The One With Sickness

Try as I may I cannot keep my family healthy since February. The majority of the family came down w/ a stomach bug/flu in Feb and ever since we've been battling colds and now, another stomach bug. So far just the 4 y/o has it.... but what comes in goes around fast. It drives me crazy to get sick. We go three places consistently: Church, Friday School & the Library. We get together w/ friends once or twice/week as well, but we don't go to any other public places. I don't even take the children to the grocery store with me... and yet we still pick things up. It's discouraging to me. It wouldn't be a big deal if I had one or two children, but since I have 5 it seems to take us FOREVER to get over something.

I chalk them full of echinacea and elderberry syrup. They get over things fairly quickly, but then seem to get something else because their immune systems were lowered by the previous flu/cold/stomach bug. I wish there were a sure-fire way to not get anything.

Awww.... Summer, you cannot come soon enough.

The One With a Summer Cold

What is up with summer colds? I think it should be impossible to get sick in the summertime. I don't remember being sick in the summer when I was a kid. Perhaps I was a few times, but not that I can recall.

We had VBS the week of July 19th and ever since then we've been fighting a cold. Usually in the winter we get something every time we go to church and/or Friday school. It drives me bonkers.

Some people have a stomach bug too... I thought perhaps Nathan had it becuase he did throw up once on Friday morning. The rest of the day he was fine, tho... eating, playing, running around. Matt tends to get really sick if he gets overtired & Nathan was overtired, so I wonder if he gets the same thing.

I'm making a big pot of chicken soup today. I put in a whole onion and a whole garlic bulb. I'm hoping it'll help.

The One With Updates

Updates, updates...

The house update:

Besides the deed problem, there was another big cafuffle issue that our lenders were freaking out about. It got resolved already, so I won't go into details. It just added to the stress for a week. Fun, stuff. No word on the deed problem yet. I'm feeling my patience waning each day. I'm so anxious (in a good way) to get into the house. I know we will get there... I just don't want to wait anymore. We start school in less than 3 weeks and I so badly want to be settled before we start!

My Health Update:

Apparently I have a Vit. D deficiency that is causing me to feel as awful as I have been. I go in to discuss it with my Dr tommorrow afternoon. Hopefully it's no biggie and I can just take a supplement. In the meantime I'm spending more time in the sunshine (Thank the Lord it's been beautiful this week!!) and started drinking milk fortified w/ Vit. D again. I don't typically drink milk as I like to save it for the children, but I decided my health is worth it.

Schooling Update:

The children are super excited to start their school this year. They are every year, but then get tired of it by the time winter hits. They have been asking to start, so I let them start their readers. If they finish their readers early we can always get more books out of the library. Michael has chosen to wait to do his reader as it's all incooperated in his schoolwork. Nathan is reading Winne The Pooh & Karah is reading Oak Meadow's Ben & Meg (which is amusing because OM wrote it and incoorperated their homeschooling schedule/style into the story. )

Personal Update:

I got my hair cut! I haven't had my hair cut in a long time. I wanted to go completely different this time and so I chopped it all off. Ok, not all, but it's chin length. It looks really good and feels good. :) I have a secret about Karah, but she so desperately wants to be the one to tell her Aunt that I can't post it here just in case her Aunt reads it. I'll post after she gets to tell her.

Another One About Anemia

I don't know if anyone remembers this post, but I thought I'd update on how I'm feeling. It's pretty much the same. Exhaustion, fatigue, off/on heart palpatations. I did a bunch of resarch in my midwifery texts & online and I'm 99.9% sure it's anemia. So I called to make an appt finally and they can't get me in until next Thursday. However, the Dr was concerned about the heart palpatations, so she is going to call if there are any cancelations.

This should be interesting... 5 kids and a 40+ min appt. *sigh* This is one of the biggest reasons I wanted to avoid going to the Dr. For one, Dr's never take me seriously. (Or so it seems). And secondly I don't know how I'm going to keep Katie occupied. She's such a busy, busy little girl. But I need to find out my numbers so we can go from there. Matt is getting concerned because of my constant fatigue. I cover it up by drinking alot of caffeine, but even that isn't helping much these days.

