It was Aidan’s 1st birthday on the 17th and we all had a bit of an adventure.
It all started last Wednesday when Aidan rolled off the changing table in his room and broke his collar-bone. Here he is after he got back from the emergency room.
On Thursday morning, he woke with a 38.1C (100.5F) fever. That’s low, so we just gave him some Paracetamol and he seemed ok with it. We were alternating Ibuprofen and Paracetamol anyway, to help with the pain of the collar-bone, so we didn’t worry too much about it.
Here he is on Thursday.
Friday morning he woke with a slightly higher fever of 39.1C (102.3F)so Chris decided to make an appointment with our GP just to make sure everything was OK. I thought the fever might be related to the break, but it wasn’t. The GP looked him over and didn’t really find anything major other than his left ear was a bit red – not infected, just red. She prescribed some antibiotics for him just to be sure and thought that should do it.
So Saturday rolls around and Aidan wakes up very hot with a 40.1C (104.7F) fever. We were beginning to worry but thought we would see if the medicine would bring it down. We also gave him a cool bath which he didn’t like at all. It worked, however, and he was back to almost normal temperature in about 30 minutes.
Through all this he never really seemed overly clingy or upset. He just got on with it.
Anyway, everyone came around for his birthday party around 2pm. Chris’s parents, Catherine, Frank (and his g/f Catherine), Elizabeth, Sally and Christine were all there.
I took a load of video that I’ll try to post later, but suffice it to say that everyone had a good time and Aidan was a star. The fever stayed down and he was really happy all afternoon.
We put him to bed at the normal time, but we weren’t able to get him to take the antibiotics. He really hates them and refused to take any. We didn’t give him any of the other meds because it was too close to the last dose. We knew that meant he would wake up later in the evening (probably with a fever) because he was in pain, so we were ready for that.
We weren’t ready for him to wake up with a 41.1C (105.9F) fever!
He was very unhappy when he woke and wouldn’t stop crying. First off we tried to get him to take some Paracetamol to help with the fever, but he just gagged on it and vomited instantly. Hmm, not good. So we tried to get some drink in him but he wasn’t having any of that either.
Chris got on the phone with NHS direct immediately, while I ran another cool bath and got him in. This didn’t really help a lot, and NHS said to take him to A&E immediately. This was at 11:15pm.
We went to A&E and they saw him instantly. One good thing about the NHS is that babies are a top priority so we went to the top of the list straight away.
A nurse did a quick exam and sent us back the the pediatric ward for a Dr. to take a look. We waited for a while but someone came around eventually and gave him the most thorough exam he’s had yet from any NHS doctor. (This made me a bit more comfortable, I have to admit.)
In the end, they took urine and blood samples, a throat culture and maybe a few other things and decided he should be admitted. Here’s some of the blood that leaked when they were stabbing him. 
At 2:45am.
Mum trying to kiss it better. His fever was coming down a bit by now, but you can still see how red his cheeks are.
It was now 4:30am Sunday morning.
Chris and I had been up since around 5:30am Saturday so we were working on 24 hours awake and it was starting to show.
Once we got in the room and got settled, I sent Chris home to get some sleep and I stayed with Aidan. This was the first time Aidan and I really got any decent rest and it was well needed by both of us.
Sunday Aidan felt better, but still wasn’t himself. He didn’t really want to crawl around or do too much and was pretty clingy. To be expected, I’d say.
I went home and took a nap in the morning once Chris came back, but nothing really happened of note.
Chris stayed with Aidan Sunday night and I went home to get some sleep. Aidan had been getting a bit better through the day, so we hoped that he would be able to go home on Monday, but nothing was for sure.
When he woke up on Monday morning, Aidan was much better. The light was back in his eyes and (most importantly) he was hungry. Chris gave him some Frosted Flakes for breakfast and he wolfed them down.
All this time, Aidan had been quarantined in his room since they weren’t exactly sure what he had.
He was going crazy in the room now. All he wanted to do was walk around and get out the door. We asked the nurse if he could go walking around a bit since he hadn’t had a fever all day on Sunday, and she said it was OK. WOOHOO! He was SO happy to get out and go walking.
There’s a playroom on the ward so we headed there first. Here’s me in a goofy hat.
He had a blast. He was really, really happy and playing like normal. In fact, he was even starting to use his arm again like it wasn’t even injured. That was good and bad – good in the fact that it was obviously healing and bad in the fact that he wasn’t supposed to be using it yet.
We had a few walking trips around the ward and a few more sessions in the playroom, and he seemed perfectly fine.
Finally the Dr. came around and checked him over and gave us the all-clear to go home!
We have to continue the antibiotics for another 7 days, but he’s out and as well as can be expected.
