Oh, the screaming...

Mam's been a little under the weather this week. And if I'd been paying more attention, I would have known what was going on tonight without having to agonize about it. Today went well. I sent her back to school. Her cough sounds awful, but she was happy. No fever. She was happy when I picked her up. But by dinner (a nice dinner out with Gram and Grandpa at an Afghan place), she was starting to drag. She kept saying she was tired. By the time we got home, she was crying and complaining about the canker sores that have been dogging her this week. Pretty soon, it was time for cake, but she had started screaming. She ate a few bites and then Daddy took her to bed.

Only she didn't stay asleep. Half an hour later, there was more hysterical screaming. Daddy dealt with that too, but after a time, I couldn't take it anymore. She was clearly inconsolable. I went in there to relieve him. She was screaming, thrashing around, pulling the sheets off the bed, kicking the walls and finally...grabbing her ear. Oh. Of course. That nasty cough is just the kind of thing that goes with an ear infection and this is classic ear infection behavior for Mam.

Smunch has had very few ear infections and they hurt and he complained. Mam gets one (just one) every year. You'd think someone was amputating her legs or that she's suddenly gone completely mad. It's truly freakish. And it's the kind of thing that makes you wonder how any pediatrician can deny a child antibiotics in a situation like this. She's clearly in pain and her parents are losing their minds. And yeah, I was a genetics major in college. I know all about antibiotic resistance. It's really, really hard to care about the health of humankind with a small child screaming at 4am and nothing you can do to help her.

Happy birthday to me...