Strep and PANDAS awareness

This past weekend with the boys was bad.  Sometimes when I say that, Dave gives me a reality check and says "they are always bad!" which isn't true.  However, I knew it wasn't just me when Dave said to me this weekend that is was the worst weekend he has ever had.

I couldn't put my finger on what was different.  They are generally high energy, but they were turbo powered this weekend. Ben literally looked like one of those cartoon characters whose legs spin in a circle as they run.  We were correcting their behavior 10-15 times an hour (between the two of them). In addition to this, there was screaming, screaming over everything.  Screaming uncontrollably for 15 minutes when told they canot watch a movie that we don't even have in the car.  Refusal to put on clothes.  Refusal to eat.  Refusal to bathe. 

Monday Ben refused to get in the car with me to take Liam to school.  He physically fought me.  He stayed with our house cleaner.  Then later that day, a friend who was at the house had to help me as he punched, kicked, and scratched at me to pick Liam up. Then around dinner time Liam started crying that he had too much mucous in his throat; I thought he was just overtired.

At 3am on Tuesday morning Ben woke crying saying his ears hurt; I suspected an ear infection.  I made a doctor's appointment and was expecting the diagnosis to be ear ibfection and pink eye as his eyes were goopy.  He had neither of those, but tested postive for strep throat without a single symptom.

Meanwhile, Liam and Ben were pushing everyone of my buttons.  Liam cried at school because he thought I was not coming to get him and was leaving him at school.

Wednesday (today) I took him in...positive for strep.

Do you know about PANDAS?  I didn't know much, then I went to these websites.
http://pandasnetwork.org/
http://www.pansawareness.org/Home.html

Check out the diagnostic criteria:

Symptom onset includes Primary ONSET of OCD* and/or Tics
along with at least two other following symptoms:

.

• Tics or other abnormal movements
• Severe separation anxiety, Generalized anxiety
• Irritability, Emotional lability, Aggression, Personality Changes
• ADHD, Inability to concentrate
• Sensory sensitivities
• Deterioration in learning abilities and school performance
• Developmental and age regression (inc. Deterioration in handwriting)
• Sleep and night time difficulties
• Urinary Frequency or Daytime or night-time secondary enuresis

*OCD may present as severe anxiety

Obviously, this is hard to differentiate from Liam's already existing diagnosis of autism and anxiety disorder and Ben's sensory issues.

The good news is that usually the awful behaviors decrease after a round of antibiotics (just like it would if you were treating regular strep).

I REALLY hope so because I want my kids behavior to do back to their version of normal.