Something To Report

The blogging gods heard me. And they delivered.

Shortly after writing that I had nothing interesting to tell you, William got bitten in the temple by a bug, which has since created a rather interesting, if not-very-fun week for us. I know, I know, a bug bite isn't that big a deal, and it certainly didn't seem like anything special or blog-worthy for that matter, until two days later when the poor little guy's eye swelled shut. He woke up looking like a boxer who'd seen better days. Of course my camera decided to do some wonky things with the autofocus and I only got one semi-decent picture of him at breakfast, which doesn't quite capture the situation.

He looks happy enough though, doesn't he, despite not being able to see where his food was.

I gave him some Benedryl, but after two hours, it wasn't any better. We'd arranged a play date with our friend Anika and her naturopath mummy, Megan. At their place, Meg took one look at him and gave me what sounded like a very serious "Hmmmm." She was concerned that the reaction might lead to infection, especially since it was his eye that was affected and there was a nasty red rash at his temple. She then gave him some Apis tablets, which are made with the stinger of a honeybee. Wouldn't you know it but fifteen minutes later the swelling was going down. By the next morning he was completely back to normal.

Normal, that is, until 10am when he spiked a fever and complained that his head was hurting. I gave him the last of our tempra, put him to bed after a quick lunch and he seemed to sleep well for an hour or so. Once he awoke, he was complaining that his head hurt again. It was time to give him more tempra, but we'd run out. Since I couldn't wait for Mark to come home, I just took both boys to the pharmacy. I got children's Tylenol instead of infant tempra, thinking maybe he needed something more suited to his age and gave him a dose in the car. On the drive home, we stopped to look at a construction site and then five minutes later, three blocks from the house, Will threw up all over himself and the car seat. 'Uh-oh," Owen said. Sigh. Nothing like blue puke-stained car seats to make everyone feel better.

But amazingly, within a few minutes of getting home, Will said he was feeling better. His temperature dropped and an hour later he was demanding dinner. He nearly ate a whole chicken by himself. I was very nervous of feeding him too much of anything in case it came back for a visit later, but he insisted he was fine and hungry and "more chick-kin peas". Who am I to argue with a hungry child?

Megan thinks his body was just fed up with all the medicine and the toxins from the bug bite and just got rid of it all. Hey, all I know is he's feeling much better, was jumping up and down on the bed the next morning full of smiles and telling me "my head no hurt mummy!" "Yeah, I can see that, buddy."

Now I know this really isn't the most interesting of weeks, or the most fascinating of stories, but some weeks, this is as good as it gets. Swollen eyes, fever, barfy car rides...some weeks this is the reality of being a parent. Maybe my next post will be about glamour and glitz. Or maybe it will be about poop. The suspense is killing me.