Thursday, September 21, 2006

Virus 1 Laetitia 0

My poor baby girl is sick!!! Wahhhhhh (that the mummy crying, not Laetitia.) It seems like she probably caught a stomach virus at her garderie (daycare). It started on Saturday when she vomitted her carrot/pumpkin dinner. I had thought initially that it was because Etienne was a little to eager to have her eat her food. I know I know, I was being presumtuous. And on Sunday morning when I went to get her for her first feed around 6am, she was crying loudly which was very unusual. We soon found out that she was running a fever (38 degrees) and had had also made a big poo so I gave her some Doliprane (liquid paracetamol) and Etienne changed her. We decided not to take her to church since she is unwell and I stayed home to care for her. Throughout the day, the fever came and went but she also having diarrhoea. Normally she clears her bowels once every two days and on Sunday alone, she had 5 bowel movements. However, aside from that, she seemed fine. Monday came and in the evening she vomitted her dinner again and this time, I thought Etienne was playing a little too rough with her before I nursed her. Come to think of it, it looks like Etienne gets all the blame most of the time from me. I'm horrible. :-( And then Tuesday, everything was fine, no vomitting no diarrhoea. I thought she was finally okay, it was just a passing stomach discomfort she had. And then today...

She first vomitted her breakfast in the morning but I managed to clean her up and nursed her again. And then in the afternoon, she had a HUGE vomit. It looked like she first vomitted her lunch and then much more fluid came out and she cried from the discomfort and looked like she was going to vomit more. By then I was getting much more concerned. I called Etienne and we decided to try to get her to her doctor. I called the doctor's office and the receptionist could not get through to her. In Paris, most doctors are by appointment only and even if you want to walk in to see them, you have to call beforehand. Finally at about 3pm, the receptionist called and said the doctor asked us to go over as soon as possible.

We saw the paediatrician and she said Lae Lae has gastrointestinal virus (or common called stomach flu). She prescribed a whole lot of medication and replacement milk and told us not to go to the garderie for the rest of the week. The toughie for me is when she told me not to feed Lae Lae anymore but to only give her oral rehydration solutions (water mixed with powder form of minerials and elements replacement for lost of fluid) for the rest of the day. It was so hard as I could see that Laetitia was hungry and rooting for food but I could only give her the solution. When she cries and I carry her, she could smell my milk and keeps searching for the breast and when she realises she not getting any, she cries more! Finally I gave up and called Etienne and asked him to try to be home as early as he can. Anyways, it was already 6pm and he normally leaves work at 6.30pm.

Once Etienne got home, we gave our darling a quick bath and then Etienne took over calming her and putting her to sleep. I left the house for a walk to destress. When I came home, he was still trying to soothe her to sleep. He did that for 1h30mins! At the end of the night he was showing me the muscles he got from carrying her for all that time. But, she's finally asleep. Thank God.

Lord God, please restore my baby girl. May Your healing hands be on her and remove all her discomfort. Have her be the chippy joyful little bundle again. Thank you. AMEN.

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