Sick Daze

I woke up Monday morning as a baritone. 

I've spent the last three days in and out of fevers and sleep. Bryan, Peter, and Cooper have juggled feeding and driving the rest of the kids while I've mostly stayed in my room, near a humidifier and a jumbo pack of tissues.

Today I felt well enough to shower, but it took all my strength.

As of this evening I'm starting to feel more like a human and less like a giant germ.

I'm really thankful for children that can drive and a husband who works from home.

Rock and Roll

This is me at 3:11 this morning. It's the only picture I took of Bryan's stay in the ER. He was in so much pain, I didn't think we would appreciate any pictures I took of him.

Last night the kidney stone pain combined with medication induced nausea to create a perfect storm. He was back forth about going to the ER again. After he threw up for the third time in less than an hour I said it was time to head to the hospital. He checked in just before midnight. Around 3:30 in the morning we were told that he was being admitted and had been put on the list for surgery. They were going to remove the stone.

Nearly twelve hours and several anti-nausea and pain medication doses later, a nurse arrived in his ER room to wheel him to surgery. Just over an hour later he was out of surgery and in the recovery room. The surgeon found me in the waiting room and told me the stone was so big Bryan likely wouldn't have passed it on his own. They were able to blast the stone and break it into smaller pieces. Then they endoscopically used a tiny basket to scoop out the pieces.

He was finally able to eat food after he came out of the anesthesia, roughly twenty hours after he had started feeling so intensely awful. He has a stent, which is both supposed to help the process and will really hurt over the next five days.

Thankfully he's home. He's still in pain, but hopefully that pain has an end date. And he's really glad to be in his own bed.

A Long Long Time Ago

Today is our 24th family birthday. We had planned to eat our traditional family birthday meal, but we needed to postpone it to Wednesday. Bryan woke me up at 6:00 in the morning to tell me that he was having a kidney stone. We think this is his ninth, but that's just a guess since we've kind of lost count. He spent the morning in the ER getting some very strong medication and the rest of the day going in and out of sleep, still on very strong medication.

This is not how he wanted to spend today.

Since the day went sideways, let us instead focus on this day twenty four years ago.

Aw, look at those cute kids.

That Funny Feeling

We were almost done with bedtime tonight when Topher told me that his throat "felt funny." I looked at it and his uvula and tonsils looked red and swollen. Since Bryan had strep throat a few weeks ago, I knew there was a chance his funny throat was something more. I told him to put pants on over his pajamas and I took him into urgent care.

No one balked at my request for a strep test, which I appreciated. The test was negative, but the PA that we saw agreed that his throat didn't look right. The look of his throat, plus his runny nose, and the fact that he randomly threw up last week all led her to treat him as if the test had been positive. She put him on antibiotics.

He's looking forward to a day of resting and maybe watching TV tomorrow, but he is sad to miss school.

This has been a long season of sick.

You Can Dance If You Want To

Some of the kids felt well enough to attend a family dance at our old ward on Saturday evening. I mostly sat and chatted with people, but I did dig up enough energy to dance a few of the songs. Last year at this same activity I danced every dance. Being sick for a few weeks really saps your strength.

Topher was sad to miss it, but he started feeling under the weather that morning. Bryan stayed home with him. After resting most of Saturday and Sunday, Topher felt healthy enough to go to school on Monday.

Health Status

We are sick.

Bryan has the flu and strep throat. 

Sophie has a sinus infection.

Cooper and I likely have the flu, but haven't seen a doctor and therefore haven't been tested.

Phoebe is starting to feel sniffly.

Topher is healthy and has bounce-off-the-walls energy but nowhere to spend it.

That is all.

If I Only Had a Brain

I haven't written much (or at all?) about my autoimmune disorder. Most of the time I kind of pretend like it doesn't exist. I take some medicine for it first thing in the morning, can't eat dairy until four hours later, and have had to become (mostly) gluten free. Those are the things I deal with daily. They're annoying, but manageable. I'm aware of the symptoms, but, when my medicine is at the correct dose, they're also annoyances. Yeah I'm cold and my skin is really dry, but I can wear slippers and a jacket in my house and apply extra lotion.

But sometimes it shows up more than I'd like. When I've overworked myself and neglected the basics of caring for myself (regular exercise and sleep), the disorder arrives in force. These are called flares. I've been in a flare for most of the last week. 

