Sick....Again.

Since January we have been sick pretty much every two weeks. You name it. Fevers, seizures, barfing, diarehha, coughing, wheezing, lime green snotsicles, green poo. 3 sets of antibiotics, 2 different seizure medications and about 2 bottles of Costco sized Advil and a litre of Pedialyte a month. Just for Adam. 3 trips to CHEO (Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario), 2 via ambulance. I've missed about 17 days of work. I am told this is totally 'normal' by health care professionals. I don't really know anyone else who is sick this much.

Every time my kid's cheeks are flushed, I start to have a panic attack. I feel the dread bubble and rise and overflow like a glass of beer poured too quickly. We are in for it. Every single time. This child who has defied every sliver of advice and every baby book and chart also has to outdo all the other kids when it comes to being sick. When my kid is sick I do not sleep. I am on guard day and night with a dropper full of Advil waiting and the timer set for the next dose to avoid a febrile seizure, which we've had about 8 of.

I also have to worry about whether or not it will rip through our house like a tornado and take down my husband and I. If we're both out of service at the same time and Adam is healthy, its like Lord of the Flies - Adam runs around free range and gets fed what doesn't make us gag to prepare. If only one of us is sick and Adam is either healthy or sick, we're exhausted and ready to scratch each other's eyes out after a few days without the other able to help.

Then there's the issue of missing work. You can only miss so much work before its a problem. Stuff doesn't get done, leaving in a panic to get to a feverish kid means things slip through cracks and forgotten. I try really hard on the good days to look perky and be productive. At a certain point I'm sure I will hear the line 'the unpredictability of your absences is a problem' - as other parents in my situation have run into. 1 month into the new fiscal year and I have burned through all of my "special leave" already.

This was not in the brochure. I look around and feel jealous of parents who seem to be happily out power walking with their strollers. People who have kids that get sick without seizures every time they even flirt with a fever. People who have family close by who can give them a break. People with kids who sleep through the night. These people don't know how lucky they are. I envy women who have the bandwidth to have 'date night' with their husband or work out and socialize with friends, not because of any magic mommy formula, simply because they are not either in sick kid mode or recovering from the exhaustion of having a sick kid, being sick themselves and then having a sick spouse.

I guess to quote my dad - "you can sleep when you're dead". In the meantime there is no way to go but forward.