Addison's "Polka dots"

I know, someone says polka dots, and you think chicken pox. That's what we were guessing on Wednesday afternoon too. If only it had been that easy!

Wednesday morning I got a call from our nanny that Addison woke up from her nap with some spots on her. It was almost lunch time, so I ran home. She had sursome pink spots on her inner legs and upper arms. By the time I got home from work that afternoon, she had more spots...and they looked like chicken pox. I couldn't figure out where she could have been exposed to it....and she had her vaccine for it the week before. So I googled the chicken pox vaccine, and apparantly it can sometimes cause a mild, usually non-contagious form of the chicken pox. Ok, so that was our guess at the time. We ran down to ACE for the opening of the solar field at the back of the store. When we got home, she was running a fever of 102. Got the fever down....then the kids down....bed time!

Thursday morning we woke up with more spots, but they no longer look like chicken pox. She was still running a fever. The ones on her legs look terrible! I made an appt with our family Dr. Took her in, and he had no clue what it was. He said it was probably a reaction to something...(he really needed to work on his poker face!!!) He told me what to watch for, and told me to call any time if it changed, or anything else showed up.

Took pictures at lunch and sent them to my mom, who had a bunch of nurses at work look them over. By lunch time she also had spots on her chin, all over her arms and legs. But they weren't on her trunk. At least she was still active, playing and generally her cute self!

So I couldn't focus at work, and came home at 1:30. She looked worse, was fussy, and had more spots. I called the Dr, and took her back in. He was still mystified. We talked about trying benadryl, and would know within an hour if that was working. So I came home, Dave brought the benadryl....and it didn't work. So Jackson went over to grandma and grandpa's house while we hopped in the car for a ride to the Children's Hospital.

Now that is never a place we want to have to go to, but the staff was nice, and they didn't make us feel like we were crazy. She was running a fever when we got there, and by that time, the spots on her legs had started to turn purple. The resident we saw said it was either HSP vasculitis or something with an "E" vasculitis. The Attending Doc came in and they both watched her and asked us questions, and decided it was the "E" vasculitis. Basically it is a swelling of the capillaries as a reaction to some sort of infection, vaccine, medication, and is not contagious. It will take 4 to 6 weeks to go away. She is still breaking out in spots and running a fever. She is uncomfortable too. But still smiling...spots and all!!