show's over. we're all dead.

I'm just popping in to tell you we've all died.  It was a long, slow, painful death.  At least, that's what I'm looking forward to saying when all of this is finally over.  For now, we're still in the writhing, gnashing throes of dying.  Get ready for the gory details.

Today marks Day Eleven of the stomach bug at our house.  A week and a half ago, Rocco sounded the starting gun with a diarrhea incident all over the kitchen floor.  (Thanks to the Shark steam mop my mom got me for Christmas, it was actually as non-eventful as such an event could possibly be.)  It seemed like it went away over the weekend, but then it came back full force on Monday.  I was changing around ten diapers per day for him, and his poor little bottom was so burned.  Luckily, other than one afternoon/evening of running a fever and being really clingy, he acted pretty normal.  At the end of it all, his mouth weirdly broke out in canker sores before he was finally deemed 'in good health.'

Unfortunately, right toward the end of his ordeal, I started to feel queasy, and then Penelope started getting the gurgle guts.  At midnight last Wednesday, Finneas came nonchalantly upstairs to tell Todd, 'Dad, I think there's something you need to see.'  It turns out, he'd thrown up in his bed - and on the wall.  So there was that.

Since Wednesday, the three of us have been miserable.  Fevers, headaches, pyrotechnics.  There was a moment a few days ago when a migraine hit me so suddenly and intensely that I honestly thought I was having an aneurysm.  For a split second, I was like, Is this really how it ends for me?

Callista is clearly feeling the sympathy pains.

Luckily (ish) I lived to see another miserable day, and another, and another.  I am still battling fevers and raging headaches, and have zero appetite, although the GI stuff seems to have settled down for me.  (The kids are still dealing with it.)  And my mouth and throat feel like I've swallowed scalding hot tea.

Unfortunately, Laurelai now seems to have caught the bug... and last night after dinner, Atticus started complaining of a bellyache.  So we're nowhere near being out of the woods yet.

I have served nothing but saltines, Wonderbread, and Sprite for the last twenty million meals.  (I'm not proud of it, but I'm not not proud of it.)  I am so far behind on laundry that it would take less time and effort to just burn the place down, file an insurance claim, and buy all new stuff than it will to get caught up.  Thank our gracious heavenly Father above for my absolute gem of a husband, who has managed to juggle all of our needs with amazing patience, all while prepping for not one but two sermons this week.

We clearly have a ways to go before we can put this all behind us and move on to catching the next horrible illness waiting for us this winter.  Will you please pray that Todd stays healthy, that we can get through the rest of this quickly and with a little bit of dignity, and that my milk supply would stay strong through my dehydration and exhaustion?  I would hate to have to give up nursing because of this, but my body's finicky as it is, and seven months is usually when it starts giving up the milk ghost, so we're treading on dangerous ground.  (Callista turned seven months a few days ago.)

Anyway.  As you can see, it's been no fun, but at least we've gotten to gaze at lots of sleeping kids, which always does the soul good.  Also, as Atticus was the last kid to fall ill (besides Callista), he got lots of time to play outside by himself, which does his soul good.  On Saturday, while everyone was resting inside the bowels of hell the house, he was outside, happily digging foxholes for five hours.

At least something good came out of all of this!