Stomach Flu...again

Back in early September, I wrote a post about our family having the stomach flu. I hoped I would never have to write another one. Yet, here I am - just 5 short months later, reliving the whole thing.

Here's how it all went down...
We all survived the respiratory junk that hit us at the end of January. It cost us a fortune in medications and nearly cost us our sanity (remember the steroids?), but we survived intact. Jan was up for the weekend, so we went out for a nice dinner at Cafe Rue Orleans on Friday night. We thoroughly enjoyed it - as always. Friday and Friday night, Caleb had a little bit of diarrhea, but we chalked it up to his antibiotics and didn't think much of it. On Saturday, Jan agreed (quite willingly) to keep Caleb so Rudy and I could have a day out together. We decided to take a chance on getting tickets at the arena for the Arkansas vs. Florida basketball game, so we went to Fayetteville. We did manage to get pretty great seats and had an absolutely fantastic day together. We watched the game, celebrated the big win with the other crazy fans, went shopping and went to dinner. Rudy even bought me a new iPod for Valentine's Day! Before the game, I commented to Rudy that my stomach didn't feel very good, but I just thought it was because I was hungry. During the game, I started to feel a little queasy and almost feverish, but I pushed it off because I was having so much fun. Rudy called a few times during the day to check in with Jan and Caleb and she said that they were having a great time, but that his diarrhea hadn't stopped and that he was developing a terrible diaper rash. She called us at dinner and said that we should probably come home pretty soon, because he was absolutely miserable and needed some really strong diaper cream to stop the rash. We left as soon as we could and stopped at Walgreen's for diaper rash treatment. When we got home, poor Caleb was in terrible shape. His diaper rash was so painful that he just couldn't be consoled during diaper changes. We were still blaming the antibiotics for his troubles...

I went to bed late Saturday night with a splitting headache and woke up Sunday morning with THAT FEELING. I laid there in misery for a while before I made my first sprint to the bathroom to throw up. That continued throughout the morning and went downhill from there. I definitely had the stomach flu. (In the meantime, Jan had to go help her mother take her father to the hospital. Grandpa's health has been really poor this past few months and he needed some pretty significant medical attention.) Rudy took over taking care of Caleb who obviously had more than just the antibiotics upsetting his stomach. Caleb was a different child than I have ever experienced. He cried at the top of his lungs all day long. He had to be held constantly and could not be satisfied by anything at all. I couldn't lift my head off the pillow without throwing up, so Rudy was completely exhausted by noon. We also knew that the way things were going - there was no way Caleb would be going to school on Monday and that I probably wouldn't either. That's when we decided that we needed to call for backup. I called my mom and she agreed to come up and take care of Caleb. She made it to the house at about 5:00 - just about the time the flu hit Rudy. I was as sick as I have ever been on Sunday night. I could not walk from the couch to the bed by myself. Mom was amazing (as usual) and did everything in her power to take care of Caleb and me and managed to get all of our laundry done at the same time. Somehow, Rudy managed to go to work on Monday. Mom left after going to Wal Mart to get prescription diaper cream for Caleb and Gatorade for me.

Monday and Tuesday nights, Rudy had concerts at the middle schools, so it was just Caleb and me. They were both very trying nights. We were both tired, both still not feeling great and both cranky. That doesn't make for a very good combination. But - we survived and our whole family had a great night last night. Rudy had another concert tonight and Caleb and I had one of the best nights together that I can remember. We played and read books and had dinner together. It was a complete turnaround. I'm praying that we are through being sick for a while and that we can enjoy some time together this weekend without any of the distractions of being sick, tired and cranky.