Category: health

health, mommyhood

Duped

WFAM

Has this ever happened to you? You have a sick kid over the weekend and on Monday they wake up in a horrible state. They are overly emotional, out-of-sorts and seem so unlike their norm, you determine they should stay home. You send them to bed, pull the covers up to their chin and tell them to rest. Not twenty minutes later (and this is after you have already sent your other child to school), they ask for breakfast. Then, there is a spring in their step and a twinkle in their eye. Suddenly, you’re the one who feels ill because you know you’ve been duped.

The positive to all this is that at least Full Speed is super-compliant. He is cheerfully following my every command (I’m getting a ‘yes ma’am’ to anything I ask) because he beat the system (and his Mom).

health, kids, mommyhood

Another Day, Another Vitamin

WFAM

I may not do a lot of things consistently when it comes to the boys nutrition, but I am religious about giving them a daily multi-vitamin. Since I have been frequenting my local Walgreens due to my family’s varying degrees of illness, I remembered to pick up a fresh supply of children’s vitamins. There wasn’t much of a selection so I grabbed the largest one I could find that happened to be Flintstones Gummy vitamins. I had grown up consuming the hard, candy-like chewable variety of Flintstones and I had a fleeting wave of nostalgia overcome me. The next day I didn’t think twice as I passed around the Flintstones. I grabbed a couple and popped them in my mouth. I was quite surprised to realize they were like rubber cement. I could barely gnash and gnarl my way through them. I look up and see little T.Puzzle has one in his mouth and is fighting his way through it. His face is red, his fists are clenched and he is grunting like a crazy ape.

“These are hard to chew,” I manage to sputter out.

“No they’re not,” states Full Speed.  “All you have to do is swallow them whole.”

My heart drops to my shoes. My mind immediately races to the thought that these vitamins are a serious choking hazard. I thought the whole idea of a multi-vitamin was to preserve and protect my children’s health not endanger it.

Needless to say when I was at Target today I stocked up on loads and loads of SOFT, chewy vitamins. No worries dear readers, T.Puzzle and Full Speed will live to see another day.

children, health, self-image/self-acceptance

No Surprise

WFAM

Little T.Puzzle can’t shake his sick. It keeps lingering and lingering. It interferes with his eating, his sleep and his overall mood (lucky me). He woke up today with the nastiest cough. It was time to visit the doctor (again!). The timing wasn’t great as today is the day T.Puzzle’s long awaited big boy bed is to arrive and be assembled. Somehow, with Mad Dog’s calm input, I managed to get Full Speed off to school, T.Puzzle to the doctor, drop off AND pick up T.Puzzle’s prescription, deal with an extremely moody three year old, clean-up the aftermath of an explosive poop and be home for when the new bed arrived.

During the course of all this misadventure, I also had to throw T.Puzzle’s new Thomas the Train sheets in the wash. How is it possible that I have owned these sheets for over four months and I did not have one chance (not one!) to launder them before his bed arrived today? This bed has been back-ordered for 10 weeks so it wasn’t like it was a surprise.

The real surprise (or maybe not so surprisingly) is that I’m a Mom who isn’t perfect. In my defense I write excellent limericks. I would prefer no one actually comments on that. My self-esteem is depending on you.

bad day, health, mommyhood, self care (or lack thereof)

A Frightful Sight

WFAM

Starting off the new year has been a bit rough. All family members have been displaying varying symptoms of illness. I think the post pic of T.Puzzle properly captures how we all are feeling (bad and sad).

I am a Type-A personality. Unfortunately, I do not have the physical constitution to withstand the demands of having this type of personality. When I get sick, I get hit hard. Call it stress, call it being run-down, or call it whatever, I hit a serious rough patch about seven p.m. My body aches had reached a level 9 and my throat pain was at about a 7. The chills I was experiencing were out of this world. I was heading into the 72 hour range of having flu symptoms and was downright miserable.

Inevitably, Mad Dog and I discussed how to get me medical intervention. After some heated discussion (heated only on my part because of my 100.5 fever), the best solution was to call TeleDoc. It is a service offered through Mad Dog’s insurance that will diagnose your ailments through a phone call and if they deem necessary, call in a prescription for you.

I was offered Tamiflu (an antiviral) and took it. Mad Dog was sent out into the night to our 24 hour pharmacy to get it. I took it and felt an immediate improvement in body aches and fever (my throat is still killing me). Tamiflu is a slight contradiction. It can cause nausea which is awfully counterproductive if you felt nauseous in the first place. However, since it improved my symptoms overall I’m not going to knock it.

I now realize real love is blind. As I sat at the table yesterday feebly attempting to consume some food, I was surrounded by my three guys. I hadn’t showered in three days, had the same clothes on from the day I first got sick and my face had broken out. No one at the table cared. They were happy to see me even if to look at me was a little frightening.