Amputations, Vaccines and H1N1

I'm getting over what could possibly be, one of the worst weeks in my life.

Wait.

The worst two weeks.

It all started with Election Day and snowballed from there.

Dad had his surgery on his foot at Brigham and Women's in Boston and his surgeon was awesome! Dad was able to keep his foot. Yes, KEEP. His dead toes were removed and his physical therapy is going to make leaps and bounds (yes, I actually hope to see my Dad doing leaps and bounds!) If you don't know the story about why my Dad had to have part of his foot amputated, I'll catch you up to speed by directing you here. Dad's in Dover at the rehab place there. We went to see him in Boston after his surgery, but haven't been over to see him in Dover because...

Nik and the kids had H1N1.

Wait, back up.

Before I tell you about the swine, I have to first tell you about Kate's 1 year well-child check.

I'd been dreading this check up because of two things. The first being that I knew the doctor was going to tell us that we needed to have Kate go to an allergist before we can start weaning her from formula. And, well, that's exactly what they told us. Allergy testing, for those of you who haven't done it before, is not fun. The allergist is going to do a bunch of "prick" tests to see how large the "bump" or reaction is and that will tell us exactly how allergic she is. Hopefully it will be a one time thing. I am not looking forward to it.

The second thing that I knew was coming was her MMR shot. Oh yes, I'm bringing up the dreaded vaccine conversation. It's almost as bad as the gay marriage conversation. Whether you choose to vaccinate or not to vaccinate, it's your choice. I have done a lot of reading on vaccines and vaccination reactions. When Dougie was a baby, I didn't know I had a choice. I figured since my doctor was telling me, this is what we do, that, well, this is what everyone does. Dougie got a lot of ear infections as a baby, and looking back at my calendar, I was able to pin point that each time he had an ear infection, yes, EACH TIME, he was at the doctor just the previous week and received a vaccine. I wanted it to be different for Kate, so I started my research.

Kate is on a delayed vaccination schedule. She doesn't get as many vaccines as the normal baby and I choose to only give her the ones that Nik and I thought were the most important. When she was born, she didn't get the vitamin K shot, the goop in her eyes or the Hep B shot. I mean, come on! Three shots before she even leaves the hospital?!? Welcome to the world Baby girl! Poke, Poke, Smear. Nope. Not my kid.

Each visit after that I had to remind them that we were delaying and waiting and choosing to not be so aggressive in vaccinating. Hey, I KNOW that the MMR shot is important. I get it. But during my research I read about kids that had SEIZURES after that got that shot. and I was scared. I knew they were going to push it on me and I knew I wanted to wait...but, I didn't push it, I let them give it to her.

Fast forward 29 hours and I'm driving Kate to the ER because her fever is so high, guess what? She's having SEIZURES. I'm so mad at myself that I'm crying on the way and I was stuck behind a car that thought it would be fun to go 35 on Route 4, when the speed limit is clearly 55. We get there, and they don't really fuck around with babies, so we went right back to the Ped room and within 45 minutes Kate's fever was down and she was sleeping in my arms. But, man, that was scary. She's tested for pneumonia, the flu and a whole bunch of other crap, but two hours later, her fever is down and we're being discharged with a diagnosis of "fever". I'm so tired I want to cry.

I came home and was relieved to put Kate to sleep in her own crib with no more fever and I walk into my room and surprise! Dougie is in my bed because he can't sleep. He's got a cough and a fever. I lean over to talk to Nik, and you know what? HE has a cough and a fever. Welcome to the H1N1 part of this post.

You know that old saying, "God doesn't give you more than he thinks you can handle"? Yeah? Well, I was almost at my breaking point last week. Nik, Dougie and Kate came down with H1N1. On top of it all, Kate got an ear infection (see paragraph in which I describe that my children get ear infections from vaccines) So, I wasn't sleeping (Kate, ear infection, coughing, needing meds every 4 hours, Nik and Dougie, coughing and needing meds every 4 hours...), I was still working because, somehow, someway, I did NOT get H1N1.

There is a God.

and he is Good.

and H1N1 isn't as bad as eveyone says it is. I mean, yeah, it sucks, but everyone survived and no one had to go to the ER again. Yeah, their fevers were high and they didn't eat and some of them, I'm not saying who, had diarrhea, and I wouldn't want to do it again, but it wasn't any worse than the regular flu.

Did I mention that I didn't get it? Thank you, God.

So, after ten days of being home and life being a little abnormal, life returns to normal tomorrow.

Whatever my normal is.