Some of you may already know part of this from my "12 pains of Christmas thread" but I was hoping that you all could keep my oldest DS Alex in your thoughts in the coming days. He's been sick since last week with an unknown virus and just when he seems to be getting better, he goes downhill again. He's been in and out of the ER with high fevers (up to 103.3) and was at the doctor every day this week so far.

He came down with the fever last Thursday and it went away until Christmas Eve night. Once he got it then, it hasn't really left. The only time he gets rid of it is when I take him out in the cold. We've been alternating Motrin and Tylenol per doctor's orders, but it never really takes the fever away completely. He normally hovers around 100-101. Christmas night he was in the ER for the first time and they said that he had strep throat even though the rapid strep test came back negative.

When his doctor saw him on Tuesday (luckily our other DS had a 2 year check up and she took one look at Alex and knew something was wrong), she said that she didn't think he had strep at all, that it was viral. She was correct, which we found out yesterday (about the strep).

He's had two shots of Rosefin (sp?), which is a super antibiotic and is on two types of antibiotics to try and control the effects of the virus and the bacterial stuff it's causing (coating in his throat). His CBC came back normal and his urine was normal. We just don't know what's wrong.

Yesterday was a fairly good day, his fever got up to 102.4 briefly before he went to the doctors, but last night it was back up to 103.2. I have to call his doctor's office again and leave her a message with his condition, and she said that if he still had a moderate to high fever, she was going to squeeze him in.

So if everyone could please keep him in your thoughts, I'd really appreciate it. He's only 5 years old and is being as brave as he can, but when opening Christmas presents doesn't excite him, or he asks to take a nap, I know something is really wrong.

Thanks in advance.