Periorbital Cellulitis

Wednesday morning Nichole woke up with a puffy eye. I was not too worried about it and gave her some benadryl. By nap time, I felt her eye had not improved and she seemed crabby. I woke her up from her nap and to my surprise her eye seemed much worse.

Thankfully, we have an incredible optometrist that was willing to look at Nichole's eye. He made sure she was tracking well, put some dye in her eyes and checked with a black light to make sure there were no scratches that would make her actual eye get infected.

He advised fro us to take Nichole to the doctor the following day and that she would need some stronger antibiotics to get to that infection before it became something more serious.

The thing is, Nichole has been taking antibiotics for the last 2 weeks. Amoxicilin and Zithromax did not help, and because Nichole has Down syndrome, her inside "tubing" is a lot smaller, so little colds can become big colds. A bad sinus infection, can get nasty. And for Nichole in particular, any cold means it will affect her eyes to some degree. Just never like this before, and this also did not seem to be her worse cold or sinus infection she has had. Really, we thought this wasn't too bad.

Thursday morning we went to see the doctor and sure enough, Nichole was on her third round of antibiotics, some pretty powerful stuff.

But then I woke her up from her nap and I could see blood in her eye. I rushed to the doctor with Nichole. Our doctor called an ophtalmologist who said to go to the ER where he would check Nichole. This doctor met us as the ER desk. As soon as he saw Nichole's eye and took a look at her he confirmed our fears. She has Periorbital Cellulitis, and in the hospital we will stay for a couple of days.

She is getting antibiotics via IV for 48 hours.

The good news is, we got her in right in time before it got worse, and they have drawn blood to see that the infection is not spreading and this seems to be working. She is being such a trooper. Hates the IV but has resigned herself and is letting it be. She is loving watching her shows and playing with the iPad all day.

On the home front, Ellie woke up with a fever. So we have a sick girl at home and one sick girl in the hospital. This same virus has been punching our family for a while. Last weekend I was sick and I had a fever for about 3 days. We have not been able to make it to church for 3 weeks! I don't see us coming this week either (Sunday is my 30th birthday!) I know this year has been hard for a lot of families, lots of people sick. So I have to say that I agree with the many who say, "I cannot wait for Spring!" We will forget that spring also means allergies, because for now, Spring means fresh air and less sharing of germs!