I'll update again after my appt. :)

The One Where I Don't Feel Well

I haven't been feeling well for quite a while. I'm exhausted all. the. time. I was talking w/ Rachael the other day and she asked why I'm so tired all the time. I started thinking about it and realized that I'm constantly tired. I have different levels of exhaustion, but I'm always tired. I have headaches almost daily that get progressively worse as the day goes on. I have heart palpatations and can't even go up the stairs w/out getting winded. I am starting to think it's more than just 'mommy' tiredness. My guess is anemia (I've always been borderline anemic and am wondering if it's gotten worse w/ age or the number of cihldren I have or something...)

So I'm trying to decide if I should go in and get checked out or just wait and see if I can improve it by getting more iron into me...

The One With Continued Observations

After I posted yesterday Erich started having a headache & a sore throat. He may have had a low grade fever, but as fevers aren't high on my list to check /cure I didn't take his temp. I gave him a few extra doses of the elderberry syrup and popped in a movie to ensure that he rested. He did. He slept for hours in the late morning and then again in the late afternoon. He woke up fine, ate a great dinner and then proceeded to stay up til 9. LOL! He slept fine all night and is bouncing around like nothing ever happened today.

Katie STILL has a runny nose. She slept all night last night tho! Yay!

The boys are still coughing and sniffling. No signs of anything else yet.

Matt reported a sniffle.... and I have a slight sore throat. Due to the elderberry syrup being almost gone I'm saving it for the children and I'm just taking extra doses of Vit. C and echinacea. Plus tea... I love tea, so ginger tea and chamomile tea are high on my list to drink today.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

In other news: I filed my taxes last night. I somehow messed up both of the girl's s.s. numbers. I have no idea how that was possible when I had the cards RIGHT in front of me and I thought I'd double checked it. DOH!! So needless to say the Federal government rejected it. I corrected it and e-filed again. Hoping it goes through this time. I love e-filing! Imagine how long it would have taken to come back and then be corrected & sent back through the mail?! This took less than 12 hrs! It looks like we're getting back enough to pay off all our debt except our house! Praise the Lord!! This has been a goal for us: to be debt free (except our home) at 30. It looks like it'll happen!! woohooo!!

The One With Observations on Illness

Here's the rundown of this week... I find this interesting, so I'm posting it.

Friday ~ Exposed to a child I thought may be sick.

Saturday morning ~ Gave Karah & Erich 1 tspn each of elderberry syrup. Gave Michael & Nathan 2 tspn of elderberry syrup each. (This is what is recommended on the bottle for their ages) Gave Katie nothing. Matt & I each took 2 tspns as well.

Sunday morning ~ Repeat of the day before.

Monday morning ~ Repeat of Saturday.

Monday later morning ~ Katie has a low grade fever and over-all fussiness.

Monday afternoon ~ Karah now has a low grade fever and tiredness.

(I left the fevers alone. No tylenol)

Monday evening ~ Katie now has a very stuffy nose accompanied by the fever. Karah still have a fever. Karah threw up (tho I think this was related to falling asleep and then being awakened fast) She ate/drank fine.

Monday Night ~ Katie up A LOT. Fever ranged from 99.7-101.7 Karah slept all night. Erich woke up with a high fever and fever nightmares. I gave tylenol to Katie as she seemed to be in pain, but none to the others.

Throughout Monday I gave Karah doses of 1 tspn elderberry 3 times. I gave katie 1/2 doses twice, but she wouldn't take it more. I gave the boys regular doses twice.

Tuesday morning ~ Karah woke up feeling better. Still tired, but no fever and barely any runny nose. Erich woke up fine. Katie woke up exhausted and with a majorly runny nose and runny eyes. Boys woke up coughing a bit.

Tuesday ~ No fevers in anyone. Continued elderberry dosage twice/day for all kiddos.

Tuesday night ~ No fevers in anyway, everyone went to bed fine. Katie still has lots of congestion in her nose, but it's clear and coming out. She woke up twice.

