Not What We Thought

My daughter has been itchy for a while now.   It wasn’t just when she would go to the bathroom, it was most of the time she said.    She said there was no stinging or burning when she urinated, but there was a lot of itching.    She’s had this happen before and we had gotten some advice from multiple doctors on it, saying it was uncommon for children to have urinary tract infections, but they could have a mild yeast infection that we could treat at home.

For an adult female you go a more internal medication application route, but for children, applying yeast medication cream externally typically solves the problem.   So we did that, but it continued to itch.    She was urinating in her pants sometimes and was wetting the bed at night as well, which was unlike her.

But she wasn’t going to the bathroom with a significantly increased frequency, which would be another sign of a UTI.   She had no fever and aside from complaints that things itched, and some wet linens, she wasn’t complaining that much of bad symptoms.

We gave her bleach baths (a capful of bleach in a full tub) on prior recommendation from her dermatologist.   It sounds like a lot, to put bleach in the bath, but it’s less intense than the chlorine in a chlorinated pool we were told.   We also found out today from her pediatrician that children with MRSA infections have a bleach bath every night for multiple weeks and that it can make a significant difference.  

We were trying avenues.   We also put steroid cream on her because her eczema itches on other parts of her body and her brother gets it on his genitals, but that didn’t help either.

So today we took her into the doctor and, guess what, she has a UTI.   She’s probably had it for some time now but because we’d been told they were uncommon in young children and the fact that she wasn’t demonstrating typical signs, we had convinced ourselves it just couldn’t be one.

She’s on an antibiotic as of this evening and should hopefully feel much better soon.   I was talking to her doctor today, saying we felt like negligent parents for not bringing her in sooner but we weren’t the type to rush to the doctor at the first sign of something possibly being wrong—because with children, many times there’s nothing wrong.

This time we talked ourselves out of what it would now seem like were clear signs.   Next time we’ll know.   She’s been so good through it all and not much of a complainer I’ve been impressed.   I’ve had UTI’s before and I wouldn’t have handled it as easily as she has.

The Big Boy Tiny Girl Party Visitor Update:  We had a gathering at the house tonight.   The children were meant to be upstairs and out of sight when the guests arrived as it was shortly before bedtime.   They wanted to meet the guests though and couldn’t help coming down to say hello when they heard guests arriving.   I was at the forum at school prior to our trustees and search committee members coming to our house for the post-meeting gathering and left my husband to heat and put out the food and get the children ready for bed.   It turned out he had more to do than anticipated so he told them they could help by completely getting themselves ready for bed without him.   And they did and then went upstairs and were quiet.   Both he and I were impressed with their initiative and respectfulness tonight.   They got extra stamps in thanks.