Chicken pox from the vaccine

Last Thursday (16 July) when we got home, Rian was very cranky and had not had his naps properly. We had noticed some red marks on his legs the day before, and presumed them to be mosquito bites. On closer inspection this day, a random thought came into my mind. It was the 10th day of his 1 year vaccines (given on 7th), and I remember the doctor mentioned we may see a rash from the MMR. I thought this was related to measles. It completely skipped my mind that he received Varicella as well. We called PAMF after hours nurse support.

Usually the advice nurses are very good, but this time around it took forever to speak to one, she didn't have Rian's record in front of her, asked me tons of questions about this "rash", and the conversation wasn't very nice. Meanwhile Amit had given Rian some Tylenol, so baby had his dinner without incident and had seemed to calm down quite a bit. We missed the urgent care window by 10mins, and decided to monitor Rian overnight on our own. The next day was Friday and was WFH so I could monitor the little fellow and take him to urgent care if required. Since he was fine throughout the day, albeit a bit cranky, we decided to skip the visit to the pediatrician.

On Friday night though, one red spot on his leg and one on his right hand seemed to be full of "water" and the one on his leg burst. Now we were concerned, and got an appt for Saturday morning 10:30am. The doctor (Amy Henegan) was very nice to us and explained this was classic chicken pox from the vaccine, a 1 in 100 chance. She handed us some anti-biotic ointment to prevent infection of those boils. Since the virus is attenuated for the vaccine, this chicken pox does not spread to healthy people. Phew, what a relief!

Today Rian is getting much better, and the boils have reduced in size. They're still there though, and the one on his hand burst and made a big wound :-( My brave babe is taking the boo boo quite well, I should add. A few 6am wakings :-) and a few low grade fevers asides, he's my sweet little pumpkin. Get well soon, meri jaan.