Hello all! First time I've posted in forever! Sorry if I get long here...My son is 15 years old now. He's had ITP since he was about 6 years old.
Sometime around the last week of March, he came to me and said "Why do I have petechiae all over my feet?". Sure enough, both of his feet and up to about his ankles were literally covered in very tiny, faint purple spots! Not bright purple and if he'd been barefoot in the presence of someone who didn't know better, they probably wouldn't have noticed! He felt FINE! No other petechiae on his back (which is usually where it shows up first) or anywhere else. Since he was feeling normal and healthy, I thought little of it. Checked it here and there for a few days then kinda forgot about it. He hadn't been out of the house in 2 weeks at this point so I thought the chances of him having corona were very low.
March 31, he had a spell or two of diarrhea, no big deal. Again, feeling fine so we thought maybe it was something he ate. No more problems with that.
Sunday April 5, he suddenly started running fever. Fever was like 101.3 initially but came on down to 99-100 for 4 days. Never really felt bad he said. He had some mild chest congestion but no frequent coughing. He just had to clear his throat/chest regularly. I phoned his pediatrician the day after the fever started (forgot to mention the feet thing to her because I didn't associate it at the time) and she said she didn't think there was anything to be alarmed about but to just watch him. He got better without his symptoms ever progressing so I thought he must have just had a cold.
However, this week, I see articles reporting cases in Italy, France, and Spain where patients with coronavirus are presenting with lesions on their feet. "According to a statement from the Spanish General Council of Official Podiatrist Colleges, the lesions are described as similar to those seen with chickenpox and can largely be seen on the feet of children and adolescents." Granted, my son's were not as large as chickenpox lesions and did not look like the child's toes as reported in the article... but it REALLY makes me wonder if he had a very, very mild case of COVID-19 and we didn't know it! (His feet are all clear now BTW)
Looking back on those 10 days or so, I do recall him being unusually tired. My son is quite athletic and is not one to just lay around all day. I remember finding him asleep in his room at such random times and asking him if he was ok and he'd reply "Yes I'm fine, I'm just really tired".
Hindsight is 20/20 but the clues looking back are
1. Purple specks only on his feet
2. Brief gastrointestional issue (which is sometimes seen early in coronavirus cases)
3. Mild chest congestion
4. Fatigue
5. Fever
I can't wait for the antibody tests to be more readily available. I would love to get him tested to see if he has the antibodies present so we'll know if he had it. I feel like this information would be useful! The symptoms are so diverse and bizarre in some cases. If he gets the testing completed I'll update.