Profound exhaustion is one of the symptoms that sent me to the doctor initially and led to the diagnosis. I've had to nap nearly every day this week to try to counter the feeling of my head being too heavy to hold up and the realization that I probably shouldn't be driving. I thought I was feeling better yesterday because I didn't need a nap, but today proved otherwise. And I do feel silly complaining about needing to nap. Naps seem like they should be a luxury, a welcome activity. But when they're a necessity and keep you from other things that need to get done, they're not as fun.

I think the worst symptom this time has been the brain fog. My thoughts are sluggish and difficult to put into words. It kind of feels like the hangover I get after a migraine; thinking hurts for about a day. I was thankful this week that the kids provided enough blog material because I couldn't have come up with anything on my own.

Bryan is amazing and encourages me to rest when I need to. He picks up the slack, and there's a lot of slack when flares hit. I am not so good about resting. I've trained myself to constantly be productive and lying in bed with no energy feels more like torture than rejuvenation. Bryan reminds me that rest is productive, but I struggle to convince myself of that.

The good news for tonight is that the brain fog has cleared enough for me to write this post. Maybe the other symptoms will begin to calm down as well.

Breathe In

Sophie finished her second round of antibiotics over a week ago. She seemed to be getting better. Then yesterday during dinner she started coughing again. It continued through the evening until she went to sleep. She woke us up around one in the morning because she was coughing and having trouble breathing and couldn't sleep. I gave her cough medicine and sent her back to bed. She came in again two hours later, this time wheezing and panicked that she couldn't breathe.

That's what prompted us to spend a few hours in the ER in the early hours of the morning. It was dark when we arrived. They took her back right away and put her in a room. A doctor came to look at her, they ordered a chest x-ray, then swabbed her for strep throat, RSV, the flu, and COVID. She said they would likely give her an inhaler to help her breathe.

Then we waited.

They did the x-ray.

And we waited.

And watched the Disney Channel.

And waited.

And waited.

The doctor finally came back and said she had tested negative for strep and the x-ray looked clear. I thought they would offer a breathing treatment. But they didn't. Other than running tests, they didn't do anything. They didn't treat her at all. In fact, they decided to send her home before any of the other tests were done, they would call with the results.

I was surprised and frustrated that they weren't going to help her at all. They said since the other possibilities were all viruses nothing could be done. I asked about the inhaler and was told that they didn't want to give her an inhaler because that would show up on her medical record. That might cause a doctor in the future to think she has asthma and misdiagnose her or misread her symptoms. I told the doctor that some of my other children had been given inhalers for isolated illnesses and hadn't had the problem she described. She was apologetic and I discovered that she had been overridden by her supervising doctor who had only seen Sophie for about a minute.

The sun was up when we drove home. She and I were both sad and frustrated at the lack of help.

They never called back with any test results.

We'll see how tonight goes.

The Road to Healthy Living

The good news is that Sophie is finally on the mend. She still has a cough and a stuffy nose, but they're much better than they were. Phoebe also appears to be improving. She came home early on Wednesday because her sinuses were so angry and active, but today she was much less drippy. I'm exhausted and dragging with a dry cough, but I seem to have had the lightest case so far. Cooper only has a cough left. Bryan is dragging and may be getting sick, but has still been able to function. Peter is so busy I'm assuming he's not home enough to catch anything.

Unfortunately Topher missed school on Monday because of a fever. He came home early today because of a headache and a stomachache. I'm not even sure if he has the same thing the rest of us got or if a new strain of something has been introduced into the household.

That said, I'm cautiously optimistic that we may be heading toward better health.

Down For the Count

You know how last week I wrote that everyone was sick?

I wasn't.

And now I am.

I guess it's good that they're all at least well enough to function now, because I certainly am not.

Maybe they'll all come take care of me while I'm sick...

The Days of the Week

On Monday we had no school for the holiday.

On Tuesday everyone went to school.

On Wednesday Sophie stayed home from school because her throat hurt and she had a cough.

On Wednesday Cooper came home from school and fell asleep on the couch because he was running a fever.

On Wednesday afternoon Sophie was feeling well enough to chase Topher through the house and was told she would be attending school the next day.

On Thursday Cooper stayed home from school.

On Thursday Phoebe called home and asked to be picked up early from her rehearsal because her head hurt so much and she was coughing. She came home and slept until dinner, then fell asleep on the couch soon after dinner was over.

