Our struggle with tonsillitis

She’s only 13 months old and already suffering from tonsillitis! She had a cold more than a week ago but was feeling and looking well last week on Wednesday when I took her swimming. Massive mum guilt here because the next day she looked and felt miserable. Very clingy, wanted to be held and cuddled all the awake times. It reminded me of the newborn days when I found it hard to put her down as she’d start crying soon after. 

I put it down to teething because she went off food and kept pulling her ears. That afternoon she was so exhausted at 5pm and looked like she was ready for bed. After a quick bath I put her down for the night at 6pm, which I’ve never done before! Afraid that she might be up super early we went to bed earlier to be ready for a long next day. She slept till 7am and then some more when we brought her to our bed. I rang the doctor and asked if we could be seen the same day because she just didn’t look right.

Later that day the doctor said she’s got tonsillitis – the last thing on my mind – and I kept repeating “I shouldn’t have taken her swimming”. She was prescribed penicillin and we were told to give alternating doses of ibuprofen and Calpol for pain.

It’s now day 4 since the diagnosis and we can see small improvements but at the same time we’ve regressed to:

• Baby food. We were told not to force any food on her if she absolutely refused everything and just making sure she drinks water regularly. I still have Ella’s Kitchen purees in the cupboard and she has been eating them since yesterday. It’s back to soft baby food but at least she’s eating something and slowly getting her energy back!
• Using dummies all the time. Daytime she has hardly ever wanted or needed one but now it soothes her and stops the crying. I hope she doesn’t get completely addicted to them now as we were planning to wean her from dummies soon(ish!) 😀

Due to being so weak she sleeps a lot more – over three hours during the day and over 12 hours in the night. I could get used to those “lie-ins” after 7am ;). For the first few nights I was worried that if she slept so much during the day she’d have trouble sleeping through but no problem at all. She’s just getting her strength back. The awake times are hard though because she cries a lot and wants to be carried around. What keeps her calm is a walk in the pram so between naps I’ve been going out to give her some fresh air.

Giving penicillin is such a struggle and it breaks my heart how we have to force it down her throat. It doesn’t taste very pleasant. When they’re this young they always get antibiotics, when they’re older their bodies might be able to fight the illness without them.

In the evenings I watch videos of her smiling and laughing, something she hasn’t done in days. I want my happy baby back! It’s her first serious illness. Sure, we’ve had a few colds and coughs and teething has made her cranky but this time is very different. Perhaps in a few days she’ll be back to her old self. Until then I celebrate with a glass of wine that she sleeps so well, at least there’s something positive in all this 🙂 .