At 3:45, it started to thunder. We left the pool and headed home. As soon as we arrived home, the storm rolled through our neighborhood. The boys were scheduled to attend a birthday party for one of our neighbors at 5:00. I was concerned that the party would be cancelled due to the storm. Fortunately, the storm was quick and the weather cleared up.
The boys and I headed to the birthday party a little after 5. It was down at the river and the birthday boy had a jumpy house. The party guests seemed to be enjoying the jumpy house, but SJ wasn't interested in jumping. (This is out of character for him.) Then, the mom told the kids to eat some pizza. Again, SJ wasn't interested. (This is definitely out of character for SJ.) He did eat one slice and then sat on a swing.
I could see that SJ was really feeling miserable. I told SJ and Bob that we would leave as soon as the birthday boy was done opening his presents. As soon as we left, I told SJ that I would give him some medicine when we got home.
He had a low grade fever, so I gave him a dose of Motrin. He put on his pajamas and rested for the remainder of the evening. The next day he was still moping around the house. He complained about his ear hurting and he had very little appetite.
On Monday morning, I called the pediatrician to see if I could get him seen. I was able to get him an appointment that morning. I had a feeling he had an ear infection or swimmer's ear. My suspicions were confirmed by the nurse practitioner.
She told us that he had swimmer's ear. "Oh no," said SJ. Then, she gave us the really bad news. "No swimming for 5 days," she told us. Immediately, SJ began to cry. A very quiet sobbing at first and then he built up to a much louder cry. "Why me?" he asked. I asked the nurse practitioner if we could put plugs in his ears and she said that was not an option. She said he could go if he didn't submerge his head, but if you know SJ you know that would not be an option.
She gave us the prescription and we went to get it filled. As we were walking through the store, SJ was still crying. He looked so sad. You would think the nurse told him he was losing a limb by the way he was acting. "I hate my life," he said. I told him the five days would go fast and we would find things to do. While we were waiting for the prescription to be filled, we did some shopping and tried to rent a video from the Redbox.
SJ was very indecisive, so we didn't rent a video. We picked up the prescription and went home. I had SJ lay on the couch so that I could give him his ear drops. He finally settled down and lay nicely on the couch for the mandatory 10 minutes.
It has been three days and he is managing nicely. Hopefully, the next two days will go as smoothly at least for SJ's sake.
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