Ticks and Tylenol

The Tick

Here’s the scene: I’m at work in the big blue truck with about 10 more deliveries to go before my weekend starts It was hot. I am tired.

Then I get this text message from Beautiful Wife:

Crap. Double Crap. Triple Crap.

A few more text messages and a call to the Pediatrician and we can breathe. The ticks were not on her long enough for her to be hurt. Today’s tick lesson for you: they have to be on for 36 hours to be a problem. That’s good to know!

Apparently the situation was not good. There was one found on the back of her leg when she was on the potty and I am told that all the um, “business” stopped and the screaming and tears began.

I am glad I missed that. By the time I got old blue parked and I was home you would not guess that there was the tick crisis of the summer of 2023

I am told that the ticks happened because the wee one and her two little friends were playing in the playground and decided that laying down in the grass was a good idea. It turns out it wasn’t because the park is on the edge of a small creek with some wildlife like birds, frogs and turtles and also  - ticks!

The new rule is you can play - but no laying down. Keep it moving.  No more tick collecting please

The Fever

The following Friday  I’m once again at work in the big blue truck with about 10 more houses to go before my weekend starts. It was hot. I am tired.

Beautiful Wife sends this text:

The answer was 103.5. Not good folks. not good.

Of course, the child was miserable and ornery and would not take the Tylenol. The flavor we had of course was the wrong flavor. She wanted Grape flavor.

A half hour later we had Grape flavor. Thank you Instacart.

The next trick was trying to get the child to take the Tylenol. No way was the medicine going in the child. Until mommy started to put her shoes on and told her that they were going to the doctors office for medicine and with a needle.

Tylenol was instantly taken by child. Idle threats work some of the time.

We got the fever down and we had her wrapped in ice packs in bed to get her to cool down. The Tylenol worked a little too well because due to a 2 am dose the child was awake and full of activity. She wanted breakfast. It was 6 am. I am still tired from all this.

She wasn’t cured, but was on peak Tylenol and I paid for it at the first light But, I would rather have her feel good. I can sleep when she’s in college.

The bummer with the fever was it’s timing because Friday was her last day at daycare! Pre-K here we come! We were celebrating. We got all dressed up in a “pretty dress” for the big day:

and then as the last souvenir from daycare we get just one last bout of sickness as she heads out the door on her way to “big girl school”. It’s a shame. We had more than  our share of sick from her friends at daycare over the years we had hoped she was immune to to all the cooties by now but aparrently not.

The odd part is that despite she had a fever for most of the weekend she was fairly pleasant to be around. I had feared a long weekend with a miserable kid but it didn’t materialize as we had feared.

We still don’t know the cause of the fever and with a bit of Tylenol in her she’s fine so we are hoping that time, like a lot of other things - will cure this fever too.

Also, new rule: No more laying on the grass at the park. It’s a dangerous world out there.