What can be the matter with DS (13 months) and what can I do to help?

[sausagedoesnotroll]

I've posted on here before about DS not sleeping, but DH and I are getting really worried about him now.

Since New Year he has had one cold after another it seems, and most nights wakes and cries all night. The explanation we have had from the doctor/nurse is that his eustacian (sp?)tubes are getting blocked with snot and the pressure makes his ears hurt. However, they will not treat and say it will get better on its own.

We have had almost 6 months now of getting about two decent nights sleep a month.

Typically DS will go to bed and sleep fine for about 3 hours, then he will wake and cry, want to drink water, crawl around his cot crying and trying different positions, throw himself against the end of it, lie on me or DH if we take him into bed with us, sit up again and cry some more, lie down...etc., etc. This usually goes on for two hours, or until enough time as elapsed for us t give him more Calpol. Then the same thing happens again 2-3 hours later.

Something must hurt him, because otherwise giving Calpol wouldn't help. He has been having it every night for over a month now.

We have tried Karvol etc, nasal sprays, propping up his mattress, nothing makes any difference.

What on earth do we try next?

[thelittlebluepills]

I'm so sorry for your situation - it makes me so mad to hear what you are going through.

We also had a GP who was in favour of watching and waiting but I made a fuss and we went private to see Paed ENT who was horrified at the state of DS's ears and said they were full of glue (Otherwise competent GP said they were "a bit pink")

ear infections are absolutely classic in being worse at night then the child is fine the next day and then you feel like a fraud going to the GP trying to explain how bad it is

it makes me sad for the kids too - if your GP/HV was suffering from earache every night I bet they wouldn't wait months to see if it got better

hope you get a resolution soon

[TiredMumZzz]

thank you for this thread - I could've written it myself! Just wondered if you have found anything that helps - afraid I don't have any suggestions really. My ds does the same thing at night, am so fed up of being told to do cc when I know there is something wrong. We finally have a referral to ENT so hoping we may get to the bottom of it soon - can't cope on this level of sleep dep for much longer. ds does have glue ear, altho hearing not too bad & I wouldn't have known as he reacts to sound etc. Sorry no help, just thought I'd sympathise, I was cheered up that its not just us!

[sausagedoesnotroll]

We've done that when he's been very bed, though the ibuprofen seems to be much more effective than the normal Calpol, but I don't want to just keep giving him drugs. The bottles all say not to give it for more than three days. We had been giving it for more than three weeks! Although the doctors all assured us it is just a precaution to stop people drugging their kids instead of taking them to the dr when they need to go, I'm not happy about him having so much.

[sneezecake]

how about piggy backing the calpol and calprofen, as long as you don't go over either dose i should be fine, we did this with ds when he had a temp, to try and keep it down, have also done this when he has teething pain, otherwise he would never get any rest.

[sausagedoesnotroll]

Don't worry, I know Calprofen and Nurofen are the same animal. A friend said her daughter likes Nurofen better, so we bought some to use when the existing bottle of Calprofen runs out, not at the same time as it.

I don't know about going private. I guess it depends on how expensive it would be. Anyone have any experience?

Got a pile of stuff about controlled crying through the post from the HV this morning

[Tablefor6]

Calprofen & Nurofen are both makes of ibuprofen......don't give both brands. A friend of mine thought calprofen was calpol, it's not!
I agrre with getting a second opinion or just pushing for an ENT consult.

Go with your mum instincts, they are never far wrong! Hope your Ds is well soon x

[sunshineandshowers]

poor you. poor baby.

to me it def sounds like ear infection. my ds (3) gets like this with them. no temp etc. they are worse when lying down, and he will wake after 2-3 hrs. sometimes at gps they just say "a little bit red", but a little bit red to my ds is massive ear inf and loads of pain.

i would go back to doc and def get ab's. if this doesn't work i would second above and ref to ENT. could you go private?

btw nurofen really good and you can overlap with calpol.

x

[ttalloo]

It's great that your DS's hearing doesn't seem to be affected (the daredevilry is always a good sign!).

But I would still get him checked out by an ENT specialist rather than a GP who tells you to wait it out (for how long exactly?) so that he can get you both out of his office in five minutes.

[sausagedoesnotroll]

Thanks for that. Looking at the list of possible symptoms I begin to see why they're reluctant to make a diagnosis of ear problems, as he doesn't obviously have many of the symptoms.

He does sometimes pull at his ears, but he has no discharge and I'm pretty sure his hearing is fine. He isn't talking but he babbles ten to the dozen and is quick to turn round and the smallest interesting sound. He also has no balance problems. He started walking at 10.5 months and can stand up on our bed, on the mattress and bounce up and down without falling over (not a skill I'm particularly keen to encourage!).

Just at the moment he has a cough and that has been keeping him up, but yesterday when we finally got him to stop coughing he slept fine.

Oh I don't know what's going on!

[oricella]

That's not helpful at all.. sorry

The problem with ear problems is that there is no easy solutions; glue ear is often "treated" by watchful waiting. It looks like your GP is taking the waiting approach, but forgetting about the 'watching' part. Do you have any concerns about his hearing? If so, that would be another indication to get an ENT referral and a hearing test.

have a look here for some more experiences (maybe the dairy free approach would be of help to your DS) and this makes for interesting reading (Scottish guidelines)

There is of course a chance it has nothing to do with his ears at all, but from what you say it sounds quite likely and I would try and get to the bottom of it

[ttalloo]

Good for DS! Shame it wasn't something smellier....!

