Mummascribbles – Chicken pox take two – Mummascribbles

As I expected (although prayed for it not to), the pox has come for a second visit, this one attacking our gorgeous Oscar pants. As if he hasn’t been through enough with the persistent cough and cold that he has had since he was just a few weeks old, now at four months he is suffering with one of the nastier childhood diseases. 

I knew it was inevitable. With the most contagious part of the pox in the system for 2-3 weeks before it even appears in form, there is absolutely nothing I could have done to stop Oscar from catching it from his big brother. 

I noticed the first spots on Tuesday night, only I mistook them for a rash as he’d just done a bit of a toxic poo. It was then on Wednesday morning that we woke up and saw a couple of spots on his face, and one by his ear which had already started to blister. Throughout the course of the morning more and more started appearing on his head. This seems to be the most affected place which is typical because it’s the only place he can actually scratch. He then spent the next 24 hours with a temperature that I struggled to get below 38.5 – even when he was dosed up on Calpol.  

It initially didn’t look as ferocious as Zach’s, with the majority on his face and bum but now it’s Thursday and more and more are appearing over the rest of his body. He has a cluster of them around his bottom which have all blistered and they are appearing throughout his stomach, chest and neck. At the moment his legs are quite clear, other than the backs of his thighs but this also happened to Zach, his legs were the last part of his body to get them. So it seems that we may be looking at quite a bad case. There is a mixture of information online about chicken pox in young babies – some say they get it milder than older children but others say that when they catch it from a sibling, it is always quite a bad case because they have spent far longer around the infected person. 

So far he has done a lot of sleeping. On Wednesday night we had him sleeping on us, alternating every couple of hours so that we weren’t too uncomfortable for too long. And he has spent most of today sleeping on me, only waking once which gave me enough time to change his clothes, have a wee and then feed him again before he drifted off into another dream. 

He isn’t too itchy at the moment, mainly because he’s asleep. It’s so hard though, with Zach we could tell him not to itch and he didn’t. He would tell us when he started feeling itchy and we could distract him from it. Oscar is too young to understand. I’ve cut his nails and he is wearing mitts so he can only rub himself and I’m currently waiting for a call back from the GP to let us know if we are ok to use Poxclin on him as it doesn’t say you can’t but that you should simply check with the Dr before using it on a baby under six months. Oh, the doctors just called and said no and then said ask the pharmacist. Nice, helpful doctors haha!! The pharmacy said calomine lotion but it seems no bugger round here has it in stock! So we still have nothing other than oats for in the bath.

The next few days are going to be rough, with more spots appearing, the early ones scabbing over and him being uncomfortable. I’m hoping that he deals with it all by sleeping and that he doesn’t stop feeding. Zach got it all over the back of his throat and didn’t eat for about three days! I am expecting that the majority of my time is going to be spent on the sofa. I have the other half working from home today, meaning I actually get to eat, and tomorrow, the help of my Mum. 

Chicken pox really does suck and especially when you get two cases back to back. Watching both of my children go through it and with there being very little to be able to give them that actually works, leaves me feeling totally helpless. I cannot now wait for the day that both of them are completely spot free.