On Thursday Sophie had a doctor's appointment and tested negative for strep throat, COVID, and the flu. But she was diagnosed with acute bronchitis and the beginning of an ear infection and prescribed antibiotics.

On Friday Phoebe and Sophie will both be staying home from school. I have no idea what everyone else will be doing.

How's your week going?

Dictation

I haven't talked too much on here about some of the health things that I deal with. I do my best to manage them and choose not to highlight them, at least in written form. But today I have been hit so hard with some of my symptoms that Bryan is kindly transcribing this post while I huddle under the covers. my arms too weak to type. He's even filling in the correct words when the brain fog is so thick that I say the wrong thing.

Tonight I'm really thankful for Bryan. and all of the stuff that he jumped in and did today without being asked. I know he doesn't like praise (and I'm sure it makes him very uncomfortable to type them while I say them) but I'm really thankful for him, and all that he does. I'm especially grateful that he doesn't feel put out when my energy fails me, even though I have a tendency to get angry at myself with these health challenges that I can't control. 

So thanks Bryan. I'll try to type my own post tomorrow.

Lesson Learned

After waking up sick on Friday I made myself rest as much as possible on both Friday and Saturday. Bryan made it possible by taking on my jobs as well as his. By Saturday afternoon I wasn't feeling totally well, but I was feeling guilty for staying in bed and not helping around the house. Usually I would have gotten up and done chores.

But not this time.

I continued to make myself stay in bed. I was supposed to teach Relief Society and lead choir practice the next day and I really wanted to be well enough to do that. So even though I had started to feel a little better, I intentionally kept recuperating.

You know what? I woke up on Sunday morning and I felt well!

I feel like it shouldn't have taken me 43 years to learn that rest really does help with recovery. But it did take that long. I hope the lesson sticks.

Love In Action

My body has been trying to be sick for a few days. I was feeling a few symptoms, but holding it at bay so I could get through some big commitments. Those commitments are done and my body has responded by plunging into a wicked cold. Instead of pushing through like I've done in the past, I'm deliberately taking a sick day today. Bryan took care of getting the kids out the door and I am making myself stay in bed as much as possible.

Because of my thyroid issues I can't take regular cold medicine. I ran out of my supply so Bryan made a quick store trip between meetings. He asked if there was any comfort food he should pick up for me. In a moment of self pity I told him I couldn't eat any of the comfort food anyway, so no. He suggested BBQ potato chips and I agreed, those sounded good.

I slept while he shopped.

When he retuned home he had a grocery bag of goodies. In addition to the chips and cold medicine he had picked up sushi and cherries. He knew what I wanted even when I couldn't think of it.

As I looked at the treats he had picked up for me a thought popped into my head, "This is what love looks like." And it's true, at least for me. I was too tired and sick to think of anything I wanted to eat, so he took the time and mental energy to think about what might make me happy. These aren't his sick day foods (McDonald's french fries, if you're curious), they're mine. And they have helped. It's a seemingly small thing, but it makes a big difference.

I really love him.

It Caught Us

The audience information that was emailed to us with our Broadway tickets said that masks were optional but encouraged. I chose to wear one. I'm really thankful I did. Remember I said that Shari, Bryan's mom, stayed home from the show on Wednesday because she wasn't feeling well? On Thursday morning her throat hurt so much she thought she had strep throat. Ron, Bryan's dad, took her to urgent care to check and within a short time we had an answer: COVID.

As soon as Bryan shared that news with me I walked upstairs and took a test since I had started coughing the evening before. Guess who else got a positive result?

Bryan and Topher both took tests as well since we'd all been sleeping in the same room. They were both negative. Bryan's dad also had a negative result, but he had symptoms so he decided to isolate anyway. Both Ron and Shari kept to Topher's room, which we had converted to a guest room. I stayed in my room. That left Bryan sleeping on the couch and running the house.

Looking at the timeline, there's no way that Shari got me sick, it was just a crazy coincidence that she and I got it at the same time from different places. We were glad that they were staying with us while they recuperated instead of being stuck in a hotel.

I was congested, but not horribly so. I probably wouldn't have thought to take a test if Shari hadn't tested positive, mostly because I've tested negative so many times with worse symptoms. I did have that cough though. I kept telling myself it wasn't that bad until I realized all the muscles on the left side of my core hurt whenever I moved. It was from coughing so hard. My other two main symptoms were exhaustion and dizziness. I would lie in bed while it felt like the room was spinning around me. And I was so tired that just sitting up in bed took more energy than I had. I kept thinking, "Has my head always been this heavy?"

