5 posts tagged “pestilence”

that Friday's little extravaganza of stupidity was a prelude to The Bug being sick. Yet another ear infection, this time with bonus pink eye.

What was a bit of a runny nose on Friday turned into a constantly runny/stuffy nose by Saturday. On Sunday, he took a three hour nap, which is really out of character for Mr. I-won't-take-a-nap-and-you-can't-make-me-I'll-sit-up-my-room-talking-and-singing-and-screeching-but-I'll-be-damned-if-I'll-take-a-nap...

By bedtime Sunday, he added a cough to the mix. He had a rough night, and then threw about fifty-four fits in the first hour he was awake on Monday morning. A quick check of the calendar showed us that he was right on schedule for another ear infection, since he was just looked at and declared infection free less than two weeks ago. So, I took him to walk in hours at the ped's office first thing.

I wasn't surprised when the diagnosis was otitis media. I was surprised, however, when the nurse practitioner asked me how long The Bug's right eye had been gunky. We thought the red-rimmed eyes were due to the excessive amount of crying he'd done, but by the time he was looked by the NP, it was clearly pink eye. Ew.

The good news is that the antibiotic he's on for the ear infection will take care of the pink eye, too, so we don't need to mess with drops. I'd rather wrestle a rabid alligator than try to get eye drops into this kid...

The bad news is, he's still stupid. Last night, he woke up and proceeded to throw the granddaddy of all fits. Nothing would calm him down, everything just pissed him off more. So we said fuck it, stay in your room by yourself if you're going to be an asshole. (Okay, we didn't literally say that to him, but that was the general gist.)

Yeah. Bad idea. He screamed and screamed until he puked.

Changing puked-upon bedding at 1:30am is not my idea of fun. Also? Self-induced puking doesn't make me feel particularly sympathetic towards the boy. I'm just that kind of mom.

Anyway. He probably could have gone to school today, since he's being medicated and his eyes were basically gunk-free, but I was able to get a co-worker to cover me at the store, so me 'n The Bug are spending another glorious day at home. Did I mention that this is Daddy-man's late night at the office? He won't be home until well after The Bug's bedtime.

How do I cope, you ask? Like this:
Breakfast = an entire pot of coffee and an english muffin with butter and peach preserves
Lunch = waiting until after The Bug is in bed for nap time and actually enjoying my California roll
I will not count the actual number of servings of diet Pepsi I've consumed. It may well be obscene.
I'm saving the gigantic mocha frappuccino that's in the fridge for after The Bug gets up from his nap. I know I'll need it.
I'm letting him watch far too much television, and when he is not insisting that I play with him, I am knitting. "You work on your project, sweetie, and I'll work on mine."

But tomorrow? I'm going to work, come hell or high water. The ridiculous bullshit that our adult customers bring through the door will be a welcome change.

So said The Bug, after booting three times in quick succession, covering the majority of the tile floor on the enclosed porch.

That was Sunday afternoon.

On Sunday night, I made his bed as follows:
waterproof mattress pad
fitted sheet
waterproof mattress pad
fitted sheet
garbage bags (I was out of waterproof mattress pads, you see)
fitted sheet

My logic was that if he barfed in the middle of the night, I'd much rather take off one layer than have to remake a whole bed. And it paid off, because boy, did he barf. And boy, was it quicker and easier to deal with, what with my smart planning ahead.

On Monday, I kept him home with me. He was fine. Not even a hint that he might throw up. Monday night? He was fine. But I was sick. All.Night.Long.

On Tuesday, The Bug went to school, but I stayed home from work. Not too far into the day, Seth came home sick, too. And at about 4pm, The Bug's teacher called to say he had thrown up. Which meant he had to stay home Wednesday. That was okay, though, because Seth was in no shape to go to work, so they convalesced together and I went to work.

Why, you may wonder, am I writing this at two o'clock in the morning? Well, I'm doing laundry. Because I'm fine, Seth is fine, and The Bug was fine all day long... Hadn't been sick since 4pm Tuesday afternoon... Had a great day... Went to bed... Slept for a few hours... And then threw up in bed.

So, yeah. You don't want to let Spaghetti-O puke sit until morning. So I'm washing the sheets, the comforter, the pillow, the blanket - the whole kit and caboodle. It was so bad that Seth took The Bug in for a shower while I took care of the laundry and got his room back in order, and then he was so pitiful that we let him watch Sesame Street before we put him back to bed. You know he's pitiful when we let him watch tv at 11pm.

I know the stomach flu has been going around. Lots of kids at The Bug's school have been out with it. But this business of being fine for 24+ hours and then getting sick again, since Sunday? This seems a bit much. We'll be taking Mr. Bug to the doctor in the morning. How I love sick child walk-in hours...

And then we'll have to figure out what to do if he can't go to school on Friday. Tomorrow's a no-brainer, we both have the day off. But Friday, we both have to work. Seth can't take the day off, and if I can't work, I'm responsible for getting someone to cover for me. Which I already did on Tuesday. I might be SOL.

