I meant to get to this post done a couple weeks ago while the whole deal was fresh in my mind but here goes anyway. My son who is now 7 would get an ear infection about once a year, (none in his first year of life though) Usually when he would get infections it would be him running 102.9 temp and one cough would make him lose everything in his stomach. Once he puked 7 times in a morning and also at the dr's. The ear infection before this last one I'm sure burst his ear drum because it drained for days once we got him on antibiotics and he was up crying in the night from the severe pain even while on ibuprofen (more often than he should have been). And he has a high pain tolerance, as in, not even two and wouldn't cry for his flu shots. Yes yes flu shots, this may have been our last year from what I've been reading lately. Back to the point, a friend told me a while ago about Wally's Ear Oil, it's all natural with anti bacterial essential oils, you could use it even if your ears are just itching. On his ear drum bursting infection, I got the oil in the mail too late in the game. Let me back track a moment, LAST winter my son didn't have any ear infections, he seemed to grow out of them!! But then last spring he had another, and another this fall, and ANOTHER a few weeks ago. Why? Snot sniffing, constant packing of snot from a cold back in his ears of his own doing. We have had LOTS of talks with him about this.
Anyway, another cold, most of us got, but he ends up with an earache. I believe it was Tuesday late afternoon. So we do some drops... no fever... yet. The next day, low grade fever maybe 99.5 and ear pain, we keep up on the drops every 3 hours or so. I also heat up a rice pack for him and make him rest on the couch, one thing I did differently this time around was refuse to let him play the wii, so he wasn't tempted to sniff, and use up energy, and also didn't give him tylenol unless he couldn't find relief with the drops and the heatpack and PBS. :) I wanted to let the fever burn the infection as much as we could and let the fever make him feel tired enough to lay low. His fever got higher as the day went ( I did give him tylenol once inthe afternoon to sleep, and then he woke me in the night hurting so I gave him some then) I really thought we were headed for the dr. I kept thinking I need to call the dr, antibiotics are the only way to kick this, but I thought, just wait another day. Tuesday night and Wednesday night were rougher nights, the tylenol and ricepacks seemed to help him not be completely miserable and sleep and we kept on the ear drops but I would do every four hours or more if he was sleeping and I did BOTH EARS because I think the infection can shift as it did in his ear draining infection. We got up with him at 1a.m. on Thursday morning, he was hurting and I took his temp, 101.6. I thought that's it, calling the dr in the morning. Well, he gets up Thursday morning and says his ear feels a lot better! I say, reallly?? let me touch your ear, usually he won't let me NEAR it. He let me pull on it gentley. I took his temp, 97.9. Thank you Lord. And he continued to improve the fever did not return, not even a little. I did do the drops a couple times a day for day or two, then just did them at night for a couple more days. I have never had this happen so I was so encouraged to not have to spend the money, and put the antibiotics in his body!
Recap what I learned from this:
1. Wally's Ear drops, use them at the first ache in the ear, or if your child is prone to ear infections use them during the initial cold to prevent infection. I used 2-3 drops every 3 hours, but don't wake the kid to the do it, I did not make him stay long with it sitting in there, about a minute then let it drain out. Do BOTH ears.
2.Elevate the head with pillows so the ears can drain.
3. Use a humidifier to thin mucus.
4. Hydrate with water, and eat healthy, he ate lots of fruit and we avoided crap foods and unnatural sugars. Eat organic yogurt or something probioticy. ;)
5. Rice packs ( so easy to make yourself, sew a rectangle, dump a bag of long grain rice in, sew it up, heat in the microwave for a few minutes) use as often as needed.
6. Rest and Sleep, make your child take a break from all tv and see if he falls asleep in his bed. Sleep is critical to healing.
7.Tyelnol only when pain is too much or it's keeping patient from sleep. Otherwise, let that fever burn.
8. Know when to fold, if the pain becomes severe, fever gets high, ear is draining or puking is involved time to call the dr.
9. Do not put anything in a draining ear
10. Go with your Mommy gut, don't have a hippie spaz freakout if your kid needs antibiotics, we do our best and that's all we can do right? Right.
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