Sickness

It's a regular old infirmiry around here. Elizabeth started puking last Saturday. And then everybody ended up being sick. The thing is, they all seemed to be sick in different ways. Elizabeth had the GI stuff, Savannah had a high-ish fever, Emma had snot and diarrhea, and Mark seemed to feel perfectly normal, but had the runs. I know, that's way too much information. But I haven't left the house for a week. I have nothing else to talk about. Unless you'd like to know what I purchased at my quick store run on Thursday--the only day I actually dressed. Anyway, so my kids all had these different symptoms, but were all clearly sick. I kept the kids home from school Monday, then sent him on Tuesday while Elizabeth finished recovering. And I thought we were out of the woods. Then Mark woke up in the middle of the night with a high fever. Which developed into a doozy of a cold. He was out of school for the rest of the week and Emma has been functioning, but clearly under the weather. Kip and I both had these weird bouts of exhaustion. Not normal get-up-100-times-in-the-night exhaustion, but like, I went to bed one night at 8:30, then woke up at 7:00. I got Elizabeth off to school and then just crashed on the couch with all the kids just doing stuff and going crazy around me. I never do that. I never can. I dragged myself up for lunch and then crashed again that afternoon for a couple hours. It was just weird. But, hey, if that's a sickness, I will take it any day. The question is, was it a sickness. I thought it was. Because I thought we were out of the woods again. Because, finally, on Saturday Mark's fever broke and I thought, "Hurray. Maybe we can all even go to church together on Sunday." And then Saturday night Savannah threw up. It was so painful. Painful because I'd thought we were done. Painful because she's so little and was so uncomfortable and I didn't know if she'd feel bad all night or be able to sleep. Painful because I couldn't help but thinking, "Okay, if we're throwing up again a week later, who's going to throw up next." And suddenly we weren't out of the woods at all.

Also, whenever my kids are sick, I start viewing our food as something that might be regurgitated. This is not good for one's appetite. In fact, perhaps people trying to lose weight should just start businesses where they care for puking children. All of the sudden, they will see the food they plan to eat as something that will be puked. Instant appetite control.

Anyhow, Savannah recovered very very quickly, slept through the night, and we stayed home from church (again) and watched hundreds of Veggie Tales movies (again). It wasn't too bad though. There was a warm fire and lots of cuddling. I even made chocolate chip cookies without worrying too much about throwing them up. And so I am grateful. But do I dare to hope we're out of the woods. I'm not sure.