Dealing with the flu still

Still toughing it out here with four very sick kids. No one has told me that this is truly the swine flu but I am thinking it has to be since it is so hard for them to lick. Most of the time a flu is in and out of our house in the matter of a couple days.

I think they are starting to feel like they are never going to get better. Camille got sick on Sunday the 25th but it was mild and by Wednesday she was back in school. Later that night, after we got home from the ward Halloween party Savannah starting getting really sick. On Friday Kennon and Marcus starting fevering. And then surprise surprise Camille decides that she is still sick after all and Saturday night is doing terrible with all four of them waking me up all night long with high fevers. Since Sunday it has been around the clock Tylenol and Motrin and three kids sprawled on the couch shivering or sweating every 3 hours when their current medicine wears off. Marcus on the other hand just runs around -nose running, coughing, saying, "I cold! I cold". He can't figure out what hit him. He never lays down like the other kids and I can't imagine how he has the energy to keep running around.

I make Brent check them out every night with his stethoscope. The two things the Doctor tells you to watch out for is dehydration or respiratory problems. Since I am very clear now on respiratory problems after dealing with Caroline I feel they are in good hands with me as their nurse. I know so much more this time around then I did when Caroline was sick.Now I am running a cool mist humidifier, thumping on their backs, and giving them mucinex once in a while doing all I can to keep fluids from building up and starting off pneumonia.

The other night after tucking all four kids into bed in the same room- the one with the humidifier, I said to Brent, "What did we need this big house for?"

I wish this could be over soon so I could stop worrying. Or at least have one of the four pull out of it, so the rest of us can see it can be beat. And I hate being reminded on the daily news that kids do die from this stuff. There have been two swine flu related deaths in the area in the last week. One of them was the 15 year old daughter of Brent's patient coordinator at the dental school. She went into Children's Hospital the day after we left with Caroline. She died one week later after her organs all shut done and she was waiting for a heart transplant.

When you have four all down at once you have to be fairly well organized.

I have been keeping a white board next to the medicine cabinet where I chart their fevers and when I give them medicine. It is just too hard to keep in my head when they are needing medicine so often.

Caroline is loving being the well child and was heard this morning coaching Kennon how to get her medicine down.

Seeing her so well reminds me that this too shall pass. It is just hard to see the light at the end of the tunnel right now. I hate seeing my kids sick.

I am thankful. For a warm house, modern medicine, and the fact that Brent and I remain flu free. I keep thinking, "What if we were crossing the plains right now?" and then feel so bad for pioneer mothers. Things could be so much worse.