Term Break sickness --

literally! We have spent the past two weeks nursing the sick in our household. First, Conn's mom was sick with the flu. Then, Melesiata was sick, I think just the crud. Hers turned into a rash because she was reacting to some of the medicine they were giving her. Conn's mom's turned into diabetic issues with very high blood sugar. I don't really know much about how she is managing it, so I don't know how she's doing with that. Last Tuesday, Parker got it. He started with fever, then runny nose, cough, lethargy, loss of appetite, general discomfort and crabbiness. On Wed. his temperature was 104.7 under the arm! Glad we brought acetaminophen and ibuprofen for kids. We dosed him up and gave him a cool bath. This helped somewhat as well as lots of cuddling. He started having diarrhea Wed night too. To me, this is the worst part! By Friday, he still was feverish and symptomatic so we took him to the doctor. He didn't really say what he thought was wrong, but he gave us a prescription for amoxicillin and nystatin. He seems to be doing a bit better since starting those, but the diarrhea is not. That's still pretty often. He gets lots of baths each day which is also good for his fever. It's not that high now.
Next was James. Monday night he woke in the night and threw up. Tuesday he seemed fine, but Wednesday morning he couldn't hold anything down. He also has some diarrhea.
It hit Tanielu Tuesday night. He had diarrhea in the night (in his sleep twice -- think Ernest P. Worll: eeeeeeeeewwwwww), and all day Wednesday. He also has the high fever and lethargy, loss of appetite, and runny nose and cough.
Luckily, we found out that there are American military doctors here this week and next. It's part of a project called Pacific Partnership. They are providing medical services specifically for eyes, teeth and ears, and for general medical concerns. Since Conn's mom wanted to go about her eyes (which are getting worse, I attribute it to the diabetes) we rode along to have the kids seen. We registered them all and Conn and me too. Starting with Tanielu: his sores on his knees and under his nose are impetigo again, he's wheezing, everything else is probably viral going through our family. He got an antibiotic (cephalexin) and a couple of bottles of albuterol. James just has the viral crud and got some multivitamins. Parker was advised to continue the antibiotics he already had and to be very intentional about getting rehydrated. The doctor was pretty concerned about this. He also got a bottle of vitamins and a recipe for homemade rehydration salts. Conn is fine and I just have some fluid behind my ear that had the infection and I'm a little dry. I got some Sudafed. We also got a couple more tubes of Bacitracin (antibiotic ointment) and a couple of Cutters (stick mosquito repellant). The doctor wants us to come back next week to follow up with Tanielu and to make sure Parker is rehydrated enough.
As for all other medical issues, we're all doing fine and everything is resolved, except the lice. Parker and I still have a few. We comb our hair with the fine tooth comb daily and we're using coconut shampoo. Otherwise, we're waiting for the Nix from Mom.
We have a few more days before our school starts back up, so we're all resting up and taking it easy so we can heal and get healthy again. All prayers are welcome. And while you're at it, pray for rain. It hasn't rained for about two weeks except for a couple short midnight showers. It's been very hot as a result.
Hope I didn't jinx anyone and make you sick (Beth, maybe you shouldn't have read this!). I'll keep you posted on our recovery.