‘Common’ daycare illness almost cost mom her eye after viral infection: ‘Sick inside and out’

A mother has issued a warning to other parents after her son came home from daycare with a common illness that left her with a glass stent in her eye.

Talitha Akamarmoi, from the NSW Central Coast, was in the middle of COVID lockdowns. Her son was still going to daycare as she was an essential worker.

Another parent sent their child to the facility with a cold sore — a common term for herpes simplex virus (HSV).

“I was at home with him. Whether it was going to be cold sores or hand, foot and mouth disease, I was obviously being careful,” she told news.com.au.

“I’m a nurse. I was washing my hands constantly.”

But, unfortunately, that didn’t stop the mom from catching it.

On Akamarmoi’s first day back at work, she developed a red eye. She thought she perhaps had conjunctivitis. So, she treated it as recommended, but it got worse.

She went to the doctor three separate times. The third time she asked them to swab her eye. The next morning, “she felt like she was dying.”

Akamarmoi felt “sick inside and out” and her eye had become swollen shut. There were sores all around it.

She went to the emergency room and, while she was there, her GP called and confirmed what she had assumed.

She had herpes simplex keratitis — a viral infection of the eye. She was told she could possibly lose her eye.

Her eye healed but as a result it was really watery. It meant she had to see an eye specialist, who tried to unblock her tear ducts. This required a needle in her eye and saline to wash it out, but built up scar tissue meant it was a hard task.

He told her she needed a stent — a little tube placed in there to hold it open temporarily to stretch the passageway.

Akamarmoi had the surgery booked. But, two months before she was due to have the procedure, she had a colonoscopy. It revealed she had stage three bowel cancer.

“That trumped eye surgery. I had to have a few surgeries and then six months of chemotherapy and dealt with that,” she said.

“But by the time I went back to the eye surgeon it wasn’t until 18 months later. He told me my tear ducts were completely blocked.”

She lived for more than a year of tears “dribbling” down her cheek. Her only option was to get a Jones tube. It’s a glass or pyrex tube that is in there permanently that creates a passageway for her tears.

“That’ll be the rest of my life. But, it works. He said it was a ‘s—t solution to an even s—ter problem,’” she recalled.

Looking back, Akamarmoi said she loved the stent. Without it, people constantly thought she was crying.

When she was at work intubating people she couldn’t touch her eyes. Tears would be dripping down her eye.

However, HSV also spread throughout her sinus and she had sores on her mouth as well. It also caused her to get tonsillitis. Now, she only breaks out on her lips when she is run down.

Her story blew up on social media after she shared that it was all because a child was sent to daycare with a cold sore, saying it wasn’t just a “sore on your lip.”

She said when a child is sick they should stay home from these kinds of settings, saying she was stunned that anyone would choose making money over the health of their kids.

The video divided its viewers. Some completely agreed with Akamarmoi. Others felt like she was unnecessarily blaming parents. It was a reaction that surprised the mom.

“I was just responding to a comment where someone was asking why there was a kid at daycare with a cold sore,” she said.

“I totally agreed with it because I wouldn’t be in this situation if the parent hadn’t sent the kid. I was just trying to educate people that it can be worse than you think.”

She made it clear that she was talking about parents of daycare and nursery aged children.

She said as children got older, they could be educated on washing their hands and not sharing food and drinks. This meant there was less of a risk.

Akamarmoi pointed out once you get HSV — like an estimated 3.8 billion people around the world under 50 do — you have it for life. She pointed out the first time someone is infected, they can get incredibly unwell.

“You want to prevent someone else from dealing with that — especially a small child,” she said.

Akamarmoi pointed out that some people may not have education or awareness about cold sores and that was why she was sharing her story as a warning.

She said that it can have horrific impacts — and in some cases even go into the brain.