And Then There Was One ...

... Healthy person left in the house. Dear Husband is the last one standing. We are dropping like flies from Big A's plague.

Little A started acting off a few days after Big A. No fever, but some coughing. She developed a forlorn little cry that had the effect of Ginsu knives on the rusty tin can of my heart. I am not the type of mama who typically wells up when my kids get vaccinated or skin a knee. But this new cry was so honestly sad and pained that I was edgy and nervous for for the rest of the week. Sometimes I'd think she was a little hot, but just when I'd get my act together enough to get the thermometer out of the medicine cabinet, she'd feel cool to the touch. She continues to cough a little, but it is mostly dry, and her nose isn't runny at all. She is usually such a smiley baby, but she was fussy and frowny, and so I was on edge and enveloped in a cloud of hazy worry

As of last night, I am all too aware of what caused the heart-breaking cries in Little A. My neck started to get achy last night just as the nieces both arrived at our house for babysitting (sister-in-law's husband was turning 40 and they were needing a child-free evening of celebration). I figured it was stiffness from pruning trees earlier in the day. But as Big A and the nieces swirled around the house in early-play date tornado mode and Little A was mournfully mewing in discomfort, the neck stiffness quickly spread down my spine and legs. I was flat out in bed and quivering like Little A in less than an hour.

The bad news? I wasted most of Sunday, our family fun day, laying in bed. The good news? Because it was Sunday, DH was home to take care of the kids and I could lay around in bed! I did manage to nurse the baby multiple times and drag my butt into the kitchen to make cookies with Big A. But, that level of activity is about 1/1000th of usual. DH was a real peach and no doubt when inevitably comes down with the plague tomorrow or the next day, I will similarly spot him all parenting duties while he lays around moaning.

Being sick used to drive me utterly nuts. Pre-kids, I focused on the mucous and the coughs and how annoying it was to not be up to full capacity. I was so annoyed and impatient when I got ill. But I was just talking to a childless friend of mine who was bitching about this killer sore throat in exactly the same way I would have done four or five years ago: It was torturing him, he called in sick for days, and even ended up calling his doctor brother and begging for a vicoden RX, which he then complained left him feeling fuzzy-headed. And the thing was, I had the EXACT same sore throat he was describing while we were talking on the phone, and it hadn't even occurred to me to mention it to him! It really hadn't stopped me from dragging myself through my life. In fact, I'd been feeling pretty grateful it was just a sore throat, because a handful of Advil now and then can usually take care of that, whereas a fever or chills and aches put a kink in the usual daily routine.

I guess one of the benefits of having a bunch of medical mishaps in the last year is that I now have a completely revised pain scale:

Wabi's New Pain Scale

1) Horsefly bites. Those suckers draw blood!
2) Stubbed toes
3) Cold sores on your tongue, so every word or bite rubs it
4) A bad sore throat
5) A fever
6) A sprained ankle
7) Food poisoning/Montezuma's Revenge
8) Big A's labor, pre-epidural
9) Uterine perforation & intraoperative awareness during the emergency laparoscopy to repair the perf.
10) Uterine rupture in pregnancy ... contractions with the baby's feet extruded through a hole in the top of your womb hurts WAY WORSE than regular old contractions. Plus, internal bleeding feels like being stabbed.