I called my doctor the day I took the test, but I didn't hear anything back until Friday. She called back and we had a phone visit. She said that because I have asthma I qualified for a prescription of Paxlovid. Both Bryan's parents had gotten it from urgent care and said that it was helping. I said yes and Bryan picked up the medicine that evening. I had to take all three of these pills twice a day for five days. I do think they helped, though they gave me a really horrible taste in my mouth the whole time I was taking them. That's actually how I remembered to take them, the awful taste would go away and I would know it was time for another dose.

On Saturday morning I woke up to Bryan coming out of our bathroom, a new test in his hand. He had just tested positive as well. That meant that all of the adults were now in isolation and the kids were in charge. We did have to make quick trips downstairs for food and my one request was that they not "go all Lord of the Flies." Topher went a little nuts from too much TV and not enough grownup intervention, but they all survived. The bright side? Bryan and I got to ring in the New Year together.

Ron and Shari came out of isolation on Sunday, which meant they were able to watch church with the kids while Bryan and I watched upstairs in our room. They also did a lot to help restore order to the chaos that was creeping in downstairs. My last day of isolation was Sunday. I still need to wear a mask if I'm around other people (so anytime I'm outside my room) until Friday. Bryan's parents were well enough that they flew home on Monday afternoon, a necessary change from their original itinerary that would have had them leave last Friday morning. Today will be Bryan's first day out of isolation.

I tried to get right back into the business of my regular responsibilities on Monday, but my body was not on board. I drove Ron and Shari to the airport, a thirty-five minute roundtrip and had to take a nap when I got home because I was so worn out. I wanted to put away the Christmas decorations (they're usually all put back in the basement in time for us  to ring in the new year), but it took me three days to pack it up. The tree is up, now only dressed in lights. I'm still really tired, but I do feel like I'm improving. Bryan has had a worse case than I had. I don't think I ran a fever at all, Bryan has been running them on and off for days. Yesterday he finally started to perk up, though he's also completely exhausted. His doctor gave him a note that said he couldn't work until today. I don't think Bryan would have had the energy to sit up at his computer long enough to do his job.

All the kids have taken tests throughout the week. So far, they've all been negative.

Germs Make a Comeback

Today's post was going to be my General Conference recap from last weekend. I'm going to save that for another day. Instead, I'm going to share this picture that Bryan sent me this morning.

After two and a half years of not catching germs from other people because we were isolating all the time, most of us have colds. Bryan caught it first, last week. It didn't seem to get passed on to anyone else, until early this week. Cooper missed seminary Wednesday through Friday because he was so sniffly. Wednesday afternoon my throat started to hurt. I actually thought I was feeling better on Thursday, until it was time to go to sleep. That's when I stayed awake until nearly 3 o'clock in the morning because I kept having to blow my nose. I slept in while Bryan took Topher downstairs for breakfast. And that leads us to the picture. Topher had no energy at all. When I came downstairs I discovered he was running a fever of 101.5, the only one of us (as far as we know) to run a fever with this sickness.

The good news? All four of us have taken COVID tests and gotten negative results. Peter seems fine, maybe because he's spent the majority of the week away from us? Topher rested for most of the day and was feeling well enough by the afternoon that he was back to jumping off the furniture.

Sophie and Phoebe, as of this evening, have mild sore throats. Poor Phoebe was supposed to go to a friend's birthday party tonight but had to stay home because of our germs.

I guess it's a good thing we've had so much practice doing at-home church, because I think we may need to revisit that method this Sunday.

My Turn to be the Answer to Life, the Universe, and Everything

Today is my 42nd birthday! We had our celebrations yesterday since we knew Bryan had to go into work today. I love Sunday birthdays, so I was happy to shift my Monday birthday to Sunday.

Here's part of my church view:

A fun birthday surprise was getting to see my brother Jordan and his family. They were on their way home from camping and realized they weren't too far from us. We said hello for a bit in the backyard before they got back on the road. I told them I counted seeing them as a birthday gift.

After church Bryan got to work on my birthday dinner. He made his delicious Panang curry.

Sophie asked if she could be the official gift opening photographer. She did a great job.

Topher was the birthday elf, which means he brought me each package or card to open. This cool popup card was Phoebe's creation.

