I was up late last night worrying about Alex's penis. Usually if a penis keeps me up late, it's John's, and in an enjoyable way. But last night I was obsessing about an infection Alex has developed, and every time I closed my eyes I'd flash forward to morning where I'd open up his diaper to find his penis has shriveled up and fallen off. I know, I'm completely overreacting, but that's how I get when ANYTHING is wrong with Alex. There is nothing that makes me more anxious than when Alex isn't well.
Alex's nether regions were perfectly fine until last night when I opened up his diaper to find his penis was red, swollen and had an odd discharge. I called John in for a second opinion and he agreed it just didn't look right so I called the Kids Care after hours clinic and took him in.
Of course when we got there, I had to explain to no less than three people that my son had "a swollen penis, and not in a happy sort of way". I was certain I was overreacting. It was probably just a normal part of toddler penile development and they'd send me home, giggling to themselves about how that new mom brought her son in for an erection and smegma.
When the nurse practitioner opened up Alex's diaper to see what was going on in there and her first reaction was "Whoa, that's not right", I silently praised myself for following my gut and bringing him in. She cultured the discharge and brought the doctor in to take a look. Both of them agreed it was probably just a skin infection and prescribed an antibiotic. Though I was told that I needed to make sure it doesn't get worse and if he becomes unable to urinate I need to bring him back in immediately. Since his foreskin isn't yet retracting, no one could see in there to see if there was any damage to his penis causing the infection. The doctor was concerned that he could have bruised it somehow, but being unable to see his actual penis, makes it hard to diagnose.
*As an aside, I was praised by the nurse practitioner and doctor for not having Alex circumcised unnecessarily. I am still surprised so many parents do it. Alex's penis is so normal looking to me, I forget that other kids don't look like that.*
So, I took my son and his infected penis home, threw him in the bathtub and scrubbed him down, smeared his nethers in Vaseline, put clean clothes on him, and gave him his medicine (which he took like a champ). I'm also going to amp up the hand washing regimen around here. I always wash his hands after a diaper change, but I'm going to start washing them before as well. There's no way I can stop him from grabbing his package during a diaper change, I can at least make sure his hands aren't all grubby and germy.
After a fitful night full of penis nightmares, I woke up to discover that Alex had a very wet diaper and a weenie that at least doesn't look any worse than yesterday. For Alex's part, he's acting like there's nothing at all wrong in his diaper, which makes me feel even better.
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