All About JP

Ear Infections, Tubes and the Flu...that pretty much sums up life around here lately!

I'm happy to report that life is getting back to normal and everyone seems to be recovering.  Poor JP, he has definitely taken the brunt of the illness lately.  For the past couple of months, we have noticed that he has not been hearing well.  It's so hard because at first you think its just typical little boy syndrome of not listening and get upset with him telling him to pay attention & listen.  We really started to notice it when we were in Florida and made an appointment to see the ENT when we got back.  Of course, we did wonder first if he just got too much ocean water in his ears!

JP had tubes in his ears about 18 months ago, so its not the first time we've dealt with this.  The doctor looked in his ears and sure enough, they were filled with fluid and he said they looked pretty bad.  The tubes had fallen into his ear canal, so they were not working anymore.  He felt that JP would probably be needing a second set of tubes, but wanted to try antibiotics together with a steroid to see if that would help first.

As he was on the meds, he also came down with the flu the following Saturday.  He had a 103.6 fever and pretty much drifted in and out of sleep all day.  As Sunday and Monday came, he started to feel better, but it did really drain him.  We are assuming it may have been H1N1 because so many other kids in his class had it with similar symptoms.  He went back to school on Tuesday, but then on Thursday, we received a call saying that he had a rash all over his face and body and that he looked "really bad".  We packed up everyone and headed to the pediatrician.  The babies had a mild dose of the flu too, but were just plain grumpy, so I just asked if they could take a look at everyone since we were coming in anyway.  It was funny, the doctor walked in and laughed an told us in his 25 years in practice, he had never had 4 kids in the same family come in at once!

JP had an allergic reaction to the penicillin and that's why he broke out in a rash.  He also said his ears were still very bad with some scarring also.  He called our ENT's office to get our next appointment moved up to ASAP.  The babies also were diagnosed with ear infections.  Some had it worse than others, but he put them all on antibiotic just to be safe.  On Friday, JP got this crazy rash above his lip.  We emailed Aunt Gretchen and she said it looks like broken capillaries.  We still don't know how he got it, but luckily it is starting to fade.

Today we headed back to the ENT.  JP's second tube surgery is set for December 11th.  In all likelihood, his adenoids will also come out.  He said he wouldn't know until he gets in there to look, but if they are at all enlarged it will come out.  Hopefully then our big guy will be back to hearing just fine.  The doctor feels the scarring shouldn't affect his hearing.  I know that not hearing has affected him at school and socially also, so I will be so happy when this is over.  I scheduled it when Grandmom & Pop come out because we have to be at the hospital at 6:15 am.  Hopefully JP will recover quickly again so he will have lots of fun playtime with them!

On a much lighter note, there has been a lot of talk and excitement about Santa coming this year.  When the Target Toy Book came out, I asked JP to look for things he may like to have.  He was looking at it and said "Mom, look coupons!"  He knows that I am a Big coupon shopper.  He cut 2 of them out and sent them in an envelope to the North Pole for Santa with notes attached saying, "I want this please".

Yet another example of how my frugality doesn't fall far from the tree- This weekend JP had been playing a golf game on our "pretend Wii".  He was talking about how good he was at golfing and we were all discussing how he might need some clubs.  Joe & I told him that may be a good thing to ask for his birthday.  He said no maybe for Christmas from Santa, that way it would be "Free"! ;)

The Trio turned 18 months yesterday!  It's so hard to believe.  We go Wednesday for their 18 month check up, so I will try to give all the latest updates after that.

Our poor guy with the flu on Saturday:


The mystery rash:


His note to Santa with coupons for an Air Hogs R/C helicopter & Nerf Gun.  I have it on good authority Santa will be bringing him one of these things!