Premature newborn and exposure to common childhood illnesses

[flippityflip]

Ok so we have been home about 10 days now with my youngest who was born at 34 weeks and we spent 2 weeks in the NICU/SCBU. My eldest seems to be drveloping some kind of virus and my initial thought is slapped cheek as we got a note from nursery to say a child had had it recently. Her symptoms are sore ear and throat and cheek raised glands and cough and cold symptoms,but no fever yet. Obviously we are all living in the sane house so baby is exposed but what can I do to limit exposure to baby,and does anyone know how risky it is for baby? I am breastfeeding if that makes any difference.

*same house,not sure how sane it is!

Other than washing your hands and breastfeeding there isn't really anything you can do, although your immune system should afford protection via milk.

I know it's a bit worrying with a preemie (mine was early too) but honestly babies are much tougher than you think - we would all be stuck at one child families if that were so.

AFAIK Slapped Cheek is most dangerous for pregnant mothers, it's a virus that's akin to a nasty cold otherwise

Oh I remember your antenatal threads, glad to hear you are both home oklay. Breastfeeding is obviously the best thing you can do to boost immunity. There isn't a lot else you can do to limit baby's exposure to illnesses if you have other small children other than extra care handwashing, get them used to a routine of handwashing before they touch the baby, no kissing on the lips no licking their dummy etc.

Slapped cheek can be quite mild in babies, don't know about newborns but obviously straight to the doctor if temp over 38 degrees etc. For some reason my prem child had a much better immune system than his nearer term siblings.

It is hard to get rid of the anxiety once you have been through a pregnancy like yours and had an early baby. One thing I would say is 34 weeks is a very good gestation and the fact that your baby is strong enough to breastfeed is a great sign for his resilience and future health.