Being sick...

Two weeks ago, I got a call from the kids' pre-school.  Normally, when they call me, it goes something like this:  "Edith? It's Kim from the school.  The Children Are Fine.  I just wanted to…"

This time, it wasn't Kim.  It was their teacher.  And she was calling to say that Max had been acting strangely, sort of withdrawn and un-Max-like, so they took his temperature and it was a whopping 102.7!  I called Joe, who'd missed the school's first call while he was in the shower, and he ran right out to pick Max up.  By the time he got there, Daniel's temperature had been verified in the same range and Caroline was close behind in the mid-100 region.  So all three came home.

They didn't seem too sick, just a little tired and with no appetite.  They were also unusually willing to take naps and stay asleep for long stretches.  We kept them plied with ibuprofen and fluids but their fevers kept bouncing up and down.  And since the school's policy is that they have to be fever-free for 24 hours before they can return, they ended up staying out the whole week.

This was doubly upsetting because Tuesday afternoon was the mini-performance for Caroline's dance class and Wednesday evening was parent/child night (when we get to go to school and watch as the kids interact as they would in a normal class - like Open House) and we'd miss both of those.  Luckily, if you can call it luck, more than half the class ended up being out sick so both events were postponed until after Thanksgiving.

We've been fortunate that (knock on wood) none of the kids have really been very sick.  And now that they're older, they can generally tell us when they're not feeling well, though not always in time to prevent them from throwing up all over the living room.  In fact, during this bout of illness, Caroline coughed herself into gagging and started to throw up and my self-preservation instinct kicked in as I quickly cleared things off the gymnastics mat we have on the living room floor and aimed her face in that direction.

Whenever we get a cold in our house, the congestion goes straight into Joe's chest and straight into my ears (I had serial ear infections as a kid -- thank goodness these guys seem to have inherited Daddy's ear canals!).  We can always tell when a cold is in the kids' chests as they hack and cough, but a stuffy head is harder to diagnose in the pre-verbal set.  Now that their vocabulary has advanced, though, I had this wonderful interaction with Max.

"Mommy? Mommy!  I can't hear! Mommy! My ears don't work!"

I asked him to look at me, which he did (so his ears were working, a little at least) and to pinch his nose and pretend to sneeze.  It must've done the trick and popped his ears because his eyes widened and his mouth popped open and he exclaimed, "Mommy! I can hear! My ears are MAGIC!"