like less than a month. The best prognosis for a full recovery with no lasting effects is quick treatment, so we're glad they do this, even though giving him a foul-tasting antibiotic (because he's allergic to penicillin thanks to my genes) two times a day for 21 days is not high on my list of fun things to do.

I think he's feeling better now, because he's not sleeping so much. Last week he took a 3.5 hour nap on Wednesday when my in-laws were babysitting, and both Wednesday and Thursday he wanted to go upstairs early in the evening and get in bed. We put him on our bed and he put himself to sleep. Pathetically cute, but he was sick. Now he's back to his old I-wont-go-to-bed-without-nummies-for-an-hour self.

Just wanted you to know why I was so quiet.

Comments

[hokgardner]

Goodness, how scary. Hope he's better soon.

[jodifur]

how scary! I hope he is ok!

[angi]

yikes!
Hope he is feeling all better now!

[Robin]

My son has this right now too. Same protacol - 21 days of antibiotics. We never saw the tick though, but he does have a bug bite mark that ended up with the bulls eye. Our doc advised waiting 2 weeks from seeing the bulls eye mark to get the blood test to give time for it to show up in the blood, although he is pretty sure that's what it is, hence going ahead with the antibiotics. I've got a pic of it on my blog.

[ktjrdn]

uh! I'm headed to the doctor now for a no-bug bullseye rash. Thought of you. I'm sure that makes you warm all over :)