Catch Up and the Sickness

Welcome back to blogging land!  It's been a while for several reasons:

* I went on vacation and didn't have a lot of time to post.
* My laptop died so I couldn't post.
* We were all sick so I didn't want to post.

I plan on doing a catch up post on Christmas to catch up as well as all my knitting goodies that I have created.  There isn't a whole lot of other things to post about yet.  I will have two upcoming posts about Cal since his first birthday is tomorrow!  Plus his party is on Saturday.

For now, here is a wrap-up of how we spent my winter vacation.

Friday December 14th was my last day of work and I was excited!  Even though I was feeling some weird throat thing/cold coming on.  I chalked it up to allergies.  Saturday I went to my knitting class as usual so I could finish up all my Christmas projects.  Things were going fine until Jack caught my mild cold.  He seemed fine but he woke up in the middle of the night on the 19th complaining that his ear hurt.  He went back to sleep just fine but I knew that he needed to be seen by the doctor.  He doesn't complain of ear pain unless he has an ear infection.

Sure enough, after a visit to the pediatrician, he was given a prescription of Amoxicillin and sent home.  Since he won't take medication straight up, we had to hide all his doses in juice.  Stellar parenting right here folks.

Vacation cruised along for a couple of days and we brought the boys to see Santa. They did great and it resulted in the cutest picture ever.  I will post in the Christmas post.

Cal caught Jack's cold on Saturday and was pretty miserable.  By Saturday night, just mere hours after getting sick, it was evident that he also had an ear infection.  He wouldn't sleep and just cried all night.  Since it was a Sunday and I didn't want to wait or risk not getting in to see the pediatrician on Monday since it was Christmas Eve, I took him to urgent care.

Ding ding!  Ear infection.  What can I say?  I know my kids.  After getting a prescription, we were sent home.  Cal was feeling much better after a couple of doses of the Amoxicillin and some baby Advil.

We managed to avoid being sick on Christmas with the exception of ear infections. It was touch and go because Cal was coughing pretty bad even though he felt okay.  We weren't sure if we would be able to go to my in-laws' on Christmas Eve because our elderly grandmother and her friend would be there.  We didn't want to risk getting them sick.

Christmas was fun and we all felt fine.  I should have known that it was short-lived.

I started getting sick shortly after Christmas.  Not just a mild cold, but a full blown, snotty, coughing, sneezing, can't taste anything cold.  It was gross.  I think I consumed nothing but orange juice for two days.  And since our house is small and there is no place for germs to go, I managed to pass my cold back to Jack.  And Jason got it too.

We were functional but since we were all sick, I wasn't able to take the kids to any of the fun activities that I had planned for my vacation.  I wanted to take them to Zoo Lights, to OMSI, go see Christmas lights and to the new Portland Aquarium.  We did nothing but sit at home, watch a lot of tv and wash a lot of laundry.

On Sunday December 30th, Cal was acting weird, not sleeping, not napping and tugging at his ears.  Back to urgent care we went!  He had yet another ear infection.  Even though he was on Amoxicillin, the infection wasn't clearing up and it had migrated to his other ear.  It appeared to be a drug resistant bacteria so he had to be put on a different medication.  Poor guy.

New Year's Eve came and since the boys were still getting over colds but stable, Jason and I decided to stay in, have some appetizers and drink some Prosecco.

After heading to bed early, I was awoken at 3am by Jack who wanted to snuggle on the couch.  He then proceeded to throw up all over himself and he didn't stop throwing up for hours.  I didn't think Jack had a stomach virus because this seemed different. He has been struggling to poop lately and I thought maybe this could be a blockage.  To the children's ER we went.  Two hours later we were home with a prescription for Zofran and a diagnosis of stomach flu.

Since Jack was feeling better, Cal and I went to our family celebration on New Year's Day.  I needed to get out of the house for a bit after being cooped up for what felt like weeks.  Life went on for another couple of days and I went back to work on Wednesday the 2nd.

When I logged off work on the 2nd I started feeling bad.  Like nauseous and head spinning bad.  At the very same time, Cal got fussy.  By 6:00 Cal and I had both thrown up.  Jack had gifted us both his lovely stomach bug.

It was a rough 8 hours.  Cal and I were both sick and neither of us could keep food or any liquids down.  I had an awful fever and diarrhea.  Cal cried and cried and cried because he was so thirsty but we didn't want to give him much liquid at a time because we knew he would vomit it back up.  Thank the Lord for Jason.  He would hold Cal while I went to the bathroom to empty the contents of my stomach.  He got Jack his dinner and put him in bed.  He held Cal for a couple of hours so I could try and sleep.

At 1:00 in the morning, both Cal's and my fever broke and we both had managed to keep some liquids down.  I held Cal in bed and he slept like a log until 4:00, woke briefly for some juice and then went back to sleep.

The next few days were touch and go.  We were all so weak from being sick off and on and we had to modify the kiddos' diet so they weren't consuming any milk since milk is so harsh on their stomach when they have a bug.  Most days the kids didn't throw up.  They have a couple of times here and there but we are feeding them such mild foods so their tummies don't revolt.

Now?  We are slowly getting better.  We all still have the trots and I am on medication for a sinus infection.  Other than that, we are slowly starting to feel better.  Please everyone cross your fingers that none of us get sick again. I can't handle any more damn illness!