Help! My 18 mo DS has painful white spots on his tongue...

[QuietlyConcerned]

...and I can't work out what it could be. One appeared two days ago and is now disappearing. The other appeared this morning and he's really unsettled and refusing to eat or drink. His temp dropped today to about 35-36 degrees.

The spots are about half the size of a hole punch hole, and are translucent white, slightly raised so perhaps they're blisters. Can anyone help?

Hand foot and mouth discease

It does sound very much like it is tbh.
There is no treatment but you can get a mouthwash for the blisters.The dentist prescribed some for dd1 when she had it.
Your poor ds it can be very painful.

Looked at that. The spots are only on his tongue, not on his palms or soles of feet.

The spots dd1 had started on her tongue ,then gums and throat.The spots on the palms of hands and soles of feet can be very slight redish under the skin marks almost unnoticable and not always present.

Ah, I see. Right, I've just had a look at the NHS Direct website, which says the blisters usually start out red and then turn yellowy. My DS's blisters have only ever been white. What colour were your DD's spots? What other symptoms do you remember?

I remember her spots being white and some red and she was generally unwell with temp and sniffles.She didn't eat and barely drank for a week as her mouth was so sore.

You don't necessarily get the spots everywhere that you might expect. GS had this recently and only had spots in his mouth.

Bless her, poor love. How long did it take for her to get better?

TBH I'm not convinced it's HF&M, but perhaps it's early days. He's recently been exposed to people with tonsillitis and cold sores so that may also be another factor.

She was fully recovered after about 8 days.
Hope your ds hasn't go it

Thanks Pelvic, and Joash. I'll have to keep a close eye on him. Now he's napping so I'm going to dream feed him some water so he doesn't dry up!