^#&#^#&#&#%^ (Doom on Winter Bugs..)

12:45 pm update. Rapid strep throat culture came back negative, which means that Salamander does NOT have an active strep infection (TG for that). He does, however, have a massive sinus infection. As I've pretty much exhausted every other tool in my toolkit, I had to make the decision to go the antibiotics route. So as of 5 minutes ago, Salamander is on Zithromax (and yes, I'll step up my anti gut bugs protocol). I'll continue to keep a close eye on things, as the pedi shared with me this morning that she's seeing more and more sinus infections that turn out to be caused by buggies that are resistant to Zithromax. So if Salamander is not responding in a day or two, we'll have to switch to something else....

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8:50 am update. Salamander napped until about 8.30 am. Fever dropped to 100.7 F. He wolved down a big breakfast (good sign), chattering non-stop (a feat in itself, with a sore throat). His morning urine was EXTREMELY SMELLY (so I'm 100% sure we have substantial detox in the mix too), I'll be sending it off for testing.

He is acting better than he did when he woke up. BUT he is now complaining of leg aches and a monster headache.

We have a doc appt for 10.15 am..

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7:35 am update. Salamander had a 101.4 F at waking. Throat is very very sore. He'll be home from school, and I'll be climbing in the phone to schedule a docs appointment as soon as the various offices open (9 am).

Potatey seems much better this morning.

It's interesting .. as a little guy, Potatey's immune system was much more impaired than Salamander's. Potatey at one point was considered immuno compromised (RSV at 3 months, followed by bronchiolitis, followed by a whole bunch of other illnesses, then we seemed to be going into asthma territory (removing ALL dairy and soy stopped that development) and then development of many more food allergies, and then we were going the Colitis route, then I got smart and got Potatey on an extensive biomed regimen as well). But now, 2 years later, he's the one that bounces back so much quicker from illnesses, and if he gets ill, his illnesses tend to be much milder than Salamanders.

Two big differences?
Caught on to Potatey's problems much earlier than I did with Salamander.
Potatey has had MUCH less vaccines than Salamander.

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Salamander developed a bad case of sore throat yesterday.. and last nite he had a 103.2 F fever. I've heard that strep throat is doing the rounds in the neighborhood and in schools.

If Salamander has a fever again this morning and if he's still complaining of a sore throat, I'll have to schlep him to one of his docs and get a course of antibiotics (I do NOT want to mess with strep throat - PANDAS anybody?).

And if he does need to go on antibiotics,? Well, then those nice CSA results I talked about in my previous post will go right 'down the tubes' (of course I'll double up on probiotics and increase Salamander's anti-yeast protocol.. but still...).

Potatey is under the weather too, and I continue to feel lousy as well (of course the fact that I have NO TIME to be sick myself and have to keep going is NOT helping).

Will keep you all posted...

[I am seriously considering taking the boys to a nice, warm and sunny place for a long weekend or something.. we need to get out of this cold and bug infested environment...]