Welcome back, thermostat of my young child's body. We've missed you so.

My daughter's temperature finally returned to normal early this afternoon (at that point it had only been running 99.5) and now she will be able to attend arts camp!  She is so excited!  I'm excited for her.  She's missed it so much.

I've disassembled sick bay, stripped her bed, cleaned and swept her room and while the desk is still staring at me, in need of much love, I'll get to that tomorrow.  Rome wasn't built in a day, you know.

K- and I were in and out today.  She played with chalk, caught butterflies and ran around.  We saw tiger swallowtails, a monarch, a ton of cabbage whites, Peck's skippers, silver spotted and an American lady.  I wanted to give her body a good test in the heat and dreadful humidity to see how well it would regulate.  She sweated up a storm and did just fine.  In fact, we attended the program at the library this evening.  She was able to choose her prize from the prize box.  We got a call last week that she won, but hadn't been able to come to retrieve it.  In true K- fashion, she chose an Amelia Bedelia book-- Amelia Bedelia for Mayor to be exact.  How we love Amelia Bedelia in our house!

She'll go on to arts camp tomorrow and I'll scoot back to get some things done.  I've got to run by the license bureau to pick up new tags, then home to give the house a good scrubbing.  I would love to throw open the windows, but it is supposed to be dreadfully hot tomorrow, so another airing will have to wait. 

In the meantime, we rejoice that K- is well.  Hooray!

Smiles in my day:
-  Listed above.  :)

The 10-day run

A marathon of sorts is how I would describe this virus that has overtaken my child's body and rendered me short on sleep, high on worry and low on nerves. 

Her body is still busy stepping down that fever mode that it seemed to have permanently ingrained in its memory.  While she has still been running a fever, it hasn't been constant.  It also hasn't been a fever of 104 magnitude.  I'm happy to say that we left the 104 on Monday evening.  She's moved on from there to 102.5, then 101.5 and down to 100.  While these are all fevers, it seems as those are the points to which the high stops. 

I spoke with the nurse at the pediatrician's office today.  Bless Kathy, she told me that K- is getting better, it is a 7-10 day virus and that it'll be a few more days. 

Currently, K- is running NO! fever.  I know not to rest on that, though.  We're looking forward to the day that the fever completely leaves.  For now, we are thankful.  We're thankful for the steps towards healing.

For now, I'm readying myself for bed.  I'm looking forward to some sleep. 

Smiles in my day:
-  When I left this AM, I told K- that I "challenged" her to draw me something on the front steps with her chalk.  When I got home, she was on the front steps with her big bucket of chalk.  She hadn't been out long, but long enough to draw me some colorful squares with the chalk that she made in science camp.
-  The last day of work for this week.  It's just been a very long week, not work-wise, just life-wise.

Have a great day!

Tales from the Trenches: The highs and the lows.

Since K- still had a fever through yesterday, including 104 F, we knew that we wanted her to get into the pediatrician's office today.  Now then, I hate the Monday Morning Pediatric Phone Lottery, so I opted to do something I would never normally do.  Hubs and I made a plan last night to pile into the truck, go on over to the office, he and K- would sit in the car and to bypass the phone mess that can last for upwards to an hour and a half, I went into the office in person to schedule an appointment.  Knowing that it was Monday morning, I thought that the likelihood that they would have an early morning appointment available would be very high.

The gamble worked. 

Bless Toni's heart.  I got in there and I think I stunned her when I came in sans child.  Her computer wasn't up yet, so she had me take a seat.  When she was all up and ready, she had me tell her what was going on.  I told her that I had talked to Kathy on Friday.  She said to bring K- in on Monday if she wasn't better or got worse.  The 24 hour nurse's line nurse said that with the high fever still remaining and the additional vomiting that she wanted her seen today.  With that she said, "Is she in the car?" 

"Yes."

"I have an 8:50 AM.  It would be 8:50 - 9 AM, depending upon when Dr. P gets here.  I'll go ahead and mark you down for that." 

We saw Dr. P.   She explained that K- is suffering from Endo Virus, which is running through our area like wildfire.  She had listed off the symptoms and had me confirm the ones affecting K-.   She understood the high fever, and said that even adults are suffering from the same.  At that point, I told her I had.  She told me that she expected K- to suffer from the fever for a couple more days.  Vomiting and diarrhea may be added to that.  Coughing will be around for a few weeks. 

We left with K- and looking towards the sunlight that had just broken through from the storm.  She was without fever, seemed a bit chipper and we were thrilled with the idea that we had gotten to the end.

Then she started running a fever again.

And she vomited.

The good news is that we've been able to lower the fever from 104 at 6 PM to 99.5 at 8:30 PM.  She asked for toasty cheese.  I made her a half.  She wanted more, but I wanted her to let it settle and I asked what else she wanted.  "Cantaloupe."  I brought her a fresh bowl of cantaloupe and she scarfed it down. 

"Mom, may I please have another toasty cheese?" 

My child hasn't eaten in 5 days.  If she wants a toasty cheese, I'll make her a toasty cheese.  I went back to the oven, pulled the stuff back out and belted out another.  She ate 3/4 of it.

She is sitting up and playing with My Little Ponies, while watching Shrek.  She has polished off yet another thermos of water.  The food, at the moment, is remaining in the proper containment area.

She's out of arts camp for another day.  Oh, she's cried about missing it.  She's cried about missing swimming with Grandma and Grandpa at "The Club."  She's cried because she felt so bad.  She's cried because she had to take Advil and was afraid it would make her vomit.  She's cried for all of the things that she has missed.  All I've been able to do is to grab my fevering child up and to hug her.  Oh how she has broken our heart.  How our phone has rung off the hook with friends and family calling to see if she is feeling any better.  E-mail is flowing the same way. 

So here we sit.  Currently, we're at a high.  I'm not looking forward to the defeating low.   We'll deal with it.  It's not a permanent thing.  This too shall pass.

Smiles in my day:
-  A doting father who wanted nothing more than to get his kid to eat today.  Hubs really did try.  He fed K- her favorite peanut butter and cheese sandwich and a fruit plate. 
-  A pediatric office who could get us in this AM when we showed up.  Grant you, I went to schedule an appointment, but since they had an appointment available, I would have been a fool to turn it down. 
-  A busy work day to keep my mind busy.

Have a great day!

A song for K-.

Oh, playmate,
Come out and play with me,
And bring your dollies three,
Climb up my apple tree,
Shout down my rain barrel,
Slide down my cellar door,
And we'll be jolly friends,
Forever more.

Oh, playmate,
I can't come play with you,
[I still have got] the flu, (should be my dollies got the flu)
Boo-hoo-hoo-hoo-hoo-hoo.
Ain't got no rain barrel, (it's actually a water urn)
Ain't got no cellar door, (no lie there)
But we'll be jolly friends,
Forever more, more, more!

My mom used to sing this to me when I was sick, and she called to sing it to K-.

Speaking of K- and sick, she's still a fever running champ.  She'll be visiting the pediatrician tomorrow.  I'll let you know the update then.