Thursday 25 June 2009

Beds, Bugs, and Bodily Fluids

Thursday today; this should be my long day "off", the one day in the week when both girls are elsewhere for at least five hours. I already knew that wasn't going to happen; preschool have an all day outing which wasn't really great for Little Fish so today was a staying at home day.

Mog was a bit quiet this morning; nothing specific enough to keep her home from school but "not quite right" enough to keep me close to the phone. A worry which turned out to be justified as the call from school came; no fever, nothing specific, just quietly unhappy and uncomfortable.

So home she came, and onto her bed, where she's been ever since - not asleep, not fitting, not hot, just quiet, unresponsive, and copious quantities of foul smelling poo her only visible symptom. Not that helpful a symptom either; she's on Movicol so it happens fairly regularly.

I'd write it off to Movicol entirely if it weren't for the fact that as I cleaned up her third explosion of the afternoon I head the ominous phrase "I need a towel NOW" from Little Fish. Stupidly I ignored her plea, being up to the elbows in the drippy brown stuff, and walked back into the sitting room to find a nice neat tidal wave of vomit lapping at my toes.

I grab a towel from the bathroom and use it to mop the flood, feeling rather spectacularly bad for having ignored the "Oh please no water"s which had been shouted as I bolused her midday feed into her. Oops. A second towel reaches Little Fish just in time for her to catch the next retch herself, saving her brace for the moment at least.

Back to Mog who has taken advantage of her nappy free state to wee all over the bed.

Back to Little Fish who is now a fetching shade of puce, sweat pouring from her forehead. When the fever strip says 39, the tympanic thermometer says 38, and the under arm one says 36c, what do you do? I split the difference, give the paracetamol, which is promptly retched back, thankfully the orange version not the strawberry which might otherwise give false child-vomiting-fresh-blood-this-time concerns. I don't care about the invasiveness, I want the rectal version please.

Mop her fevered brow to the accompaniment of much "I NOT sicky, I NOT I don't like this" and a lesser mutter of "I want peanut butter and pâté and yoghurt in my mouth and apple pudding in my tubie". Suggest this possibly isn't the best plan at this precise moment in time, and grab a tissue to mop up the nose bleed caused by a combination of retching and temper.

Back to Mog to mop up again and try to cover the pressure mark. Chase the wheelchair service in the hope her new FoamKarve might be ready some time before the end of term. Get a standard noncommittal "her name's not on the list and no one is here to talk to you" until I mention the magic two words "Pressure Mark" at which point "can't help you please go away and be patient" turns into "I'll email the boss, I'll contact the company, I'll get them to call you back in the morning".

Realise my mother is arriving shortly to take Mog to Rainbows, but that Mog is in no fit state to get there. Attempt to tidy something beyond straightforwards vomit-mopping, but give up and begin blogging this instead.

Mop more vomit, wipe more poo, cancel our attendance at a proposed picnic tomorrow and pause to be thankful that the potential visitors we had for the Children's Food Festival are not coming down for the weekend.

And then I had a momentary breather, caught up with myself and reverted to the past tense. And then Little Fish started retching again, and a suspicious drip drip drip was heard from Mog's bedroom. And then Little Fish started flapping the towel I had been using to mop the floor.

And then my head exploded.

That is all.

Tia

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Think your potential visitors would not have minded you canceling (given the circumstances!) The industrial sticky toffee pudding can be saved for another day! Hope everyone is feeling better tomorrow!

Michelle said...

Oh but you are a mom, your head isn't supposed to explode, at least not until all the little ones are well....
:)
Prayers for quick recovery!

Alesha said...

at the risk of sound saccharine...

oh no! Poor Mog!

ACK! Poooooor Little Fish!

and

Poor, poor, poor mummy!!!

; )

Wishing you all improving health and a drier, cleaner tomorrow!

Alesha

Doorless said...

Poor dears! Hope all is better tomorrow and you stay well. Sounds like a quiet bath for mom is due

Anonymous said...

sounds like you need a gin and tonic and a large slice of cake!
Shirley n Celyn

R said...

Yuck! Poor girls. If Mog is feeling up to it does she have a toilet or shower chair or some sort of commode she can sit on for a bit to give you (and her skin) a bit of a break from the pads and runny guts?

Am full of admiration for Little Fish. I wouldn't have managed to be nearly so organised with my puke at that age.

Any chance of getting someone (PA, support worker, respite person?) to come and help maintain the levees for the next day or two?

Suppository terrible idea when runny bum is a possibility - sore and irritated rectal mucosa may absorb it way too quickly and/or trigger a tidal wave from the digital stimulation...

Do you think Mog would be puking too (assume she's had the nissen or something with her peg)? If so would it help to let her vent/vomit through a syringe?

Not had a dose of throwing up since I've had my peg... horrible thought when you're not mobile.

Urk. You all have my sympathies and best wishes for a very very speedy recovery.

Tia said...

I gathered my exploded head from the floor and picked up a few spare marbles to fill in the gaps (so now not only have I not lost mine, I have a few to spare for emergencies), and thankfully everyone had calmed back down by bedtime.

Mog never does vomit now she has her fundo - and Little Fish never gets diarrhea; she doesn't go at all unless she has a suppository no matter how loose the explosion might be. I'm thinking perhaps they had a twenty four hour bug but split the difference so half the symptoms and only twelve hours. But then sanity reasserts and I suspect it was more likely to have been an unfortunately timed coincidental Movicol induced river and reflux puke. LF used to have reflux but hasn't for years; this brace holds her in an unnatural position with big straps confining her stomach so there's nowhere much for food to go.

They both seem absolutely fine this morning anyway - well, aside from Mog being rather tired and not weeing. But aside from that...

Tia

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