Planet Sicko

Avery has been sick all week with a minor fever, (the highest it got was 102.9)body aches, (especially in her legs) a stuffy nose, and exaustion. It all started Monday at preschool. One minute she was fine, the next she was crying. It was terrible to see her crumbled up and hit so hard all of a sudden. Later I asked her if she had a headache when she was crying and she said, "No, my head hurt, I didn't have a headache."

Thankfully she has been able to sleep through the night, she doesn't have a cough, she has somewhat of a normal appetite, and during the day she behaves fairly normally, though on her worse day she hit 5:00 and was exhausted. Who knows exactly WHAT she has. Most people are getting similar symptoms and claiming it's H1N1, but I don't know for sure and our Doc does not test for Swine Flu.

Speaking of that lovely flu, I tried to get Julia vaccinated for H1N1 the other night (I couldn't take Avery because of her fever) but it's madly competitive to get the shots where we live and we haven't been lucky yet. After a great discussion with our advice nurse I learned that the body's response to the vaccination can take two weeks. If she HAS been exposed to the swine flu getting her vaccinated still might not prevent her from getting sick herself.

H1N1 is obviously going around, but as our advice nurse wisely reminded me, all the other usual sicknesses are still going around,too. Most people are assuming that their child's sickness is the swine flu, but it isn't always. True influenza, our nurse emphasized, gives kids respiratory problems, which Avery hasn't had. She reminded me that who knows what spring will bring and it's wise to have kids vaccinated. So we will, one of these days, when we can! Sheesh!

There was another rise in Avery's fever yesterday after her fever had almost gone away, which is what a lot of families we know are experiencing. Who knows. We shall see how it plays out with Julia, Miss Asthma. In the meantime, Avery is laying low, hunkering down, taking vitamins, water, and some serious t.v. I'm so anxious for her to be better.