My Poor Little Archer...

My former boss used to say his oldest son was his "sick kid". It seemed like he was always sick or hurt or something. Archer is that boy for me.

When I was pregnant with Archer, they thought he might have Trisome 18. Basically he might not live to be born, if he was born, he would be severely handicapped and would probably die before he reached a year. I prayed about it and I was comforted and felt everything was fine. They wanted me to do a test to "prove" that he was okay but there was a chance of miscarriage. Since I felt he was fine and felt I would carry him as long as I could if he had it or not, I didn't get the test. He continued to grow but showed some signs that something else might be wrong with him. I think I kept my cool thru the pregnancy. My midwife even said that I was taking all the potentially bad news really well. But I felt that he was fine... Millions of tests and lots of money later, Archer was born completely healthy.

18-months was a hard age with Archer. When he was 18 month old, he fell and hit his head on a screw. He needed stitches, but he was fine.

The next day, Archer was scheduled for surgery on his leg. He had a large birthmark on his leg that they said could be or could turn cancerous so it was best to remove it while he was young. We took him to a great plastic surgeon at Primary Children's who removed his birthmark. (I tell you, as a parent, the scariest thing I have seen is my little baby boy hooked up to machines making sure he is breathing!) There were no complications with the removal and the scar healed really well. You can still see it, but it seems so small compared to the size his birthmark was!

And two weeks after the surgery, Archer had an allergic reaction to a Fruit Pizza I had made. Back into the emergency room! The nurses there had asked "were you in here just a few weeks ago?" and we just laughed. Yep. Story of our lives! Known by our first names at the Emergency Room! :) We think that Archer is allergic to the Kiwi that was on the Fruit Pizza.

Think that's the end? Oh no!

Last summer / fall, Archer got salmonella poisoning from who knows where. Poor little guy was sick and pooping blood for about 2 weeks. He's better now, but that's a pretty scary thing too!

And now?????

Our Pediatrician thinks that Archer has asthma and allergies. He is on a Nebulizer 3 times a day doing 5 treatments! I thought that was excessive, but they said that this will only go on for about a month (still, that's a month of almost an hour a day!) Then we will look at other options (like an inhaler, etc)... And he has to take 1/2 a Clariton each day. That really seems to be working (YAY!) And to throw in one more thing on the poor little guy, he has an ear infection so he's on meds for that.

Ah, my sick kid... I love the little guy! I just hope he gets better soon and that he won't be slowed down too much by asthma!