I have been under quarantine. My son caught the flu, then got an upper respiratory infection, and then the stomach flu. Lucky me. Then, because I am special, I caught everything he had. Two emergency room visits, several doctor’s appointments, and one Quick Care visit later, and I think (fingers crossed) that we are finally on the mend. My husband is a teacher, and my son goes to school, so no guarantees. My husband calls the students walking petri dishes, but at least we’ve weathered the last of the stomach bug this time around.
When I get sick, I sleep a lot. I am lucky and unlucky in that I lack a gag reflex, so nothing will make me puke, but it means that I feel sick a lot longer than I would if I could just get the bug out of my system. So, I sleep. My son, however, would not sleep ever if his body didn’t just pass out from sheer exhaustion now and then. He never takes naps, and acts completely normal when he is really sick, which confuses doctor’s and makes being a parent that much harder. So, he’s home sick from school, perky and bored, and I am sick on the couch, practically comatose. We were not a good pair. I also become rather short-tempered when I am ill, and my son has ADHD and Asperger’s, which means he’s impulsive, and talks a lot, and needs a lot of attention. It has been a rough month. If I get upset with him, he gets upset, and the house spirals into chaos. My poor husband would work all day, and then come home and take care of a sick kid, clean the house, and do all the meals while I went back to bed. I think we both thought January would never end.
So for January, I get the terrible wife and mother and just about everything else award. It is hard to keep up friendships, remember birthdays, or do just about anything normal when you are in sick/crisis mode. In between we also had car trouble, and money trouble. My husband had his birthday, and I’m sure he was extremely disappointed. I wish I could go back and do it over again. I also managed to offend family members while in this state of sick crisis. I should have just stayed in bed, shut the doors and not left the house, or let anyone else leave the house until we were all healthy and had strong immune systems. There is something to old-fashioned habits of quarantining the sick and keeping them away from the healthy populace to prevent spread of disease. If I had painted a black mark on our door, my e-mail, and our phones a lot of hurt feelings, and heartache might have been avoided. We might also have shortened the duration of our illnesses. Oh well.
So I’m issuing a formal apology, and warning. Next time we get sick, I’m quarantining myself, and will be unavailable. My husband says he’ll make me a bubble out of construction plastic. I’ll post a note on facebook, take all the phones out of service, and hide until the worst is over. If only the world would stop when you get sick. Then everybody could get better and no one would feel slighted or left out, and I wouldn’t forget to do all those important daily tasks. I think even the nurses at the hospital would appreciate that. Hopefully we’ll all wash our hands, and stay home if we get sick to stop the spread of disease so I can be back to “normal” and continue to blog and take care of all the little things in life. I hope that your January was better than mine, and maybe I’ll get to redo some of the things that went really wrong. Here’s to good health and happy memories in February!
I’m SO sorry to hear of your horrible January. I certainly hope that your fans,loved ones and friends understand that when you’re down, you can’t perform like you want to! Take care of yourself!
I find that people who suffer from chronic illnesses, or have kids with disabilities are very understanding, and get that I can’t always be there when I want to be. It is the “normal” people who have a hard time with me being out of commission. I have spent most of the past two years out of commission and it has really strained a lot of my friendships, but I’ve made a lot of great new friends. It is all a matter of perspective I suppose. Thanks for the kind comments. It was a rough month.