I’ve been trying to teach the kids to be thankful no matter what happens but these kinds of life lessons are best learnt through experience. It’s easy to teach thankfulness when life is good, when they get a gummy or a trip to the zoo but when everything seems to go horribly wrong, that’s when being thankful really counts.
Such as days like today, when Tru is just recovering from another “mommy I can’t breathe” lung infection episode. After I just spent the last two nights watching him to make sure he’s still breathing and alive. I doze off for a while and I dream he’s wheezing and I wake up to find that he is actually struggling for air which is a far worse nightmare.
Then we head off for breakfast this morning and everyone gets stricken with food poisoning so severe the husband gets admitted to the A&E at Changi Hospital. And I’m driving the kids home when Kirsten starts throwing up fountains of um, vomit for an entire minute non-stop like a bad spoof of The Exorcist. I mean, I’ve never seen anyone throw up continuously like that for that long in my life. For the next hour or so, she would vomit a handful of yellowish stuff every 5 minutes. It was unreal.
So I rushed her to the doctor and when I got back, I started feeling nauseous and pukey but I was too weak to drag the kids with me to the doctor again so I just stuck my head in the toilet bowl and tried not to pass out. It was all very exciting in a only-when-it’s-not-happening-to-me sort of way.
The husband in hospital, Tru in recovery, Kirsten in a pool of vomit and me, in the toilet. Take that, Korean melodrama.
It’s hard to be thankful on a day like today because it hits you like a freight train and knocks you out with a solid hadouken. But at the risk of sounding like a lunatic, I do got a lot of things to be thankful for.
1. I’ve got the best sick kid ever. The worst thing about having sick kids is that they’re extra whiney, which is understandable and fully warranted. But baby girl is so badass at being sick, she make it look like a walk in the park. She spent the entire day sleeping and looking so sweet and stoned all at the same time. When she’s in pain, she snuggles up on my chest and grabs my shirt real tight, then throws up on me.
2. Tru’s lung infection episode lasted 24 hours, the shortest one yet. He usually takes 3-5 days to recover but this time around, he was up and running after a day. Always a good sign.
3. We’re all on the road to recovery so the worst is over. Hopefully we all get some decent rest tonight, which is the best part about recovering from an illness – enforced rest. Some sleep always makes me feel better.
4. Not technically related but jailbreak for iPhone 4.1 is out. I’ve waited a long time for this and it is awesome.
5. I lost an entire kilo today. Mostly water, I know, but my stomach looks flatter than it has been in a long time. Silver lining, y’all.
