They All Call Me Mom

stomach bug

We had a stomach bug here in our house recently.  It was so much fun, let me tell you.  Seven out of the nine kids got it, and I’m still holding my breath on the other two.  I’ve been busy disinfecting toilet knobs, door knobs, stair railings, desks, counter tops – if they can touch it, I’ve got a disinfectant wipe on it, doing my best to keep the germ at bay.  
But I have to be honest, I’ll take a 6-hour stomach bug over a regular cold with stuffy nose, cough and congestion any old day!  Those coughs and congestion can last anywhere from 1 – 2 weeks, and then everywhere you take your kid everyone gives you the stink eye when he or she coughs, and you just want to hang a sign on them that says:  I had the cold 10 days ago. This is just a lingering cough. I’m not contagious anymore. 
The stomach bug we got here ran it’s course in each child in about 4-6 hours.  They had no fever, they didn’t feel achey; in fact, it was hard to keep them in bed they were feeling so good.  They just threw up every 15 to 20 minutes.  
I was a little worried about Aria.  Being just 3 years old and not remembering the days when she used to spit up as a baby, I thought that she might freak out and cry when she started to throw- up.  You know how little kids can be.  But that wasn’t the case with her.  In fact, when the bug hit her, we were driving somewhere on the freeway and she said, “My tummy hurts.” and I thought, okay…here we go.   So I pulled off the freeway, gave her a plastic bag that was in the trunk of my car, and I said, “If you get sick, throw up in this until we get home, okay?”  and she said, “Okay, Mommy.”   and I thought to myself, well this will be a fun ride home.
So I started back on the freeway again.  Less than 5 minutes went by and I heard her making coughing sounds  and sure enough she had her head in the bag.  I said, “Aria, are you okay?”  and the other kids told me that she was getting sick, and I was about to pull off the freeway again, but then she pulled her head out of the bag, took a good look inside of it,  turned to her brothers and sisters and said, “Guys…you DON’T want to see this! ”  meaning the contents of the bag, of course.  And I just started laughing.  We all started laughing, and then she started laughing.  So I didn’t pull the car over but instead just continued on our way towards home.   
She was the best sick three year old I’ve ever had.  Once at home, she never missed making it into the toilet.  She would get up from playing and say, “I be wight back.  I just have to go fro up.”  Then she’d run to the bathroom.  I’d quickly follower her to see if she needed help, but she never did.  Then I’d wash her hands, clean her up, and she was ready to play again. 
I swear, only if they were all that easy.  They boys – oh what is the deal with boys and being sick?!!  Alex and A.J. complained the most.  After every time they got sick they would moan at me, “Mommmm….when is it going to stopppppp?!”  and I’d say, “Oh, 6 hours or so. You’ll be fine.”   and they would whine, whine, whine.  The wimps.  Rich can be the same way when he’s sick.  I’ll be honest and admit I don’t have too much sympathy for Rich when he’s sick.  I would have a lot of sympathy  if he wasn’t such a baby about it.  It’s like he’s always trying to exaggerate it,  and that’s where he loses me.  If he plays it up too much, then I give him the famous  “Oh give me a break.  Try morning sickness for 8 straight weeks.”  comment, which he never likes to hear me say because he knows he can’t compete with that.
You know what’s totally not fair, but I do it anyway?  I compare everything to childbirth.  If Rich gets a cramp in the middle of the night, gets out of bed screaming because his hamstring muscle has seized up, to where he’s practically crying out in agony… I just prop myself up on my elbow with a smile on my face and say, “See?  Now imagine that feeling over and over and over and over again for three or four hours straight.  Yea, that’s right.   Hurts, don’t it?”   Oh, I’m so mean.  But darn it, if they only knew!!  Getting a cramp in his leg is the closest he’s ever going to get to the feeling of contractions during labor, so I use it as a comparison.  What’s even worse is that during his cramp he can’t even get mad at me for saying that because he’s in too much pain.  He just agrees with me as he’s seizing up  “Oh wow oh wow oh wow you go through this I can’t even imagine it oh wow oh wow oh wow it hurrrrrrts!”   – by the way, he doesn’t really say oh “wow” but I’m just trying to keep it clean here on the blog.  
 
Okay, enough of that.  Let’s move on to nicer things.
 

Like the weather!  We are still having very warm weather for January and are enjoying being outdoors.  Rich’s favorite place to go locally is down to the Harbor, so on this day we took the dogs, some of our kids, plus two friends — and we had lunch down by the water.  

What made this day a rare one was that Afton graced us with her presence.  Usually this sixteen year old has a full agenda with friends, sports, homework, etc.  But on this day she said, “I’ll go, too”  and we all about fell off our chairs from the shock.  It was nice having her with us :)
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Comments

  1. I currently have the bug right now but can i eat or drink anything? I drank water after the first incident and that brought me to incident 2,3 and 4. Pls help -chance

    Reply

  2. My kids always felt great with the stomach bug, played, threw up, then went back to playing. Meanwhile, when I get it I feel like death warmed over. Glad everyone is getting better. Hope the other 2 don’t get it!

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  4. I think that all of us naturally become more whiny with an audience as we grow older and more cognizant of the concept of sympathy. I am always much “sicker” if I have someone around to take care of me than if I just have to tough it out myself. Maybe that’s why littler kids shrug off being sick so easily?

    As a total random aside, I love the kid’s new photos but I miss their birthyears under them. It really helped to keep track of where everyone was age-wise.

    Reply

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