QUARANTINED

Before I had Henry, I was rarely sick. Even when he was tiny we managed to stay healthy for about the first eight months. I never understood those parents who were obsessed with germs, lathering everyone in anti-bacterial hand sanitizer, backing away from you if you said you had a little cold. Germs are good for you, right? They make your immune system strong. Too clean of an environment and people's immune systems get wacky.

Well, consider me humbled. Henry and I and occasionally Greg have been continually sick since sometime in November. And I mean continually, like two days of feeling ok in between 3 week stints of yucky-ness. I mentioned before how our holidays were punctuated by illness, but since then it's just gotten worse. We go to the pediatrician every other week. I'm thinking of switching doctors just so they don't think that I'm letting Henry lick petri dishes full of bacteria or something. And it's not just one thing that we can't kick. Sometimes it's stomach flus, ear infections, bad colds, one after another.

I felt so persistently crappy that even I finally went to the doctor, which I pretty much only do if I think I might be dying. One gave me anti-biotics that were too weak, and within a day I woke up with pink eye, a rash, and a UTI, and started spiking a fever with chills. I went to a second doctor who told me to take Cipro, which helped with everything except the original sinus infection. I'm considering going to an allergist, although I don't know what I could possibly be allergic to, since it feels like we never leave the house.

I feel like I've tried everything I can think of to stay healthy. I've cleaned my house from top to bottom, disinfecting Henry's toys, washing all the bedding, I even bought new pillows. We wash our hands like crazy and we stopped sharing spoons (wouldn't have done it in the first place but it's a way to get him to eat new foods). We take vitamins. I usually cut back on the fresh produce during the winter to save some money but I've been splurging for fresh fruits and veggies every day to try and give our bodies a boost.

I'm hoping that it will warm up soon and stop raining so we can get out and play :) Also we haven't been to our church in months, because the nursery is very crowded and we didn't want to give and receive the germs until we could go a week without getting sick. (We've visited my parents' and sister's churches because they don't have any other babies in the nursery), but I really miss the friends we were making there. I feel like our lives are sort of on hold because of this. Luckily a few good friends have come to visit us at home so that we can have some semblance of a social life despite Henry's wheezing and my ever-present box of tissues. All that's missing is some plastic sheeting.