TWO YEAR MOLARS

two year molars suck. they really do. these photos describe our day perfectly yesterday. it wasn’t until today that i pieced together it was her mouth that was giving her such a high fever and a crappy time. she slept like a rock in our bed for most of the afternoon (that NEVER happens for our little wiggle worm). i enjoyed the snuggles and the quiet day. it was nice to have a sleeping babe close –even on me at times! it certainly brought back memories of when she was a wee one that was more often than not attached to me.

how to soothe a two year old with molars wreaking havoc? here’s what we did:

• for the fever we alternated with children’s doses of acetaminophen and ibuprofen every three hours. she was incredibly uncomfortable, even to the point of having chills that left her restless and whiny. we found that acetaminophen helped this tremendously and quickly.
• i took her temperature every hour and kept track of the temp as well as the dosage of medicine. at one point her temp got up to 103.9, which was quite scary as she’s never had a high fever before and i didn’t yet realize it was her molars causing this. keeping track helped me keep a level head before i freaked out too much (having a brother who’s an ER doctor and responds to my frantic texts also helped and is a perk i am forever grateful for).
• we put clean sheets on the bed, did a quick clean of the bedroom, and sprayed the room with lavender to create a calming environment for her. the ceiling fan was turned on low so there was air movement but no chilly draft. pillows were piled up and all her lovies were close by (green blanket, teddy, pacifier).
• she got as much PBS, elmo, tinker bell, eloise movies as she wanted. also, unlimited access to her pacifier.
• we encouraged water and, when we realized it was her molars, gave ramona as much ice cream as she wanted. you know it’s bad when she starts to turn away ice cream!
• most importantly, plans were cancelled, we kept her home, and i made myself as close and available as possible. she certainly needed it and i wasn’t going to miss out on any snuggle time this anti-snuggler was going to give me.