mom fail of the year

It's official, I had my first (but probably not really my first) mom fail.

A week after his 2 month birthday (yet thankfully AFTER our family pictures) Beau woke up with a few dots on his face. 

Hmm...a little weird, I thought. It looked like the beginnings of baby acne; something we hadn't seen since 5 or 6 weeks.  I started undressing him and he had red marks on his arms and legs, too!

I texted the above pictures to my mom and sister with questions. It's funny because it looked like NOTHING just then. We laid in bed for another 30 minutes and I really undressed him and it looked like this:

What?! My sister suddenly got worried and I called the pediatrician. 

My first thought was that it was a dog allergy, but that didn't make much sense. Then I thought about what I had eaten the night before, but it wasn't anything weird and as you can tell, he wasn't broken out on his torso at all. Next up: laundry. 

Before Beau was born, I ordered some Babyganics detergent and had pre-washed most things in that. Since about 7 weeks, we had run out of the detergent and I went to All Free & Clear, because I had read that it served the same purpose (no extra chemicals or fragrances) and was safe for babies. Here was my big fail, though: I had tried so hard to find clothes in good condition when I was buying for Beau, but I felt like they were getting stiff and showing wear after just a few weeks. I decided to buy fabric softener to lessen the wear. Have I ever used fabric softener before? No. And I didn't even think about the effect it could have on us!

I did a quick google and this made me more confident in my guess that fabric softener was the culprit:

Here's my back story as to why I'm still confident that it was the fabric softener:

-The sleeper he wore that day was brand new and we had washed it the night that he went to sleep in it. Thus, it was straight out of the dryer and onto him.

-I'm not much for consistency and I had just poured out a random amount (not a giant amount, but possibly more than recommended) of fabric softener into that particular load

-I had fed Beau at 4am and 7am that morning, but took him into bed that morning at 7am and slept next to him. We have flannel sheets on the bed and he was up close to me, which I think caused him to sweat

I called the pediatrician, sent emails of pictures, and ultimately decided to go in later that afternoon.

We ran to Target (and bought new detergent!) and this pitiful face made me so sad:

He wasn't showing any signs of being uncomfortable (the face above was just sleepy) but the sight of his rash was so horrendous that I almost cried every time I looked at him.

at the pediatrician's office

The pediatrician just checked for signs of a virus and after finding nothing, said that there's really no telling what it is. It was obviously an allergic reaction and that's all they could say!

It got worse and worse throughout the day, but didn't show up on his chest for the first 36 hours or so. This was 5pm the day it showed up:

That night, it started spreading up his face:

The next morning. It looked less red and more pink, but it was spreading!

Day three. It was so crazy to watch it fade from where it first popped up and grow to where it hadn't been before. Apparently this is how hives operate. It eventually got to his chest and diaper area.

Finally, after 3 full days, the rash subsided and I had my clear skinned baby back! It was such a relief. 

(the following Thursday)

Now every time I see a pink mark or dot, I check the rest of his body for a rash. We also are used to doing the 'smell test' on all of his clothes and blankets as well as anything we wear, too. I re-washed everything in babyganics but I don't know if I missed something that had been washed with the fabric softener. 

I felt like a TOTAL moron for not thinking twice about using fabric softener after I had been so careful with the detergent in the past, but I guess it's just one of those things you learn! I am thankful that he wasn't in pain and that the rash subsided somewhat quickly! 

So, moms out there, heed my advice: crunchy clothes are better than hive-covered babies! Don't use fabric softener!