Wednesday, August 3, 2011

In Which I am Very Stealthy

Matt and Nolan at Library Story Hour.

This blasted ear infection is driving me crazy. It isn't exactly clearing up, and the ear drops are such torture for Nolan. I discovered a way to get the ear drops into him without any upset, though. I wait until he's deeply asleep, then I sneak into his room, put the drops near his ear canal, tip his pillow, and then hold my breath for 2 minutes. He fusses for just a second, then goes right back to sleep.

I have excellent ninja skills.

This tactic does not work in the early morning, however. When I try giving him ear drops at 6:00am, I end up with a howling, angry boy. Apparently, my ninja skills do not work during daytime hours.

Anyhow, his ear is still leaking some fluid and looks kind of nasty through the otoscope. I'm not a doctor, but I'm pretty sure "oozing" means "still infected." I'll give it until Friday (one week), then I'm either calling the pediatrician back or calling the ENT's office. I don't want a repeat of last year's 8 week long epic ear infection.

Ugh.

9 comments:

TheSweetOne said...

double ugh. fingers crossed for you.
go ninja mom go!

Herding Grasshoppers said...

You are an awesome Ninja Mom! Praying this ear infection is OVER.

Julie

rouchi6 said...

Ugh, this sounds terrible! I really hope he does get better before Friday.All the best Nolan.

Joe said...

Being someone who suffered though many ear infections growing up I know how bad they are. One trick I learned is get a heating pad set on the lowest setting. Wrap a bathroom towel around it and lie down on the side of the ear infection and place the wrapped heating pad on the ear. It worked wonders for me.

Joey Lynn Resciniti said...

I once had to sit on Julia to jam her aids in when she was recovering from swimmer's ear. Those moments aren't fun! Hope the Ninja treatments work for Nolan.

xraevision said...

I thought of you and Nolan yesterday when we had X's ears flushed out by an ENT nurse. I saw the papoose on the wall, but we had no drama, no trauma, only a few tears. Different hospital, different technique, and we didn't even have an appointment!

Before the ear wax removal, I too have been stealthily dropping mineral oil into X's ears when he is asleep. Otherwise, it's impossible! I can totally relate to this post.

Hope Nolan gets better soon.

leah said...

He has a rattly chest this morning and a very hoarse voice - not sure if it is reflux or a bug! The ear is still gooey, too - you don't notice it until you pull his earmold out. I really hate this stuff!

Bill and Shelly said...

I may have mentioned this before, but has your ENT checked for a cholesteatoma in his ear? The junk coming out of his ear sound like what my brother and what Allison had. Allison's would fill with junk and then break open, she never really complained of any pain, but her earmold from her CI would have all this goop in it. It was only when she had her tonsils out that her ENT did some exploring and found that she had one in each ear. It did not effect her hearing because she is deaf, but it can effect hearing in others. It effected my brother, he was slowly losing his hearing, after he had is surgery his hearing went back to normal. I am just wondering when you say Nolan has fluxuation in his hearing. I hope you can get the ear infection cleared up.

leah said...

Cholesteatoma scares the bejeebers out of me - I hope it is just another random long-term infection rather than a cholesteatoma. With Nolan's pre-existing hearing loss, it would wipe out most of the rest of his hearing to remove the middle ear bones (if he had a maximal 60dB conductive loss on top of his 40-55dB sensorineural one, he would be profoundly deaf, at least in that ear). I do know that after the 8 week long infection last year, they had to replace his PE tubes and everything looked fine then (other than infection). So hopefully it is just another resistant infection. Honestly, I just wish these things would go away!

Oddly enough, it is the sensorineural part of his loss that fluctuates (he has no air-bone gap in the high frequencies). They have finally stopped their fluctuation and have remained depressed at 55dB there. The lower tones have been fairly consistent (or just dropping) and are a mixed 65dB (mostly sensorineural).