Thought it was teething, stomach bug - turned out to be a UTI

RomeRomance06 · August 2011

Ugh, this poor little girl is just getting her share of scary illnesses lately. DD has not been sleeping well for the last week, and we assumed it was teething, because she's always been a good sleeper. She had a bad couple days at daycare last week with crying and overall fussiness. DCP thought something was wrong but she didn't have a fever so we had no reason to suspect something other than teething since she was definitley drooling and stuffing her fist in her mouth, etc. Well, Sunday night, she was crying and crying and nothing would soothe her, still no fever. Finally when she seemed to be feeling a little better, I was watching her in her crib on the monitor and saw her vomit everywhere. Super scary, since I'd never seen her throw up that much before. I cleaned her up, took her temp (it was 101.6) and called the on-call pedi. She said it sounded like the beginning of a stomach bug and to just keep an eye on her and call or take her to the ER if she became unresponsive, fever got out of control. She slept in our room and around 4am she started moaning and shaking. We checked her out and she was a funny grey color and was shivering uncontrollably and sort of listless. We took her to the ER and as soon as she got there she vomited all over the nurse who was checking her and her fever had shot up to 104. After two catheters (poor little lamb) they determined it was a UTI and they gave her antibiotics. She's feeling much better now and is almost back to her old self, thankfully.

FYI - We had no other signals that it was a UTI since she never had a fever until the vomiting started. BUT, after the fact, I did note that over the last several days I'd noticed her urine had been smelling somewhat stronger. I didn't think much of it at the time, figuring it was just my "mommy nose" getting more sensitive to dirty diapers, but the doctor said that that is a symptom of the infection. So, I'll know that for the future. I feel guilty, of course, because I wish I had known sooner. I really should have trusted my gut that something was wrong, especially since she was definitely not herself, but everyone tells me that kids are constantly changing and doing new things so I guess I assume it's all developmental or something minor like the teething. So frustrating!

vtkgirl77 · August 2011

Whew! I'm glad everything turned out to be okay. I wouldn't have though UTI either but that's a good thing for me to keep in mind with two girls.

umdbride · August 2011

How scary! I'm glad she's doing well now. It is really tough to figure out what to do when we have no idea what's going on, you don't want to be too worrisome, but at the same time you don't want to dismiss something that might be an issue.

Thanks for sharing the symptoms and signs to watch for - at least maybe other new moms will be able to recognize it now.

WinesNot Whines · August 2011

That sounds really scary! I'm glad you figured it out and it sounds like she's on the mend. It's so hard when the babies are so young and can't tell you what's wrong.

Mrs.Handy · August 2011

Poor thing! I'm glad she's ok.

The first time DS vomited when he was around 6 months, I finally understood the difference between projectile vomiting and spit up! He had a stomach bug and it was all over me! In my hair, on my clothes...

claraj · August 2011

Oh no! Poor baby! DD had a UTI at three weeks old, which resulted in a 10 day hospital stay. I'm glad you were in and out of the ER. It's the worst when they're so little and can't tell you what's wrong!