It was only her second Labor Day since birth, so a simple sneeze would technically make it the worst one of her life, but instead, it had to be staph. Apparently, Going Mom and I couldn’t save her from our own misfortunes with the infection.

My wife recently had an issue with her eye. Luckily nothing severe, and it was quickly treated and healed. And as any reader on here knows, I had that whole staph butt issue around Mother’s Day. Well, it returned once again to put our sweet little Avery in a miserable bout of pain.

What started out as a tiny bite around the lining of her diaper last Wednesday (so we think), took form into hard lump of staph. Stupid me kept playing it off as just a bite and saying it would heal soon, but my concerned wife was a little more wary. Note to self: listen to wife more!!

Avery started getting extremely protective of the area a couple days ago, and finally, once the screams of pain were unbearable (when I was saying she’d heal….dummy), we drove to a nearby Urgent Care clinic for kids.

I absolutely despise these places as feel like you’re more likely to get sick just sitting around the room waiting to be seen. We sat long enough to see Scar betray Mufasa and Simba lose his dad in The Lion King, but at least Timon and Pumbaa made for comic relief before we were brought back to a room. We’ll have to watch that movie all the way through when she’s a bit older….

In the room, we confirmed it was staph and that I’m an idiot (I bow to my wife yet again), and the nurse presented two options. She could numb it with a topical agent right there to drain the infection or we could go to an ER where they have better equipment and (she said) sedate her to make it easier and less painful to drain.

The nurse obviously didn’t want to do it herself just from the tone she used when giving us the options. I still opted for having it done right there just to get it over with and avoid another long wait. Kelley thought otherwise, and since I was in no position to argue my thoughts, we were off to the ER.

The waiting room there was filled with more sick people and I cringed as I watched parents feed their kids from the vending machines. Seriously, why do places affiliated with health care, have nothing but junk for food and drink options? Oh yeah, MONEY! Obviously, this is something I’m deeply passionate about, and was infuriated to watch it happening before us.

Pretty sure Avery was upset too, but maybe for different reasons. She went into crazy defense mode just from the nurse taking her temp, so we knew when it came time to inspect the infection, things would only get worse. Luckily, Mommy was there to help….

After watching How to Train Your Dragon 2 almost 2 times through, Avery’s 10 minute procedure was underway. Oh, by the way, they said they almost would never sedate a kid Avery’s age for something like this, so we’re positive that nurse was just weaseling her way out of draining the puss from a poor child’s inner thigh area. Hmmm, after writing that, guess I can’t blame her that much. Oh wait, yes I can; it’s her job!!

They applied the topical numbing agent which had to sit for 30 minutes and we were to keep Avery as still as possible. HA!

Mommy to the rescue again; she laid beside Avery and unleashed the secret weapon…….her phone!

The phone works in mysterious ways to keep kids’ attention. As great as it is, Smartphones (and all technology really), actually have mind-numbing (i.e. dumbing) effects on our brains. Good for when you have to keep a kid still, not good for every day use.

Finally, after waiting more than just 30 minutes, the doc came in, poked and drained the wound and cleaned it up. It took 3 adults to hold that girl down during the procedure, but it was done. Wow, that was a lot of puss! For some sick reason, it makes me feel better to watch that crap ooze out.

Despite her attitude when anyone got near her infection, Avery handled the day-long event much better than I would’ve guessed. So, Avery, if you’re reading this years from now, way to go dear, you were great pretty good.

Now she’s on freakin antibiotics (not a fan but know it’s necessary) and we’re cleaning and bandaging like we’ve done this before. Wait a sec, we have, on my butt! Sorry for bringing it up again, but I’ve been having flashbacks after this event, so figured I’d pass it on to my fellow readers. You’re welcome. 🙂

While it was far from a good Labor Day this year, at least we got rid of something that could’ve become much worse, and even better, we were together as a family all day! Of course, I’m stubborn and have this OCD thing about not eating until I workout, so I basically fasted all day until we go home. I rushed into a heavy squat weightlifting session followed by a lot of eating the remainder of the day.

Yeah, I need to work on that, but luckily I had coffee that got me through the day. I’m just glad our baby girl is on the path to recovery and already playing like normal again.

Do you have anything that’s affected your whole family?

Do you like watching the puss get squeezed out or does it make you queasy?