Fifth Disease

So as I've previously mentioned, Avery had a fever for four days and it finally subsided yesterday afternoon and he hasn't had it since. However, last night he woke up screaming like he was in a lot of pain and was very hard to console. Then this afternoon, we noticed he had a rash on his head, torso and back. My mom said it looked/seemed like Fifth Disease. Now don't worry if you haven't heard of this ailment. In all my extensive reading and research since before Avery was born, I have never stumbled upon this disease. Upon further investigation on Web MD, I decided that he most likely does have it.

Fifth disease is called such because it is considered the fifth childhood disease, behind measles, mumps, rubella and chicken pox. It's nickname is "slap cheek" because the rash usually is on the cheeks and makes it look like your cheeks have been slapped. Regardless of the odd name, Avery definitely seems to have it. The good news is, he is no longer contagious as once the rash appears, the contagious period is over, meaning you usually don't know you have it until you're done spreading it. The bad news is that since it's a viral infection, there is nothing that you can do about it except put rash cream on your skin if it itches or bothers you. Fifth disease also poses a risk to pregnant women, but the dangerous period is the first trimester and seeing as I'm at 18 weeks, I should have no cause to worry. Plus, apparently Sam had this when he was 15 months old and none of us caught it, which means we probably are immune to it. Anyway, Avery seems to be doing much better and now that we know what he has, we can at least continue to give him medicine for pain as some of the symptoms include headaches and joint pain, which might explain Avery's screaming fits for the past five nights. Let's hope this passes soon.

What I learned: Fifth Disease is not a made up disease and Avery has it!