Year in Sickness

So this year is continuing to be full of illness in our household.  Thursday afternoon, while finally feeling better from my last bout with the common cold, I had the pleasure of dealing with another stomach bug that my son somehow received.  The entire day, up until my son arrived home with my wife, was great.  He had been feeling fine, acting perfectly normal at daycare, and even for a short time when he got home.  Very soon afterwards, however, he became very cuddly and wanting just to be held by either my wife or I.  At first we didn't think anything of it, we just held him when he wanted to, and let him play with his toys when he didn't.  We also figured that he was in a little bit of pain from his molars, which had started coming through a month ago, and are just now starting to break through.  That all changed when my wife was holding him and without warning there came a stream of stomach contents, onto my wife and also the floor.  To say it is heart wrenching to see your son doubled over with a cramping stomach and there being absolutely nothing you can do besides hold him and try to keep the regurgitation off of his little body is an understatement.  The first few episodes of any stomach bug are never that bad.  They may seem to be the worst due to the larger quantity of half processed food exiting the stomach, but the worst comes with the heaving and wretching afterwards, producing nothing but bile.  I know, its a little graphic for early morning reading, but I can't help but lay it out there like it is.  This stomach bug was worse than the one he had three weeks ago, almost to the day, in that every fifteen minutes there was more wretching and dry heaving.  Perhaps even worse than seeing my son going through the wretching and heaving is the complete lack of energy he has afterwards, almost going limp from all the effort his body is putting in to ridding itself of something.  He just wants to lay down on top of you, close his eyes, and sleep.  And let me tell you, he definitely looked a greenish pale, just like they say when your sick to your stomach.  This went on for a while with another bout of wretching and heaving every ten to fifteen minutes.  We tried some pedialyte, but that came up, and in the end decided that he shouldn't have anything before he went to bed and we would just get him enough fluids come morning when his stomach would hopefully be settled.  Well, it was and unlike the previous stomach bug which was followed the next day by a fever, Friday was a normal day. 

In fact, Friday worked out quite well.  My wife was going to take the day off from work to stay home with our son to make sure he didn't spread any germs to anyone else at his daycare.  As it turned out, she had a snow day so it didn't really matter.  All in all, despite the steady stream of sickness that has invaded our house for the past 2.5 months, we have been fortunate in the fact that the only germs coming in have been those of the common cold and the stomach bug.  There hasn't been anything serious like the flu or pneumonia or something crazier.   I would much rather deal with a year of the common cold than just one bout with the flu or pneumonia, those just aren't fun.   And there is yet another benefit to all these germs floating through our house and making us all sick in a short span of time; our son's immune system is being built up and hopefully by the time he gets to school age, he will have a fairly strong one that will be able to stave off most of the germs he comes into contact with.  Yet, for all the minor benefits of the germs we have been in contact with, they don't help to ease the mind much when you have your son laying on your chest and while laying there, covers you with a nice layer of half processed food.  For some odd reason, when your a parent, the vomit doesn't bother you when you are covered with it.  The smell doesn't seem as bad, the nastiness of it is the last thought in your mind, and all you want to do is make your child feel better.  That's how I was last Thursday.  I had vomit all over me and I didn't care, I just wanted our son to get past the wretching and heaving and have his stomach settled down.  Perhaps the worst part of any stomach bug is that there is almost nothing you can do about it.  You can't give someone with a stomach bug anything because it will just come back up.  The best thing you can do is have the patience to get through the worst of it and then start the fluids going back in.  My only hope, which seems to have played out pretty well so far, is that neither my wife or I got the bug that our son had.  In any case, I just want to get through the rest of March with relatively few germs floating around our house and get a good start into warmer weather with nothing bothering us. 

This week, I am remaining positive, will be a good week.  My cold is almost gone with only a few sniffles remaining, my wife's cold seems to be dissipating as well, and our son, well, he has had the sniffles, runny nose, and a cough for months now and I am hoping as soon as all his teeth are in he can get back to being his normal healthy self.  That isn't to say that he isn't acting normal now, because he is, I just want his nose to stop running so I can stop carrying tissues around in my pocket to wipe his nose.  Things will get better all in due time.  All in all, our son has been dealing really well with his cold's, stomach bugs, and fevers.  He just rests and doesn't moan or cry too much.  Maybe he will stay like that and deal with any illness that comes his way in the same manner.  Only time will tell.  For now, its time to move on with my life, get this week started, and get these germs past us.