From Naturally Healthy Babies and Children, by Aviva Romm:

FEVERS: Fever is not an illness. It is a process occurring as a response to infection and a signal of illness. It is not the fever itself that needs to be eliminated. Rather, the task is to support and nourish the child while the body does the work of eliminating infection, regaining equilibrium, and healing. In fact, fevers may be important in the body’s fight against invading organisms by stimulating the immune system and creating a body temperature inhospitable to bacteria.

The Role of the Fever: Current research on the human immune system is revealing that fever is not a disease but an immune system enhancer and stimulant. Fevers are now known to cause the production and release of chemicals in our bodies that actually combat infections. Increased temperature may also create an environment inhospitable to the growth of pathogenic organisms that in large populations in the body can lead to severe consequences. What wise women, mothers, and traditional healers have known for ages, conventional medicine, still in its infancy, is just beginning to acknowledge. We may yet “discover that it is the widespread suppression of the immune system that is contributing to the rise of autoimmune diseases.

This information makes one wonder, “Why stop a fever???”

Evie has had a fever for going on four days now. I have blessed peace and assurance and no thoughts of rushing to the emergency room have even entered my head. I don’t even use a thermometer to gauge her temperature, and we don’t plan to use the Fever Reducer sitting on the countertop unless we absolutely need to.

A sober minded Mamma is a good thing.

My kids are sleeping in and I know everyone is curious about how we do things around here, in lieu of product recalls on children’s medications freaking everyone out. So, I’m sharing what we do for fever ’round these parts.

In short: nothing.

Not too much anyway. I like to keep my babies close to my body as much as possible, so I know what their body temp feels like when they are well. Doctors use thermometers because they don’t know my child. Since we carry our babies so much, we know right away that they’ve got a fever. (And we do keep a thermometer around just in case we doubt ourselves or it feels like its getting too high.) And when you spend all day lovin’ on your kids you also know right away when they aren’t acting like themselves. So, I don’t do a lot of hovering over the thermometer unless they look really ill and feel really hot.

Then I try to get them to nurse a lot, if they are little. Or drink a lot if they’r big. Sometimes the only way to get fluids and nourishment in them is some jello made with Emergen-C mixed in and I’m okay with that.

We try to stay home and let them rest, rest, rest. If they feel like they are getting too hot and uncomfortable with the fever, we make a tepid bath, just a couple of degrees cooler than their body temp. Usually they play very happily for a while. And we change the scenery a lot, moving from one restful activity to another. Distraction seems to help.

On the herbal front I give echinacea because it promotes sweating- nature’s way of cooling the body anyway. This could be why my kid’s fevers never get that high. We also try to get plenty of Vit. C in them. This time around, Evie seems really restless with her fever so I’m giving her a tincture of skullcap, passionflower, chamomile, etc. These all calm the nerves and promote rest, and so far it’s working.

We do have fever reducer because I know fevers can get scary. But it’s a last resort, mostly used when we absolutely need some sleep or when baby/kid is just incredibly uncomfortable.

But I pull out my books and read the words of those like Aviva and remember that fever is not to be feared.

I’m pretty sure it’s roseola, and I’m just waiting for that tell-tale rash to appear since she has absolutely no other symptoms other than fever.