We had to take our 15 month old baby to the ER after she developed a 102.3 fever rapidly and was throwing up. They had her there with an I.V. for over five hours before they took her to the Rainbow Babies and Childrens Hospital. She was in there for rour days but thankfully she is home now. Scared the life out of me.

China, actually but still D'oh!!! Congee!!! It's rice boiled with excess water until it turns almost into a milk-like material. That was one of her staples in the orphanage.

I'm such an idiot. We should have tried that right away. <img src="/images/graemlins/blush.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/images/graemlins/blush.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/images/graemlins/blush.gif" alt="" />

-Blast

About 10 minutes after you wrote this there was a muffled "boom" and the power to our neighborhood went out! It was the first time my insomnia was benefitial as I was still awake two hours later to plug everything back in when the power came back. I don't know what knocked it out. It sounded like a transformer going but it usually takes them a lot longer to fix that out here.

-Blast

Reconcowboy,

Oh man, I would have gone nuts. I'm really glad she was okay. These incidents really bring home why so many children used to die when getting sick back in "the good ol' days". I'm glad those days are long past!

Let's hope they never come back.

But, if they do I want to be ready...that's one of the reasons I'm on this board.

-Blast, who is learning not EVERY problem can be solved with a sutible application of high explosives.

Did you try Jello? When our guys had rotavirus, they both ended up in the hospital, on IVs, etc... The nurses always counted the volume of Jello consumed as part of their fluid intake, rather than as a solid. They make both sweetened and sugar-free varieties. Works for grownups, too. We've always got several boxes in different flavors on hand for yucky tummies. Good luck.
As for the lack of sleep, the only thing that worked for me was following the 'when they sleep, you sleep' rule.

Here is a link for oral re-hydration solution. It saves little ones lives in
developing countries and works here too (and is good for adults with
the runs)

http://rehydrate.org/solutions/homemade.htm

Even if they can't keep it down or in, the fluid will be helping purge
the gut and could shorten the duration of the illness.

The sugar helps the water to be assimilated more quickly.

If she won't drink, don't mess around and get her to the doc. It sometimes
takes only a day or two for those under 5 to succumb to that sort of
dehydration.

Thank you Susan for making some bells go off in my head!!!
When we took prisoners, the "golden rule" is that they have to be fed the same food from the same pots as our crew. The problem quickly arose that they could not physically "handle" our food as it was too rich for what their systems were used to. We had to then feed them the beans and rice that their systems were accustomed to.
This may be "part" of DD2's problem with the tummy. It sounds like she has maybe gotten something her system was overpowered by. Monitor her foods and see if there is any cause and effect evidence to substantiate this possibility.

That's your story and you're sticking to it, huh?

Had a similar experience when our oldest son was about 18 months old. He was having trouble keeping stuff down, and had a high fever. Tried giving him liquid Tylenol to help break the fever. He normally liked getting Tylenol, but he threw it up after a few minutes. We tried giving it to him again later, with the same results. On our third attempt, he was gagging and retching when we got the liquid in his mouth (I think he was making that flavor association with getting sick).

So, he was rejecting medicine and then wouldn't take any liquids. We got very worried, and did the late-night call to the pediatrician on duty as to when we need to make that decision that it's time to go to the ER. He didn't say "Don't go to the ER," but he said if you go, it's going to be 12 hours or so of rehydration therapy, and you only want to do that if things are really getting serious. I sadly can't remember the exact yardsticks he gave us over the phone, but there were several "rule of thumb" indicators he pointed out so we would know when it really was time to go to the ER. (I had to specifically ask him "how will we know when it's time?")

Our son already had dried cracked lips - the indicators he gave us were something to do with around the eyes and, I think, between the eyes/eyebrows region - really wish I could remember the indicators he pointed out.

As others have said, we tried a variety of liquids - water, watered down juice, pedialyte. I went to a 24-hour pharmacy looking for pedialyte frozen pops, and the pharmacist also pointed out Pediacare frozen pops - I had thought they had fever reducers in them, but just did a google search and the press releases make a point of saying there is no fever reducer in them - hmm.

Anyway, he continued to reject liquids for a long time, but did take the Pediapop when I asked him if he wanted ice cream (I was careful to make no hint that it was a medicine, and it comes in the same form as those plastic-wrapped freezer pops where you cut the end and slide it down as they eat it).

Finally, after a long night of lying next to him on the futon couch and intermittent bouts of trying to get him to drink something/anything, he took a sip of water from a straw, paused, said "More," drank some more, then said "Good." Nearly brought me to tears.

Anyway, lots of good advice from others in this thread - at some point, any kind of liquid is probably a good thing, and I like the ideas posted of jello or applesauce. Regular popsicles or medicated popsicles are a good idea. Also, try chipping them up/making them like a snow cone and eating with a spoon. Also, have straws and/or crazy straws on hand - anything that can make it a treat might be enough to make them drink. I also try to keep a package of the pedialyte pops frozen all the time.

My mom used to give us flat, room-temp ginger ale to settle our stomachs - and soda crackers or dry white toast.

Another thing I've found - I've always felt it important to keep Pedialyte on hand, but the times I've tried to use it, I'd open up the two-liter (or whatever size they are) big bottle, then the kids might drink 1/4 cup of it or less, then you can't keep it long once it's opened.

There's another brand of electrolyte drink that makes a "Blue's Clues" six pack of "squeezers" liquid - different colors and flavors, has a long flexible straw, and they're smaller so you're not throwing away a huge bottle once it's open.

Good luck - for me, this incident was one of my scariest, most nerve-wracking parenting episodes.

Dave

When all else fails...do research on renal absorbtion of water.

Of course, the child would just about have to be comatose to allow an enema...I know my three year old would definitely put up a fight.

It's a viable alternative to IV therapy. Luckily, I have the training and means to do both--but I'd be hard pressed to put a catheter in a toddler without doing it everyday. So, my (last resort) plan is to use the drip set as an enema.