Weekending it

This weekend was a saga.

Two weeks ago, Kip and Ivy got flu shots as they have every year of their lives. This time, however, Kip had an injection site reaction. This isn't entirely unusual for Kip since he tends to take after Dan with sensitive skin and has had shot reactions before. However, this was different because of how much his arm swelled. 

When the swelling was not helped with icing it, we waited two hours for a virtual urgent care visit after hours and that doctor suggested benadryl and to have him see a doctor the following day. Dan took Kip back to the pediatrician (two days post shot) and they felt like it might be a skin infection and prescribed antibiotics. Previously Kip had never taken amoxicillin because Dan has an allergy. But Ivy had just finished a round of amoxicillin for an ear infection and she did fine so we decided to try it on Kip. He enjoyed the taste, had no reaction, the arm swelling disappeared, and we went on our merry way. 

On Halloween while I was at Kip's school for his class party, 75% of the class was coughing. The principal sent an email home alerting parents that both flu and RSV were circulating in the school. Since there is no longer masking in the schools, we expected Kip would catch something. Sure enough, Tuesday afternoon he complained of feeling hot and tired. Wednesday morning he had a cough so we kept him home. His fever was mild and he was in relatively good spirits so we decided not to take him to the doctor and ride it out. Thursday morning Kip finished his round of the amoxicillin but I noticed he was starting to get a very small rash. You can hardly see it in the photo.

Dan took him to the pediatrician that afternoon where they suspected he was developing a rash which is a fairly common delayed side-effect of the amoxicillin (not an allergy). They suggested we give him benadryl for any discomfort and ran a viral panel in case the rash was related to his cold symptoms. By that evening, the rash was a little worse.

Friday morning, Kip's rash was 100% worse, covered his entire body, and it was quite alarming. 

The pediatrician had no available appointments that morning so I took a sick day, Dan worked from home, and we took Kip to urgent care. Other than the horrible looking rash, he didn't have a fever and only a cough/runny nose. The sweet doctor at the urgent care felt Kip was indeed having an allergic reaction to the amoxicillin and had pink eye as well. He prescribed steroids and eye drops. It took Dan and I literally all day to get our hands on the prescriptions because the urgent care initially sent them to the wrong pharmacy and then there was a whole insurance issue and then the eye drops script was delayed. Blah, blah, blah. We were not able to give Kip the steroids until just before bed. 

By Saturday morning, the rash was looking better and the pink eye was effectively gone. 

The weekend was relatively normal except Ivy, Mandy, and Dan all picked-up the initial cold. And Kip was ravenous and having wild mood swings from the steroids. Any time Kip would get worked up, the rash would flare. I was giving him oatmeal baths and rubbing calamine lotion on the rash and tending to him throughout the night. Everyone was in otherwise good spirits and we enjoyed the unseasonably warm weather.

This week, Kip is on fall break and off from school which is good since he is self conscious of the rash and I wouldn't send him to school. But as an added bonus to this weekend, our toilet in the powder room downstairs started leaking. A plumber was not available until Monday. So I worked from home on Monday (thank God for flexibility) to meet with the plumber and Mandy entertained both kids.

PLOT TWIST, I got a call Monday morning from the pediatrician's office that Kip's viral panel (from Thursday) came back positive for covid. Mandy and I immediately took rapid home tests and both came back positive. About ten minutes after that I got a call from the NJ Department of Health regarding Kip's positive test. Since both Ivy and Dan have symptoms we assume they are positive as well. 

So, after almost three years we finally got it. In some ways this is a relief. We've been doing our best to avoid it but always anxious it is around the corner and knowing it was only a matter of time. So far everyone is doing okay and Kip, as patient zero, seems to have it the worst but is handling it well. The full body rash like Kip's and pink eye are both symptoms of covid. I do not know why we didn't consider this nor did any of the doctors we saw. The amoxicillin issue threw everyone off the trail. 

Anyways, we are all home now. Mandy has 10 days off since the other family she is a nanny for has a newborn at home. I am able to work from home. Kip is off from school anyways. Dan's boss is not as flexible and expects him to come to the office despite having covid but hopefully Dan will be able to work around that. Ivy seems least affected with merely a blip of a cold.