I Hate Winter!

I've never been one of those people who are mad when the first snow falls because it means winter is coming...in fact I've always been opposite. I love winter; the snow, skiing, skating, tobogganing, my birthday, and Christmas. But that was until I had kids. Now when the first snow falls, I wonder "what are my kids going to get this year?"

Last year Ethan got a terrible virus that lasted ten days - ten very LOOOOOONG days! I won't go into details, there's a post about it from last winter. Those of you who have me as a Facebook friend, know that this year really started out with a bang in the area of sickness. We're only one month in, and it's been a packed month!

It started with Ethan getting bronchiolitis. That sounds bad, but in kids over the age of one, it's just a bad cough and a runny nose. In babies under a year, however, it can be quite serious, even turning into pneumonia. Well, I also have a baby under a year who is obviously in close contact with Ethan. So Anthony came down with a bad cough. A really bad cough with a lot of chest congestion. We took him to the emergency where they gave me a pamphlet explaining what to look for to determine if it might be turning into pneumonia; extreme sleepiness, no desire to play or interact, fever, and I don't remember what else. Well over the course of a few days, his condition worsened and got all those symptoms and also started throwing up most of his bottles from caughing so hard. I called Healthlinks to see what I should do and the nurse said I needed to call 911 immediately since he had spells where he'd stop breathing and also since he wasn't engaging or interacting with us and just sleeping. I was kind of scared, so I called 911. To make a long story short, they came, assessed him, took us to children's emergency, where we waited. Yes, we apparantly had to be rushed there by ambulance only to wait for an hour and a half to see the doctor who told us to go home and wait it out.........don't even ask how unimpressed we were about that whole ordeal.

Here's Ethan painting Valentine's Cookies with his cousin

while he was still sick with the flu

And that was just the beginning....about a month ago, I went to visit my friends in Steinbach after not seeing them for quite a while. I noticed one of my friend's babies looked really sick and the family was concerned about him too. Well 2 days later, we found out he had bacterial meningitis. The same day, Ethan started throwing up. And not just a couple times, he puked every ten minutes for the first hour, then every 20, and ended up puking over 20 times in the first 3 hours. This continued throughout the day.

That night after he and Anthony were in bed, I got a phone call from a friend saying everyone who had been in contact with the baby who had meningitis had to go to their doctor the next day because it was extremely contagious (I remembered I had helped clean up the baby's puke the night I was with him, then was touching Ethan's chicken fingers). Well I started panicking and called my doctor (puking is a symptom of meningitis), who told me to immediately take both kids to the children's emergency again! Well at this point I was a wreck; imagining the worst, that both my kids would have it and we'd have to be in the hospital for the next two weeks....and even death! So we woke up the kids, and took them in. We were put in a quarentined room where we stayed until 2:30 in the morning!! (sidenote: I had been up since 4:50am that morning with Ethan puking!!) They told us that Ethan probably just had a stomache flu, and they had looked at the other babies files, and his type of meningitis wasn't as contagious as other forms, and we didn't have to worry!! (I have no idea where the breakdown of communication happened, but that was NOT a fun night and I hope I never go through anything like that again).

Well Ethan ended up having a really bad stomache flu and couldn't keep food down for a week. He lost a lot of weight and Chris came down with it too. I became super paranoid about getting it (I am terrified of getting the stomache flu), and turned into a cleaning nazi. I went through about 3 or 4 containers of sanitizing wipes, and my hands were raw and red by the end of the week from cleaning so much. (sidenote: my sister and her family came over once we thought it had passed, but Ethan threw up all over her husband and my sister and neice ended up getting it, then my mom helped them and she got it too!!) My cleaning and paranoia paid off for me and Anthony, however, and we didn't get it, praise the Lord!!

So now I no longer like winter. All the viruses and sicknesses aren't worth the few outdoor activities I enjoy....or should I say enjoy'ed'. Since I have a baby and a toddler and no vehicle, I haven't even gone skating, tobogganing, or skiing!! Maybe next year....oh wait, I'm becoming a hermit next winter. I think we need to move to Florida :o)

CAN SOMEONE PLEASE TELL ME HOW TO PUT PICTURES THROUGHOUT THE POST?? I used to be able to move them no problem, but now I can't. I also can't copy and paste them, they only stay at the top!! UGH!!