Tomous wrote:Knoyleo wrote:Tomous wrote:Little man is going to start nursery in November when my wife returns to work.
First of all, nursery prices, facking hell!
Second, can anyone explain to me how the childcare tax benefit works? I'm a bit confused by it-do we pay into an account and the Gov top it up by 20% and the nursery is paid from that account? Thanks
Yep, eye watering. Luckily, my wife's a teacher and we've found a nursery that will offer term time only places, so that helps, but it's still like having a second mortgage.
Thanks for mentioning the childcare tax benefit, wasn't even aware of that, so will be sure to get that sorted when he starts going.
That'll be a huge saving, we're having to pay 51 weeks
How's your son doing now mate?
He's doing really well now, thanks! Had a good few weeks now without any return visits to hospital or anything like that, and he's really putting weight on at a good pace now, having been pretty underweight before.
I realise I haven't actually updated on here since April, and there's been a few developments since. The initial extractive surgery to remove the cyst from his chest went really well, but he was discharged with a prescription for some blood thinning medication to deal with a clot from the op, eventually wound up being a 12 week course of this medicine 3 times a day Very glad that's over now. He then had a return to hospital a few weeks later with some breathing difficulty again, but they think that was just a viral infection causing some swelling, combined with some minor damage to his throat from all the intubation etc. he'd gone through previously. So then he got booked in for some follow up procedure involving putting a camera down his throat to look at that a few weeks later again. Then, out of the blue while we were on holiday in June, we got a call from the hospital to say they'd finally got results of a biopsy on what was removed from his chest in April, and it turns out it wasn't a cyst at all, but a benign tumour. A non cancerous thymoma, and given that the consultant is a thoracic specialist in the Children's hospital, he's apparently never heard of a case of that in a child that young. So, as it was now a tumour, not a cyst, they decided to bring him in again to remove the lump that was still in his neck, but not obstructing airways. That procedure went OK, (some minor complications, they found more of it sat behind his lymph gland and took longer to remove it, my wife was in the waiting room and overheard the anaesthetist tell the parent of a child who was due to go for an op that the previous one was overrunning due to complications and nearly had a heart attack,) and he's got a scar running along the front of his neck now like he's Christopher Walken in Seven Psychopaths. Then he got discharged with a prescription for Paracetamol and Ibuprofen. It turns out Ibuprofen can cause hypersensitivity, so he hadn't been discharged more than 24 hours before I was back in A&E with him, because he'd gone all red, come up in hives, and his face had started to swell up when he rubbed it. Sat in A&E for 9 hours, then got sent home at 2am with some Piriton for him, and told to avoid Ibuprofen in future.
That was exhausting to type out. He's only 6 months, but it feels like he got here a lifetime ago.
Think that last bit was about a month ago now, so the four/five weeks since with no scares has just been bliss. We've started weaning him over the last week and a bit, and so far, all he'll eat of what he's been given is either baby rice, or parsnip, but it's a good start.