I’m posting here because I’m not seeking medical advice, just wondering about any experiences you may have had with it. In a nutshell, the teenager has been sick. She was diagnosed with an ear infection and put on an antibiotic. A friend of hers has strep throats and the daughter, while still on the antibiotic started with a sore throat. She’s also having a lot of pain and swelling in her neck area and is just overall uncomfortable, hasn’t really had a fever to speak of possibly very low grade. I had her to the doctor today, rapid strep test is negative but doc said the antibiotic may have taken care of that. She said her throat doesn’t look too bad. So as of now, she’s starting a stronger antibiotic in case it’s an infection of the lymph nodes which would be resistant to the first antibiotic or its mono. Doc said to do 48 hours on the new med and if she’s not feeling any better, take her for blood work. I’m guessing if it’s mono nothing can really be done, so the doctor figures let’s rule out an infection first. Anyway, my heart’s breaking for her she just feels so miserable. Btw, today would be eight days on the ten day antibiotic which she’s not going to finish because she’s starting the stronger 14 day one.
Seems to me that it’s a huge YMMV on this one. I had mono in college (10 years ago; no idea if treatment has changed in that time?) and I honestly wouldn’t’ve known it was anything other than a cold that seemed to linger. I still functioned pretty normally.
One of my roommates had mono the following year (I DIDN’T DO IT! 
and she barely left her bed for weeks. She ended up flunking out of school but there may have been extenuating circumstances.
I hear you, I have no experience at all with it and I’m guessing the doc wasn’t too sure which is why we are trying an antibiotic first. Part of me thinks it’s just a nasty infection because she did have the ear infection but I’m clueless. Thanks for the input, I guess it really depends how badly it knocks you for a loop.
When I had mono I was extremely sick. I lost 10 lbs (about 10% of my body weight at the time) in a week. I was stuck in bed and really miserable. I recall that I was given steroids to fight it, but don’t know if that is still done. I was kept off work for 3 weeks (maybe 4?).
My nodes were very swollen and mono was suspected early. I also recall an extremely sore throat.
She’s had a very sore throat but the doc said it didn’t look too bad or that the first antibiotic helped clear it up. I haven noticed any weight loss but the poor girl has been passed out on the couch since we came home around 8:45 this morning. That could also be partly because I know she was very uncomfortable last night. I figure the more rest she can get she needs to get while she can.
I also had mono in college, and I wasn’t completely knocked down by it. For a couple weeks I had a fever in the evening and sweats in the morning, and I felt tired, and when I would wake up my eyelids would be so swollen I could barely see for a while (an amusing and little-talked-about symptom). I don’t remember a sore throat.
Other people I’ve known were so badly affected they couldn’t walk and missed weeks and weeks of school.
At first, I felt like I just had a cold, and went to a party, where a friend immediately remarked on my swollen glands. Within a few days I had strep and bronchitis and the doctor confirmed mono with blood work. I also lost more than ten pounds in a week. It was pretty awful, but I was only out of commission for a week or so.
My youngest kid had it when he was about 14. Sore throat and swelling for a week, he lay on the couch watching telly and moaning a lot…and on the eighth day was feeling fine and went back to school.
If he hadn’t had a positive result from the swabs I would have just assumed he had a garden-variety lurgy.
I got mono at age 29 and I was bedridden for 6 weeks, lost 15 lbs and could barely function for months afterwards. That was half my life ago and to this day when I get a bad cold, after the congestion clears up I get the same lousy mono feeling that lasts for weeks.
Wow! It seems like the symptoms and how it affects everyone can be slightly off the map. I said earlier I haven’t noticed any weight loss, but the appetite is off, I’m sure because of the sore neck/throat. I just checked and her temperature is normal. I guess we will have to ride it out. I’m hoping like crazy the new antibiotic just knocks whatever it is out of her. If not, we are off to have blood work done.
This is just a thought, but I wonder if it’s harder the older you are when you get it. I know with just regular bugs sometimes it seems like it takes me longer to recover. At least she’s only 15 so that will work in her favor.
I had a fairly mild case of mono when I was 21. For about a week I was terribly tired and weak and would sleep all day. The second week I felt better and I was back to college after that.
The doctor at the time said the mono is self-limiting; eventually you recover. The only danger is that the spleen becomes enlarged and could be ruptured if you get struck.
I prefer stereo, but will opt for mono if that’s how it was intended to sound
I had mono during my sophomore year of college (age 19). I was pretty much down for the count for 2 weeks – a full week with a fever, then, a second week after the fever broke, when I was just incredibly tired, and just walking across the room would give me nausea.
I lost about 10 pounds – and, before I got sick, I was only about 155 pounds, at 5’10", so I wound up looking really gaunt.
Mono tends to present with sore throat and extreme fatigue. It doesn’t have to have any symptoms, and antibiotics don’t help it. It gives unlucky people big lymph nodes and/or a big spleen. Many viruses can cause a sore throat. I hope the second antibiotic works but it is unlikely to; I would have just recommended time, throat spray or lozenges, avoiding high impact sports and alcohol, and not sneezing on or kissing loved ones.
Yes, I’m getting that impression, it just happens to be dumb luck. I think the doc wants her on the other, stronger antibiotic for a few days to rule out a lymph node infection. I’m not entirely sure why, perhaps because she’s just getting over the ear infection and she did say if it is an infection and not mono, the first antibiotic wouldn’t have been strong enough to knock it out.
One of my daughters had mono while she was in grade school. Our doctor advised that even if she was not hungry, it was important to be sure she consumed enough fluids regardless of how sore her throat was, lest she become dehydrated. Anything was o.k. – ice pops, soda, anything.
Thanks, that’s good advice. In fact, we were just talking about that. She’s so sore she doesn’t want anything, not even popsicles right now. I told her how important it was and she finally drank some of a water bottle.
I was in high school. (So it was about 55 years ago. Gah!! How did I get so old??) i remember the doctor was concerned that nobody else caught it from me so I had to have my own silverware and plates and glasses. I was just SO TIRED. Walking to the bathroom wore me out. I was a child who normally read all the time and I was too tired to read. Seems like it lasted all summer but probably it was about a month. I don’t remember losing weight but I do remember my glands being very swollen and being thirsty all the time and it hurt to swallow.
Have her keep an eye on the color of her urine. If it becomes noticeably darker, she is underhydrated.
mmm