A great start to the day (NOT!)

Tyler has had a cold for the past 2 weeks or so. In fact, I'm pretty sure he also had laryngitis like me, because he lost his voice completely as well. But generally he hasn't been bothered by it. I've taken him to the doctor twice to get his ears checked, just in case. Both times they were perfect. So we've just been giving him Pamol & Tixilix for his cough. On Wed night he took ages to go to sleep (he was just talking) and then woke up at 10pm crying. We gave him Pamol but he didn't really go back to sleep until midnight. Most unusual for him. But the next day he was fine, and he slept well last night.

This morning I got him up and noticed there was "stuff" on his sheets. I figured he must have been sick during the night. He was coughing a lot around 2am, and sometimes coughing a lot can make you sick. Later on when I was feeding him his porridge, I noticed some gunk coming out of his right ear. It was like snot, but had a brown tinge. Blood, maybe? So I cleaned it out with a tissue and he didn't seem bothered by it. He didn't have a fever, and he was happy. But I'd never experienced ear discharge before so I rang the HealthLine. The nurse I spoke to said the only thing it could be was a burst eardrum, and that I needed to get to a doctor immediately. I explained several times that Tyler has grommets (tubes), and I asked if it could just be a discharge like a runny nose. But she insisted it could only be a burst ear drum. When I got off the phone I started crying, because I was so worried about it. I figured if his ear drum had burst, the grommet would have come out. I don't want to go through all of that again.

So it was off to the doctor (the 4th time I've been up there in 2 weeks). I was so relieved when Ruth said no, his ear drum had not burst, and both his grommets were still in place. She said (and I quote) "it could just be a discharge similar to a runny nose". OMG. Exactly what I had asked the nurse!! So his ear drum is perfectly fine, and there was no real emergency. Gee, talk about freaking me out for no reason!! Ruth said there could still be an infection, so she took a swab and is getting it checked at the Lab. Then she will know exactly what bacteria is in there and exactly which antibiotic to use. I'm worried about that though, because none of the other antibiotics worked for his other ear infections, which is why we got the grommets put in. I didn't expect him to get any more ear infections - I mean, that is the whole point of getting grommets. So that is a little upsetting, and I feel anxious about how easily this infection is going to clear up. Hopefully it won't be an infection and he won't need antibiotics. But I'm really just glad that it wasn't worse, and he is happy and sleeping now :-)