Last night Madi was red and blistered again. We were playing on the back porch and she just started crying. She grabbed at her diaper and held out her hand for me to follow her. Like a good Mommy I did. She grabbed my hand, walked me to her changing station and put her arms in the air for me to pick her up. Poor kid! She was begging me to change her diaper; hadn’t been home that long. (Pam does the last diaper change right before we pick her up from daycare.) When I pulled her diaper away she was beet red and parts of her were bubbled up. Last week we fought a diaper rash that turned into a yeast infection and those parts looked blistered. Madi was crying and trying to grab at herself. It was horrible, tore my heart out. Immediately I blamed daycare, there’s no way she got that red from one wet diaper. It seems every other week we’re fighting a red bum by Tuesday/Wednesday. We work all weekend long to get it cleared up and then Bam, it’s back after a few days of daycare. I knew she’d freak out if I dared put a wipe on her bum so I picked her up to go to the kitchen sink. She gave me a big bear hug and cried into my shoulder. I sat her down next to the sink and let her play in the water so maybe she wouldn’t fight when I tried to wash her off. No such luck. I pulled the faucet down and let it run down her back and she started screaming, legs kicking. I don’t know if you’ve ever tried to hold a wet toddler up with one hand…a little tricky. Caution, slippery when wet comes to mind. Madi refused to stand so I sat her back on the edge of the sink and that was okay with her. I very slowly moved the faucet from her feet to her legs, let her turn on the sprayer, played with that a bit and eventually made it up to her thighs so I could wash off the girlie bits. Of course I now have four kitchen towels around her to catch the water that’s not going back into the sink but I would’ve used ten towels if it kept her from screaming. Horrible, absolutely horrible. I let her sit there on the counter naked playing in the water or whatever else she wanted hoping the open-air time would help. She was naked baby for about 20 minutes before starting to rub her eyes and reaching for me to pick her up. I gladly picked her up and thoroughly enjoyed the bear hugs while I fixed her a bottle and grabbed her jammies. “Make it go away Mom” was what she was telling me. When I tried to lay her back to put on a diaper the crying started again, she knew what was coming. Of course I had to make it worse and touch her to put the prescription cream on. Madi was pulling her legs together, twisting and turning to get away from me touching her. Have I said horrible yet? Absolutely horrible. I think by the time she was dressed and snuggled in the rocking chair she had forgiven me. I really hope so.
After that ordeal last night we’re going to the doctor today for any and all advice she’ll give. I found every weird and wacky home remedy last night to run by her. Thought about switching her to regular shirts instead of onesies so it’d be easier to check her diaper, just pull back the waistband. I wonder if cloth diapering would help or maybe jump to potty training. It seems a bit early but Madi might correlate the potty to not having a painful burning bum and take to it pretty quick. Who knows. If we have to slather her in Vaseline every diaper change I’ll do it, just no more red bum every week. I can’t take it.
The only upside is that the emotional breakdown wore her out and Madi slept through til 6:30a.
So,doc says that none of the home remedies would hurt but keeping Madi from sitting in a wet diaper and the prescription Resinol cream are our best bet. She said we could definitely work on potty training because Madi knows that the diapers hurt and might figure out that going in the potty keeps her out of diapers. We will probably give it a try, see what happens. And we're going to start a diaper and food log at daycare so we're not giving her too many acidic foods.
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