Any tips/advice 8 month old with chickenpox

[onepieceoflollipop]

My dd2 - almost 8 months - came out with chickenpox on Thursday (2 weeks after her sister who is 4 years). Dd1 had a fairly average/typical case, the pharmacist recommeded piriton which we used sparingly. It helped a lot with the itching but made her quite excitable/hyper as a side effect.

Obviously dd2 is too young for piriton. She has a slight temp and we have been giving Calpol and occasionally Medised. (although technically Medised is now no longer licensed for children under 2 afaik - but I already had some in stock). She is eating fairly well and b/f a lot which is probably the best thing for her. She is covered in spots in her nappy area so we leave it off a lot to let her "air".

However the itchiness is really distressing her, especially at night. She squirms and wriggles and kicks her legs, and cries a LOT. (she hasn't cried much since the early weeks so I feel really sorry for her) The bath helps but I can't leave her in the bath all day and night.

Any tips appreciated. Thanks

try Eurax cream or lotion ..imo works better than calamine lotion. This was recommended to me by my health visitor when DD2 was very distressed with chicken pox and it definitely helped.

Your poor DD. My DS has just got over chickenpox and he was lucky that the really itchy horrible bit only lasted a couple of days, but it made him really upset. He had spots on his tongue so he couldn't eat properly either. We found bicarb of soda in a cool bath soothed him and then loads of calamine cream (easier to put on than lotion). The baths only help for a while like you say, so we just spent a couple of days doing whatever we could to keep him calm and distract him (lots of CBeebies!). Just try to think that it will only last a few days - once the spots are scabbed over they seem to stop itching as much. There are loads of threads on here about chickenpox, I found them quite useful.

Thanks for the replies. I have got some calamine cream. Will try the bicarb tip. As she is so small I am normally strict about no tv but it does help to distract her at the moment.

I am normally strict about TV too. Now he's better I'm trying to wean him back off it again!

iwouldgoouttonight there is always a bit of a challenge after every illness (or indeed holiday) isn't there? i.e. back to normal restrictions on tv, back to "proper" food - not just yogurts and fruit, back to occasionally having to say no and not give in to every request. Not all that applies to my 8 mth old of course, but her sister is older and wiser to these things. We had Cbeebies website on at 11.30pm last week as the piriton had made her rather lively shall I say. Unheard of usually in our house.

My little one has just got over it. She is six months. She had three nights of nightmareish no sleep.

The only thing that helped, was for her to sleep with me, latched on. The spots were all over her back - poor thing. I also ended up bathing her at 3am as there really was nothing else i could do to ease the discomfort.

I used tea tree cream on her spots, and tea tree drops in her bath, to stop infection. I put calendula moisturiser on her too. Chammomile lotion didn't really do anything. She was bad for about three days, then got better. Best of luck - hope she feels better soon.

ps. what's that about medised - i haven't heard about it?

Naboo thanks for the support and advice - she seemed to "turn a corner" at 3am this morning. She suddenly returned to normal temperature and was happy for me to change her nappy and leave her in her cot. She murmured and played quite happily before drifting off until 7am

Re the Medised - approx 2 weeks ago loads of different medications previously labelled ok for children 3 months plus, were removed from pharmacy shelves - cough medicines, antihistamines etc I think. Something to do with concerns over the labelling and the pharmacist assistant told me last week that apparently they are no longer effective for children under 2. [hmmm]

There was quite a lot about it all on the news for a day or two, and some threads on here iirc.