Week 41

2nd -  8th October 2005

Emma's Entry

Woohoo - Look at him now!

If someone had told me beforehand about the events that would happen this week I probably would have laughed. I had just completed my first week back at work after 10 months off and when I go into Evan on Sunday morning this week, his eye is oozing with puss. I tried to keep the eye clean but within minutes of wiping it, the infectious gunk had returned. I was sure Evan needed to see a Doctor so I sent a mobile text to warn my boss that I wouldn't be in on Monday. Little did I realise that this would actually end up being the whole week! I'd only just been back at work for 1 week, that I would then need to have a whole week off unpaid! All this happened right after we'd just been given a motivational speech about doing everything we possibly could to meet our tight deadline. The thing is... My family will always come first...

My fears were confirmed when I managed to see a nurse on Monday, Evan had an eye infection. She prescribed some eye drops that needed to be put into the affected eye(s) 4 times a day!?!? I have struggled giving medicine to cats before and I expect putting eye drops in a baby's eye is just as difficult. I managed a couple of times to apply the drops on my own whilst Caroline was at University but it was definitely much easier and less stressful for Evan when we were both on hand for this particular procedure. He cried and wriggled his head from side to side kicking his legs into the abdomen of the person trying to administer the drops. He clamped his eyes shut that we had to prise his eyelid open, it was traumatic for us all. He's a clever boy though, he knew when we were going to do it and he would start stiffening out his limbs in protest. By the afternoon of the first day the infection had spread to his other eye.

This was such bad timing as that evening we had to drive to London to visit Evan's Grandma in hospital. My mum had an operation over the weekend that had complications. It felt like deja-vu all over again as everything that happened to Caroline all those months ago was now happening to my mum. She ended up having 2 operations because the Doctor left a hole in her in the first one and she also had to spend a night in intensive care because she was having trouble breathing.

I used a route planner on the internet to try and work out my route to the hospital and evening though we were travelling all the way across London, it should only take about an hour, maybe an hour and a half at the most. How wrong could I be? 3 hours later we arrived in East London, 15 minutes after visiting time had ended only to find out that Evan wasn't actually allowed in the hospital. We got lost because it was so difficult to follow the instructions and it was too dark to read the road signs. I think we circled Tower Hamlets a couple of times and actually crossed The River Thames 8 times in our attempts to find this hospital. Luckily the staff in the hospital knew we were running late and allowed us to see my mum and my aunt who happened to be staying with her met us in reception to baby sit Evan who's eyes at this point were looking awful. After everything I went through with Caroline, you would have thought I would be used to seeing people in hospital but unfortunately my squeamish nature came out in force. It was awful seeing my mum vulnerable and weak and I found it very hard to keep myself composed without feeling queasy. I am thankful that Caroline was there to be my strength.

Evan enjoying his new found freedom at his new activity table.

By Thursday Evan's eyes were looking worse and this time when I contacted the Doctor's Surgery I requested that I saw a proper Doctor. He took a swab for testing and informed us that the infection that Evan had was resistant to the eye drops as they should have cleared it up within 48 hours. Instead he prescribed some oral antibiotics - what a relief, this would be so much easier to administer. The antibiotics were powder based but luckily it tasted like oranges so Evan didn't mind taking this 3 times a day. These new antibiotics did the trick as his eye was looking much better by Friday morning already. This was good news for me as Evan needed to be clear of the infection for 24 hours before the nursery would let him return so Monday was looking like a good date.

Our new stair gate arrived this week whilst I was off work looking after Evan. We had to buy a stair gate that would actually be fitted to the wall and not one of these easy to fit (no screws) gate because our stair gate was going at the top of the stairs. I decided to go for a gate that opened like a door and not one that had a middle section that was the door. My reason for this is that I didn't want a bar going across the bottom that I could trip over and I also wanted a bigger opening so that carrying things up and down would be easier with more space. We don't really do DIY but I decided to have a go at fitting this contraption. I swear it was the killer stair gate from hell! It took me an hour just to assemble the door portion and then I managed to screw the hinges into the banister upright in the wrong position. In the end I asked my neighbour across the road to help. He's built his own house extension and they are expecting a baby any day soon so I knew he would know what to do. He had to redo everything that I had already done and even then the stair gate didn't want to cooperate. Lots of holes later and we finally have a secure stair gate keeping Evan protected whilst he is upstairs with us.

Mummy's first picture that Evan made at nursery (pasta shapes glued to paper)

Evan had a new toy delivered this week to aide him with his standing. We bought him an activity table from vtech. It has lots of things for him to interact with, but my only issue with it is that it is too light. Evan has no trouble pushing it around and at the moment he is going through a rough phase where he likes to bash and throw his toys around. So many times he keeps trying to tip it over or whack it into the patio door windows! He does play with it properly when I sit and interact with him, I find him like that with most of his toys but I still think it is worth it. He does still attempt to stand up using tables and chairs but occasionally he will choose the safer option of the activity table. I know all babies get bumps and bruises but it is awful when it happens. Evan was playing with a coaster next to Caroline and I as we were sitting on the floor whilst he stood by the table. He dropped the coaster and immediately dropped to the floor to get it - I tire to stop him. The only problem is that he didn't move away from the table and he face butted the top of the table before I could stop him. The cries! The red mark showed immediately and we managed to get a cold flannel on his face fairly quickly - though I think that in itself was annoying Evan. My poor little bruiser boy :(, this won't be the last time and I am just going to have to make sure that mummy is there with open arms when he bumps himself next time whilst playing.

Emma