June 21, 2012

Baby Jeff's Ears


Our sweet little Baby Jeff is nearly perfect.  He is calm, patient, his cry is perfectly volumed, his face is squeezable but not too fat, and he seems to love us.  There is, however one thing about Baby Jeff that I would change, given the chance.  His ears.  His ears have been T-R-O-U-B-L-E since he was 4 weeks old.  He was pretty hysterical and fevering and he would not lie down EVER.  I took him to the doctor and said "I think he might have an ear infection." The nurse laughed and said babies this young don't get ear infections...Then to her shock and horror, I was right.  The doctor told me she had never, and she meant NEVER, seen a baby this little with an ear infection.  I told her that I had, her name is Marilyn.  Every 3 weeks since then, we have been back to the doctor (whom we all know by name, and we are also known by name).  We have seen every doctor in the clinic, every nurse practitioner, and probably close to every nurse.  We did this for about 4 months, going to the doctor every 3 weeks, plus well visits.  Finally they gave me the green light for putting tubes in his ears.  With Marilyn they made us wait until she was almost a year, but this time I was sure to push it a little harder.  His ears were worse than Marilyns had ever been and as much as I love the doctor's office and loading everyone in the car and visiting the night clinic all the time, I was ready for tubes. 


Our check in time at the hospital was 6:00 am.  We were welcomed by smiling nurses and were well taken care of.  I felt a little weird putting a gown on Jeff, he is quite obviously too small for a hospital gown (are you ever big enough for one?) He was delightfully happy and smiling the whole time.  It sorta made me feel like I had dreamt up these ear infections and was putting my baby through surgery for no reason, but the doctor checked his ears right before they rolled him away and said it was a good thing we were there, he had another ear infection on the horizon.  WHEW!!

see that cute dimple? hmmm...I love him!

We made it through! I couldn't believe that from the moment they took him away to the moment they handed him to me again it had only been 31 minutes, it seemed longer.  He was hysterical for a few hours after surgery but once he fell asleep he stayed that way for 3 hours.  (the first and last 3 hour nap of his little life). 



Marilyn was so patient all day long, she played so well by herself so I could tend to our Buddy.  She is such a good big sister. 

If only she didn't get an ear infection 3 days later and we had to start this whole thing over again with her literally 3 weeks later...

1 comment:

Brittney said...

that is CRAZY your kids are so prone to ear infections. I'm glad they can help with tubes.