Tuesday, September 15, 2009

Sickness in Seattle

I'm not sure what's worse: taking care of a sick husband and a sick toddler, or trying to take care of a mostly-better toddler while I'm sick.

It's entirely possible that we all contracted nerd flu a couple weekends ago. But whatever it is, it's miserable. (Seriously, don't catch it.) Fortunately, of the three of us, Westley seems to have had the mildest case. I don't know how he does it, but that boy almost never gets sick. I can count his "under the weather" moments on one hand. In fact, he might be a cyborg.

So all Westley and his cast-iron immune system really needed was a couple of days of quality cuddle time, his red robot to hug, and lots of TV and books. Rob stayed home from work, and slept off the worst of it. And I rushed around and got things done and waited on the guys and got totally run-down. So naturally now that Rob is back at work and Westley is quickly becoming his usual, energetic self again, I'm achy all over and running a fever (103.8 degrees of awesomely-badness).

I can honestly say that this was something I never considered before having a child: parenting when you're sick. Unfortunately, I've had to do it a lot since Westley was born. When he was a baby, it was a little easier; I sat on my ass, nursed 24/7 and watched a lot of bad television, which basically amounts to resting. But now I have an almost-two-year-old who has his own ideas about activities, and would rather not watch a marathon of America's Next Top Model.

This illness caught me completely off-guard, which I know is ridiculous to say because Rob and Westley both had it. There was a pretty good chance I would get sick, too, but I was too busy making hot and sour ginger soup, and cuing up the same three episodes of Yo Gabba Gabba to think about that. Now, I'm home sick with nothing in the way of physical and emotional resources, and it's taking almost as much a toll on me as the symptoms I'm trying to alleviate with regular doses of DayQuil.

For the first time ever, I'm wishing for more shelf-stable convenience foods stockpiled in the pantry, because "cooking" and "sick" don't mix; more of Westley's books and toys in my room, so he could stay in bed with me; and more seriously-not-fucking-around cold and flu medicine to go along with the hippy-dippy homeopathic stuff in my medicine chest. Next time sickness hits this house--because, let's face it, there will be a next time (hello, preschool-as-germ-factory)--I'm going to be prepared.

Or maybe my time would be better spent finding out how the hell Westley recovers from things so quickly, and what I can do get a cast-iron immune system of my own.

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