Your baby's First High Fever....

Your baby's first high fever might not be as traumatic for your little one as for you as a parent. I mean, definitely the baby is the sufferer and he/she will have to bear the brunt of a high fever but the trauma with which the parent goes through is at a different level altogether.

Nevan had his share of fevers post vaccinations, during common cold, etc but he had his first high fever on Friday (4th July); I don't know if you
all will believe into it or not but when I got ready for work on Friday morning there was something stopping me to go to work that day. I just didn't feel like leaving my room, so I pinged my boss I'll be a little late and made Nevan ready, fed him and then left. May be the motherly instinct was knocking me but with a job, it mostly gets curbed instantly!!!

I called his babysitter thrice between 10am-12noon and she was also wondering if I have gone nuts. And then I got a call from her around 3pm saying that Nevan has 101 fever. Thankfully my in-laws were around and they gave him the initial Crocin-drops dose. I moved out of office as soon as possible just to reach home to a cranky baby with a hot body and a crying face. The look on his face made my heart sink but now that I am a mother I had to be strong. My hubby was busy that evening and the whole of Saturday (having his 24 hours emergency duty, he is a doc at a govt. hospital) so I knew I will have to handle it all....

So I took him to the doctor immediately, who said it most probably is an airborne viral/flu and nothing serious to worry as he was not showing any other symptom. By the time I got home and fed him and checked his fever, I panicked by seeing my digital thermometer just not stopping....finally it stopped at 102.4......like 102.4 fever, are you serious, he is not even 9 months and how is he gonna cope up with it???

Anyways, again I got myself together and took off his clothes and just gave him a quick shower. That helped in cooling him down a degree or two and then I changed him and started sponging him. The temperature didn't go down, even after couple of hours and his body has started aching with pains. We gave another dose of crocin on a four hourly interval but the temp didn't go below 100. We then called his pedia who prescribed 'Meftal - drops' (they are sepearte from Meftal-Spas drops for kids) as an add on as the temp was too high to be controlled only by Crocin-drops. The whole night passed by sponging and giving him a body massage and finally on Sat morning at 6am the the temp finally went down.

But Sat again was tough as the temp was coming every 5 hourly and Nevan had zero energy and was lethargic to even sit. I made him sit in between to give him water and as I turned to get the bottle he fell on his side on the bed....it was so painful to see that my lil pumpkin couldn't even manage sitting by himself.

The fever went down by Sunday morning but Sunday morning he developed loosies coz of medicine. Ufff..... then started home remedies for that and till evening they got under control.

All in all, it was a very tough weekend and I thank God that it just passed!!!

Three things I learnt during this fever trauma were:

• The armpit temperature measuring thermometers are better than all others devices including the forehead & ear thermometer.
  
• Sponging is an instant help in case baby has high fever.
• Make your child drink as much liquids as possible to flush out the effects of medicines.

(Pictures Courtesy: Google Images/Corbis)