You know your boy better than anyone, and if something seems wrong to you, get a second opinion.

It's not normal for a child to be waking up so many times in the night in such distress over such a prolonged period. At the very least it must be making him as exhausted as you and your DH are, but if, as oricella says, he has glue ear, this could affect his hearing and have an impact on his speech development, on top of causing him pain and sleepless nights. And six months of misery is long enough for even the laziest health professional to conclude that this problem is not getting better on its own.

Just go with your own instincts and insist on seeing an ENT specialist or at least a paediatrician.

[sausagedoesnotroll]

HV was no help. She clearly doesn't believe me that he seems to be in pain and was insisting that I should try to put him to bed awake and then use controlled crying on him to force him to self settle. I pointed out that 1) we don't normally have trouble getting him to go to sleep at bedtime, it's the waking up later that's the problem; 2) he has only recently started falling asleep on the boob again because he is so bl*ody knackered he can't feed for more than 5 minutes without dozing off; and 3) on the rare occasions when he doesn't have a streaming cold and earache he sleeps well and self-settles when he wakes.

Pah!

She also stayed so long (in spite of me telling her I had to get ready for work) that I was late giving him his lunch and getting him ready for nursery and had to go out to work without eating anything myself.

The only slight consolation was that DS managed to spoon mango yoghurt into her filofax.

[sausagedoesnotroll]

Thanks for all that.

The nasal spray we have is just saline (sorry if that wasn't clear - can't construct a sentence at the moment!). I have some Nurofen which we're about to start trying instead of the Calprofen, as that is running out, so we'll see if it's better.

HV is coming in about 5 minutes to discuss the situation after I left a desperate answerphone message yesterday. Typically DS has decided to go to sleep!

[oricella]

My first thought would be ENT referral too; if no fever and actual infections, glue ear could be an issue. And if the situation has been going on for longer than 3 months I think the GP should refer you

Trouble with ears is always worse at night - it's hard... good luck

[CrapSuzette]

Forgot to add: DD also had to take antibiotics because the building up of fluid led to ear infections. The only sign of infection, apart from the obvious pain at night, was when her ear drum burst and fluid leaked out. She didn't have a temperature and wasn't off her food or obviously unwell. So I do think it's worth you asking your GP about a course of antibiotics for possible ear infection. I'm not a great fan of antibiotics for wee ones, but I seriously wonder if there's an infection in there going untreated.

[CrapSuzette]

Sounds a lot like my DD - now 3.5. Over the last two years, she's also had one cold after another and often goes through a sleeping pattern similar to the one you describe (though we use Nurofen - maybe worth trying instead of calpol? And she usually wakes only once when she needs to be re-dosed, and sleeps peacefully either side of this). Anyway, the difference is that, because her ear drum would end up bursting, the GP took her situation more seriously and referred us to the ENT clinic.
She's now on a steroid prescription-only nasal spray, and we've had no problems since. I seriously think you're being fobbed off by your GP: even if your son is not getting recurrent ear infections yet, or having a burst ear drum, the constant building up of fluid in his ear may well lead to this.
If it helps, the ENT consultant said saline nose drops can do the job of keeping the nasal passages open almost as well as the steroid spray, so we use these inbetween colds, then the steroid spray when she does have a cold. He also stressed that decongestent nasal sprays are an absolute no-no, as they make the problem of blocking and swelling in the nasal passages and Eustacian tube worse.
So, in a nutshell, I'd go back to your GP, demand an appointment with an ENT specialist; chuck out the decongestent nasal sprays and try your son with saline nose drops twice daily. And try using Nurofen instead - it's pain-killing properties, I've found, last longer than Calpol and are better suited to ear pain.
Good luck - I know how hard, frustrating (and exhausting!) it is.

[OnEdge]

Try the health vivitor, sometimes they pick on something you may not have thought of.

[ttalloo]

Poor DS and poor you - it sounds as if you are having a horrendous time. I'm surprised that the doctor doesn't think there is a need to do something for a child who is clearly suffering as much as yours is. Can you seek a second opinion from a paediatrician?

It's not exactly the same, but DS2 went from being a perfect sleeper at 11mos, to waking up several times a night and demanding milk and cuddles after we took him to the States last September. We had six months of utterly disrupted sleep before I took him to a cranial osteopath to see if there was anything he could diagnose (the GP could find nothing wrong).

Anyway, the CO said that the two flights DS2 had been on had caused pressure to build up in his ears, and that was what was keeping him awake and crying at night. An hour of tweaking later we went home, DS2 gave us a night of hell, and has slept like an angel since.

At the very least a CO might be able to relieve the pressure that's building up behind your DS's eustachian tubes, which will help him sleep better.

I hope something works for you - after DS2's nocturnal antics I would have chucked one of us out of the window but I didn't have the energy!

[sausagedoesnotroll]

I don't think so. He hates the stuff and we have to pin him to the floor and squirt it in with a syringe.

He does seem mostly fine during the day (if very tired).

[grapesandmoregrapes]

Maybe its the expectation of calpol that is the problem, it does taste yummy to children. Is he in pain during the day? If not then it could be this. If I were you I would stop giving it to him, and lots of cuddles instead, for a few nights and see if it makes a diffrence. You will probably not get any sleep so might be best done at the weekend when you can both help.