One sick family...

It seemed to start out as a normal crazy Sunday in our house and then about mid morning the first signs of the end of our normal crazy day began.. It happened.  "The Whirlwind's"  nose started dripping like you wouldn't believe.  Poor thing.  It rapidly progressed into a stuffy nose and coughing, yep.  The dreaded respiratory virus.  At first I thought it just might be allergies and the rest of us would escape unscathed, but alas.  NO SUCH LUCK.  By Sunday evening both "Prince Charming" and "Screamy" had it.. full blown. (No pun intended).  And yes.. I am not done yet, by bedtime I was it's final victim.  Ugggh.  I HATE the cold and flu season.  It sets our already crazy world into a tailspin.  "Screamy"  didn't sleep a bit last night, poor guy he couldn't.  He couldn't breathe and was coughing.  I despise it when infants get a cold bug because there isn't a darn thing that you can do about it, no medications, NOTHING.  You are just supposed to watch the little creatures lay there in their own pile of mucus and suffer.  Yes, this is number four for me so I am doing all the usual.. Saline drops, aspirating when necessary, elevation, humidifier, yada yada yada.  But it DOES NOT help a bit.  So at about 2 a.m. I finally decided to put "Screamy" in bed with me hoping that if he slept "on" me that he would be able to breathe.  Nope, no such luck.  Instead all he did was sleep for 5 and 10 minutes at a time then scream and this continued on into the morning.  I don't think "Prince Charming" nor I had more than a couple hours of sleep and if there is one thing both of us can't do without it is sleep.  We become monsters.. Great now we were sick monsters.  But oh well, the joys of parenthood. 

So after calling our pediatrician and receiving a call from a nurse that told me that I was doing all that I could do I marched my exhausted, sick butt on down to the local natural health food market/store to buy whatever I had to to help us all get over this, especially "Screamy" who was suffering horribly.  But wow, I never imagined that there was so much to choose from! Did you know that Elderberry is an anti-viral?  Hmmm.  who would have thought.   I think that I bought the store out (and drained the bank account), but in my precious hands in that beautiful plastic bag I hoped to have the magic "tincture" to help all of us to get over this awfulness.  I came home and dosed everyone up.  Unfortunately I don't see a bit of difference.  I think that we just have to ride this out.  There goes $120 down the drain.This is the first time that we have all been sick at the same time so it must be some doozy of a virus.  "The Teenager"  has so far been spared but I am sure this nasty bug has it's eye on him next.  I "quarantined" "The Artist" (who came back from her dad's house Monday afternoon) upstairs with grandparents for now until the coast is clear.  "Prince Charming"  comes from a long line of hard working over achievers so I knew today when he said he had to call in sick that it must be bad and worse because he won't be going in Tuesday either.  So you bet, I sent "The Artist"  upstairs with strict instructions to scrub her hands until she couldn't anymore and to "STAY UPSTAIRS.  One of the things that is so frustrating as a mom when your whole family gets sick with a virus is that you really cannot do much but let nature take it's course.  Oh, and be the "nose wiper", "vomit catcher", and "caretaker".  It's really rough to watch your little ones suffer even if it is just a virus.  Moms are supposed to make things better though, right?  With this in mind I decided to make homemade Chicken and Dumplings Monday night even though I didn't feel like it, I figured if all the herbs and homeopathic remedies didn't work at least my Chicken and Dumplings might.  Even if no one could taste them!

I started this post Monday night, but had "medicine head" so badly that I decided to wait until today to edit and post it.  "Screamy" is still an awful mess. He is now on breathing treatments and wheezing like you wouldn't believe.  "Prince Charming" is better though and decided to go into work today and "The Whirlwind"  is back to her usual 120 mph self with a slight runny nose.  And then there is me.  This bug is horrible.  It is now in my chest and I am coughing like I have "Black Lung".  But tomorrow is another day and hopefully one by one we will be back to usual.  I am struggling with whether to let the house go or just bite the bullet and go on about business as usual and hope I don't get worse.  We'll see...