The Dr Dilemma

I used to be one of those moms who called the dr at the first sign of a fever. After 4 kids, I've learned a few things and now try to wait as long as possible before calling. Friday night, we were eating dinner and Owen started crying, saying his tongue hurt. We told him to stick it out and could see a little bump at the end of it. Oh, the poor thing had a canker sore. I tried to get him to drink milk and eat rice - anything bland that wouldn't irritate it. Of course, the pineapple was what looked good to him but certainly did not feel good.

Saturday was more of the same, except lots more crying. We were starting to lose our patience. Yes, we understood it hurt but what can we do? Saturday night, I had him stick out his tongue again and saw several canker sores on the underside. Yikes, that looks bad. Maybe this is more serious than I thought. I looked it up on-line and found out that gargling with hydrogen peroxide and water is a good cure but since toddlers don't necessarily have the correct gargling skills, you can also dab it on with a q-tip, followed by some milk of magnesia. We did that on Sunday and it seemed to be working.

Then this morning, I looked again and saw a bunch more on the sides of his tongue towards the back. This was kind of freaking me out so I called the dr's office. Apparently, sores on the tongue could mean lots of different things so I took him in. They ran a strep test, which came back negative. They took his fever and he did have a low fever. The dr explained that he had a viral infection similar to hand, foot and mouth disease but instead of a rash, he had sores on his tongue - which had some fancy name that I didn't quite catch. He told me it would probably last for a few days, it might get worse, and I could give him benadryl mixed with maalox for the mouth pain if necessary.

Tonight, I looked at his tongue before he went to bed. It looks like it's completely cleared up. I am not joking. I just have this feeling that if I wouldn't have gone to the dr's today, it'd be worse tonight. I know that's completely illogical but isn't that the way it seems to go? And I know it's good we got it checked out and it was reassuring to hear that it's just a virus but I keep thinking, "If I would have waited one more day, there would have been no reason to call." Maybe by the time they're all grown, I'll know when to wait and when to call.