It's affirmative: it's bacterial conjunctivitis

The lab results came in today and there is bacteria in the swab sample we took on Tuesday. It was definitely a good call to start the antibiotic treatment yesterday. We had a 50/50 chance of there being some bacteria. From what I understand, it could also be viral but the test didn't tell us how much of it was bacteria, only that there was bacteria present. Either way, the antibiotics should help. In fact, I noticed a bit of improvement this morning when he woke up. His eyes were not as gooey and crusty as before. The mornings always look really bad though. Throughout the day, I noticed less and less as well. I didn't have to wipe his eyes much at all today. I'm also not taking any chances so I continued with the warm compresses and am also changing all used wash cloths.

So the bad news is that there is bacteria in his eyes and that he does need antibiotics but the good news is that he is now allowed back in daycare. In fact, the only policy is that he needs to be on his antibiotics for 24 hours before going to daycare. If he still has goo in his eyes, that is ok. They actually don't have a policy against that, although they should because he would still be contagious. They seem more concerned about new medicine causing allergic reactions and the staff are not in a position to help if medical attention is needed. The fact is daycare still admits sick children, as long as they are on medication for at least 24 hours. They will even administer the medicine for your child if you give them clear instructions from your doctor. This worries me knowing that children who are contagious are still allowed to go to daycare. Not just the children but the staff become sick all the time and still need to work. They only have 5 sick days in a year just like all of us. I have seen staff members with really runny noses that have to blow them throughout the day and there was another staff member that completely lost her voice too. If they can still physically work, they do. All this is just a fact of life for daycare. It's nothing new and obviously, there is nothing much you can do but complain at the next board and parent meeting (which I won't be doing by the way). Parents who work are already in a tough position when their child goes to daycare, like I mentioned in my last post. I am going through some of this pain right now. The demands would just not be realistic.

I debated today whether or not to take Tristan to daycare tomorrow and have decided to do so for many reasons. He has improved enough that I believe he is not that contagious. In the morning, he will be even better. He really needs to leave the house and be with other kids because I think we are both driving each other a little nuts. The change of environment will be good for him. He has much more freedom at daycare and he definitely loves that! For myself, I really need to get some work done. When I drop him off tomorrow, I will let the staff know that I don't think he is 100% better and that maybe he should keep his distance a bit from the other kids. I will also ask them to clean his hands more. Conjunctivitis is a beast and I don't want him to get it again nor do I want anyone else to go through what we went through the past week. We will continue to administer the antibiotics tomorrow but I don't want to ask daycare to give it so I'll just give his second dose late after we pick him up. Applying eye drops is a pain in the butt!