The Bug has the right of it. Puke makes it slippery.

This morning, I'll let him go for a song.  I'll even consider paying someone to take him.  Really.

I think I already mentioned that The Bug has another (or the same persistent) ear infection.  He just started his fourth round of antibiotics since March, and this particular drug is one of the "may cause upset stomach" variety.  And let me tell you, by "may," they mean "will."  And by "upset stomach," they mean "your child will wake up in the middle of the night screaming in pain."

The doctor recommended giving him yogurt with live acidophilus, or acidophilus powder, to alleviate the stomach upset.  The Bug will not deign to eat yogurt.  Not even Cookies & Cream flavor, with Oreo bits mixed in.  Not even if we tell him it's frosting with cookie bits.  He's also being extremely contrary about eating, refusing to have a snack with his medicine.  It's no surprise it's making him feel horrible. 

As you might imagine, with the stomach upset, The Bug had an extremely unrestful night last night.  This led to complete jerk behaviour for the first couple hours of the morning.  Screaming, crying, refusal to take off his sodden nighttime diaper, refusal to put any clothing on once the diaper came off, more screaming and crying... You get the picture.

So this morning, off I went to look for acidophilus powder, which we can put in his juice.  The Bug stayed home with Daddyman.

I arrived home with the acidophilus powder to find that The Bug had just urinated in our bed.  This bed.  He had just used the bathroom, so who would have thought he would promptly pee in the bed?

How does one get urine out of memory foam?  (I opened up the permanent cover, the one that's not supposed to be taken off, and blotted it with towels, then sprayed it with vinegar water to kill anything nasty, including the smell.  I'll sew the permanent cover back up once it dries and we confirm there's no residual stench.)

The awesome CoolMax cover is dry clean only, so Daddyman has made himself late for work in order to drop it off.  I will have to pick it up later, with the child in tow.  How am I going to get a two-year-old and a king size mattress cover back to my car alone?  I may have to be one of those horrible moms who leaves the kid in the car alone.  That has to be safer than having him in the parking lot with me when I don't have a hand free to make sure he doesn't dart in front of a car.  Oy.  Not a choice I want to make.

Anyway.  Let's review.

• Two visits to the pediatrician in the last week: $40 in copays
• Days The Bug did not go to preschool: 2 1/2
• Days Daddyman missed work to care for the sick Bug: 2
• Antibiotics: $40
• New thermometer: $10
• Yogurt that the kid won't eat: $2
  
• Number of times The Bug was up last night, requiring intervention: 2?  4 maybe?  It's all a blur...
  
• Time spent looking online for a brick & mortar store that carries acidophilus powder: 15 minutes
• Time spent going back & forth to store to purchase acidophilus powder: 30 minutes
• Acidophilus powder: $15
• Time spent cleaning the mattress: 20 minutes
  
• Dry cleaning bill for the mattress pad: $38
• Amount of juice The Bug has consumed since I put the acidophilus powder in it: None
• Number of things The Bug has had taken away from him today because he did not heed the "if you do X one more time, Y will be taken away" warning:  Damn, don't make me count.  A lot.  Just now, the whole box of Duplo blocks, because he preferred to throw them rather than play with them.

Mamma's frustration level?  Check the title of this post...

Because I have caught the pestilence from the child.  Please, put me out of my misery.

Day three of the bone chilling cold.  It is so cold that it's just not worth it to try to take The Bug out of the house.  Which is fine, because he's sick.  He's got a runny nose and oh-so-very-slightly elevated temperature.  He feels just rotten enough to not be sleeping well.  Thankfully, it's also just rotten enough for me to justify increased television consumption.  I'm saving the drugs for nap time and bedtime.  (Drugs for The Bug, not me.  Although maybe drugs for me would be a good idea...)

This morning's agenda so far has involved a conversation with one of my credit card companies in which I discovered that they entered our new address into their system incorrectly, so the last two statements were returned to them and they canceled my account for nonpayment.  After assessing late fees on it, of course.  Since it was their error, they're removing the late fees, but still...

I'm sure the day will progress nicely once the plumber arrives, which should be sometime between 10am and noon.  Why do we need a plumber?  Let's look back at the weather report, shall we?  Frozen pipe.  Because we needed a plumber asap, we went with the one that was recommended, but at $99 for the first half hour and $30/fifteen minutes thereafter, I don't think we'll choose to go with them for any future needs.  At this point, though, the choices are limited.  We can suck it up and pay to get the frozen pipe taken care of, or we can wait and hope it doesn't burst and cost a hell of a lot more money to fix later on.  Since the forecast for the immediate future is that it's going to stay this cold, we're sucking it up.

Did I mention a while ago that I changed the fill valve in our toilet all by myself?  I think I'll go into plumbing.

Update:  At 11:55am, as I was about to call the plumber and ask where they were and why they hadn't shown up yet, the problem resolved itself.  Hooray!!