Explorer by day, banshee by night

Yesterday I took The Little Madam to see her GP. She reckoned that TLM could well have some sort of bacterial infection, and prescribed a week's worth antibiotics. She also prescribed two doses of redipred, a corticosteriod designed to fix that wheeziness once and for all (well, until the next time she gets sick and wheezy).

By the time we got home I was feeling really optimistic that it would all be uphill from there. TLM has just started really exploring our living area. Previously she seemed content to bum-shuffle around the carpted area and leaf through books and magazines; now however, TLM tends to aim for the rubbish bin, the cupboards and anything that looks like a potential climbing frame. I wouldn't be surprised if crawling and cruising set in by the middle of next month.

All those good feelings melted at bedtime though. Unusually, TLM screamed from the time I started singing her bedtime songs (my voice does have that effect on people, but she's used to it) and didn't settle until 90 minutes, four visits and an extra breastfeed later. Then 90 minutes after that, we got an encore.

The boy is sure it's the effects of the redipred. It hadn't occurred to me that corticosteroids could have such a dramatic effect, because I've been treated with similar medications all my life (for my asthma and hayfever) and never suffered ill effects (except I used to blame it for stunting my growth, which is probably quite inaccurate as it's more likely due to a regrettable family gene which produces short females and tall males).

At first I didn't believe him and thought it was probably a developmental thing. But I remembered that she was pretty hard to settle on Saturday evening too, and that day the doctor at the After Hours place had given her a dose of redipred...

So we have one more dose of this evil fluid to administer. I'm going to be very disappointed if TLM continues to wheeze after all this suffering.