Here's my sugar-free birthday cake. I've had to adjust what food I can eat recently for health reasons, including cutting out gluten and dairy. But I already had this cake mix in the pantry. I decided I would count this as my final (for the foreseeable future) gluten cake and eat it anyway.

That may have been a mistake. I spent most of last night throwing up. I'm not sure what the culprit was since everyone else seems to be healthy. I'm so glad that we did our birthday celebrating yesterday since I certainly have not been up to doing anything other than lie on the couch today.

I've loved getting birthday messages throughout the day from friends and family members. And the kids have all been helpful and kind while I've not felt well. Peter got up with Topher this morning so I could sleep and Cooper cooked the frozen waffles I'd gotten for the kids to enjoy on my birthday. (I had some gluten-free waffles in the freezer for myself that I'll have another day.) All the kids have taken turns watching Topher and Sophie, Cooper, and Phoebe are making dinner as I type this. Maybe that's been my biggest birthday gift, getting to see them be responsible and serve each other while I've been out of commission.

Rolling Stones

Our long weekend did not go quite as we had hoped.

Our original plan was to rest, do some deep cleaning and stuff-purging, and maybe watch a few movies as a family.

What actually happened was that we left Topher in the care of his older siblings (and watching more TV in a single day than ever before) while I drove Bryan to the ER for what we estimate was his 8th kidney stone. We've actually lost count of how many kidney stones he's had, which doesn't speak well of his kidneys.

This was the worst bought of kidney stones he's had. 

I checked in on the kids several times using the cameras we have in the main rooms in the house while I sat with Bryan. I came home for a few hours and got Topher and Sophie to bed, then went back to the hospital for about an hour. While I was gone the doctor decided to admit Bryan for the night because he couldn't keep anything down. It turns out the pain medicine they gave him not only didn't do much for the pain, it also caused nausea. And once his bed was ready for him upstairs, I had to leave. It was past visiting hours.

Thankfully, he passed the stone during the early hours of the morning. I did church at home with the kids, then I went back to the hospital while Topher napped and brought Bryan home. I'm so thankful that we could delay the Sacrament until he was back with us so he could partake of it as well. I'm also thankful that Peter was able to bless the Sacrament on his own while Bryan recovered.

I'd like to say that he's feeling better today. He was feeling better yesterday, but today he's starting to have kidney stone pains again. We're both really hoping it's part the healing process and not another kidney stone coming down. After his CT scan on Saturday the ER doctor confirmed what we've been told before: Bryan's kidneys are both still full of stones.

A Sure Sign

Good news: Cooper is feeling well enough to be ornery, always a sign of being on the mend.

We're thankful the hives are almost totally gone. We're thankful that he's only had two doses of Benadryl today. We're thankful he was able to do schoolwork the last two days.

We're not thankful for the ornery, but we're thankful for him.

Progress

Friday night was rough.

We had suspected that Cooper's swelling was due to his scratching. We were finally able to get him to sleep around one o'clock on Saturday morning by holding his hands so he couldn't scratch himself and doing a deep breathing exercise with him. I suggested that Bryan head to bed so he would have some rest in case he needed to take Cooper back to the ER. I offered to stay with Cooper and hold his hands so he wouldn't scratch. There were several times throughout that night that he tried to pull his hands away to rub at his face. I held on tight and prevented that until 6 AM, which is when I finally crashed. It helped though, his face was not as swollen that day.

We also made the choice to increase the Benadryl from every six hours to every four hours. This made a huge difference. By Sunday afternoon the hives appeared to be mostly gone, however his hands, feet, and face were all swollen, though not in the same way they'd been swollen from the scratching. By bedtime last night I wondered if we were done with the hives.

He had them again when he woke up this morning. They were mild compared to what they had been, but still visible. We hadn't woken him up at 3am for a Benadryl dose, which is possibly why the hives came back. They've been much calmer and milder today as we've stayed on top of the medicine. He's still itchy and doesn't want anyone to touch him, but it's so much better than it was.

Our goal tonight is to send him to bed at his regular 8:30 bedtime, then not give him medicine until 7AM tomorrow. We all need the sleep. This will be the longest he's gone without Benadryl since he started taking it on Wednesday.

The next step is determining the cause. He's been keeping a food journal since the ER visit. In order to have an allergy test done he needs to be symptom and allergy medication free for two weeks. So once the hives are gone we'll ween him off the Benadryl. Hopefully we can do that without a recurrence.

Thank you for your comforting messages, it makes a difference.