Wednesday morning ~ Boys coughing/sneezing a bit. Karah & Erich 100% fine. Katie still has a bit of a runny nose, but it's much better than previous day.

So far Matt & I have nothing more than a little extra mucous in the nose.

The reason I find all this interesting is because the children who have the highest dosage of elderberry never got the fever and exhaustion... just a bit of a runny nose. The children with the medium amount of elderberry ended up w/ fevers, but got over it quickly. The child who wasn't taking the elderberry until she got sick and then only took a little bit of it has stayed sick the longest.

Perhaps the elderberry works? FWIW ~ I say elderberry, but it's a syrup that is made of elderberry, echinacea & propolus. The adult one has Vit. C in it as well. (The boys have been getting 1/2 doses of the adult one since yesterday as I was almost out of the kids one and wanted to make sure Katie & Erich got that one)

The One With a TV Day

After making it through most of the cold/flu season with no sickness, we were hit. Yesterday Karah & Katie had fevers and Erich woke up in the middle of the night with one. I'm a firm believer in medicating for pain, but not for fevers unless they get too high. I learned quite a few years ago that fevers aren't bad... they are the body's way of fighting off viruses & that we can actually prolong illnesses by stifling the fevers. So I just monitored them and let the fevers run their courses. None of them have a fever this morning, they all ate breakfast & look like they are on the mend. I started giving them elderberry/echinacea/propilus syrup on Friday when they were exposed to the illness & I think it's helping the coldish thing to not last too long. Tho it's hard to know for sure... maybe it's just a short one anyway.

So today is "TV/Game" day... lots of resting, lots of drinking & on the menu? Chicken soup with loads of garlic and onions. I'm thinking about looking for a spicy chicken soup.

The One About Being Sick

I detest this 'cold & flu' season. Right now we have everything that points to the "flu" according to the CDC. Everything on this list except for the first and last which both say only some people get. So we're staying home from Friday school today because of it though I know other people who have similar symptoms are going. We're all on the mend. Have been dealing w/ this for a little over a week... I've had a sore throat now for 6 days. I just realized it's been 6 days! LOL! I hadn't realized that. It's really been difficult to get stuff done because I'm so fatigued, but we're still plugging away getting stuff accomplished.

I just really detest this season... wondered if we should get 'the shot', but the more I research the more I think not. Even the CDC (the link I posted) says that most people who get the 2009 H1N1 have mild cases. I hate that the media throws such a hype into the mix. It makes it harder to make an informed choice w/out the worries in the back of my head.

The Somewhat Random One

I think we're on the mend! Still coughing and sneezing, but brighter eyes and more smiles this morning. Praise the Lord!! I'm grateful we haven't been sick all winter, but really dislike it when we do.

I'm listening to "Siblings Without Rivalry" on tape right now. It's been a fairly good "read". It's made me think about how I interact with the children and how much or little I step into fights and if I pit them against each other w/out realizing it. So I've been putting it to practice... Levi and James were outside playing basketball and James is much better than Levi at it. Levi was angry and came in pouting. Before I listened to the book I would have tried to make him feel better by saying things like "but you are good at piano and reading". Instead I just stoood there and listened quietly. He stomped off and pouted a little more. Then came back and said, "Well, I guess it doesn't matter. I have fun playing it and it's just a fun game." and that was that. He hasn't been upset that James is better than him at it since. Another thing I did was have James make a list of all the things he can do when he's bored. He had a tendancy to pick on his siblings when he is bored and it's really frustrating for all of us. So I mentioned that maybe he should make a 'bored list', which he refused at first, but then when I wasn't paying attention he made one. Lol! He came up with some good things on his 'bored list'. :)

Beth & I have continued to do her hair in neat hairstyles... but we've been coming up with our own. I'll have to take a few pictures. Some of the ones I've found on the blogs are very complicated and I just don' thave the time for them, so I tweak them. I've found that I really enjoy coming up with new styles for her hair. Now if only Alyssa would grow some I could do matching hair-dos for them.