Hand, Foot, and Mouth Disease...the Meanest Sickness

Oh, what a month.  Mastitis, followed by the ambiguous thrush, and now Hand, Foot, and Mouth Disease.  If you have no clue what that last one is, think of the flu and throw strep throat on top of the heap.  It's the nastiest of all the kiddie ailments out there, imho.

It begins with what seems like a low-grade fever, then turns into a rash on the...what else? Hands, feet, and mouth.  In my son's case, he got the rash on his bottom first, then we saw it on his wrists and feet.  When we checked his mouth, we saw why had had been rubbing his throat and cheeks.  The rash had very quickly turned into sores.

Having herpe-like sores on the inside of your mouth, all over your tongue and down your throat is pure Hell for adults.  Imagine how difficult it is for a toddler, just beginning to be verbal but not quite there yet.  He can't complain adequately enough with words, so he just screams and screams in pain, day and night.  It was horrifyingly bad.

Also, the things that comfort him...eating, drinking...are unavailable to him.  Not only that, those things now cause him a great deal of pain.  It's awful for him, and awful for a parent to witness.

I tried to keep calm while thinking of the baby, but just the thought of him catching this evil thing from his brother made me break out in a cold sweat.  We did as all the sites on HFMD recommended...washed everything down, cleaned like a psycho, washed hands until they cracked.  The boys were separated, not allowed to touch for at least two weeks.  Since HFMD is transmitted through saliva, and the kid was drooling like mad since he was in so much discomfort, we had to wash everything every night for two weeks.  That's every toy, blanket, plushy...anything he touched with his hands or mouth.  I must have done eight loads of laundry that first day we discovered the rash.  After that, one to two loads a day.  After dealing with thrush, which was basically the same cleaning regimine, I was beyond stressed, getting depressed, and feeling exhausted.

The poor little man was so miserable.  It wasn't the same boy.  He was cranky, unconsolably upset, and crying at the drop of a crayon.  I could not imagine living this way indefinitely.  Luckily for us, there was a light at the end of the tunnel.

He did get better, but it took about five days until the rash turned into sores which then popped and dried up.  Eventually, they disappeared, leaving no trace of the nastiest, meanest sickness I have ever seen.  Apparently, once you get the disease, you are immune to that particular strain.  Other strains?  Not so much.

This pre-school "catch everything every kid in the building has" thing will be giving us the gift of a powerfully strong immune system in the end, but until then, %#$!@ YOU, COMMUNICABLE DISEASES!