What a whirl wind the past week has been for our family! We want to thank you for your prayers and concern for the boys, its truly been a blessing. We did receive an update on their health yesterday that we wanted to share with you.
To recap, Kyle went to a camp 8 days ago and was there for one day when he called home crying asking us to come get him. When we arrived he was emotional and not feeling well, we thought he was just overly tired from a week at another camp, then a busy week home with his aunts and cousin in town. He slept on and off for two days, then on day three woke up with a high fever and flu type symptoms. We took him to the doctor where he tested negative for flu, negative for strep. They put him on an antibiotic and sent him home. After a few days was not getting any better so we call the camp and asked if any other kids were ill. The camp director said they had been going down the list calling parents letting them know they had children at the camp who were infected with swine flu and by Thursday of camp they were running a clinic waiting on parents to arrive Friday. The director informed us the children who were infected came from another camp where they had to shut down for two weeks due to a swine flu outbreak. The next day our youngest (Caleb) started running high fever of 103.6 and very ill. We took him to the doctor, explained the situation, and were told Kyle must have had a false negative reading on his flu test because Caleb had a positive reading. They started him on medication for the flu but told us it was to late to give it to Kyle. We asked if it was swine flu and were told since they were exposed and since they had all the symptoms, flu is put into different groups and it sounded as if they fit the swine flu group. We were asked to stay in for 7-10 days and were all given Tama Flu prescriptions.
The next day (yesterday) Mark had to call into work and explain the situation, he was asked not to come in and he would need to have a flu test given in order to return. When he went the doctor he was asked all kinds of questions and was told if they did not send the test to DHEC then it was not a positive swine flu reading. Mark was negative for the flu and after much to do he was able to get the 7-10 day restriction lifted so he can return to work.
Kyle was still very sick so we took him back to the doctor yesterday, where he again tested negative for the flu. The doctor increased his medication and said since Caleb had a positive reading and Kyle was negative she was concerned Kyle could still get it so she started him on more medication and increased his asthma meds since his oxygen stats were a little low.
After going to 5 doctors and getting 5 different answers about the flu we were very confused and not sure who to believe! We decided to research ourselves at the CDC. This is nothing to play around with, the boys have run high fevers, sweating, severe muscle aches and headaches, runny nose, sore throat, sensitive to light, diarrhea and extremely tired. If you have these symptoms stay home and call your health care provider. On the news this morning they said that 353 people have died from the Swine flu and over 5500 have been hospitalized. This is just the swine flu report, its nothing to play around with. The camp director where Kyle attended said in 25 years of running the camp he has never seen a illness take over rapidly as this flu did.
We went here to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention web page to research for ourselves.
I have seen those comercials where they say be prepared for an emergency or a natural disaster, have a plan, know what you will do. I used to ask what does that mean? What do you need to plan for? I know about planning for a hurricanes or something like that but I was not sure what they were refering to in those comercials. Now I know! If we were really quarantined in our home for two weeks it was a comfort knowing I had a stock pile of items and did not feel I needed to get groceries. Because I have been stocking up, when we got the news to stay in 7-10 days I did not feel I needed to go to the store and stock up. We were able to just come home. Ask yourself this question. Would you be prepared if you got the unexpected news you were quarintend for 10 days? What if there were and outbreak in your town and you were given a warning to stay home. I know its scarry to think about but going through this has really opened my eyes and I am now heading the warning of the congressmen on those comercials. Not panicing, just preparing.
Thank you again for your prayers for the boys and our family. Please continue to pray for their recovery and that the rest of us do not get it, whatever it is!
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