Kids Get Their Parents Sick - No Matter What They Do To Protect Themselves!

I should have been more suspicious when my daughter ran up to me with open arms and a big smile, yelling “daddy”, and hugged me while I was eating my breakfast. As it was all a preconceived facade to wipe her runny nose all over my new black shirt and run away.

Minutes later she came back handing me her partially eaten waffle saying sweetly “here daddy, you can have this now” and then sneezed on me - and the waffle - and then ran away once again leaving behind a slimy rope trail.
That was a week ago, and I’m just now starting to recover from that vicious cold virus she gave me. She, on the other hand, had recovered the next day.

When I finally came into work sharing my brave battle story of what I now refer to as “The Great Cold of ‘08” a co-worker with a new 5-week old first child confidently told me “Wow - that’s gross. That’s never going to happen to me.”

Amateur.

Then I thought to myself, “That was me 3 1/2 years ago...”
It’s not really his fault; he’s just getting started. There were plenty of things I didn’t know before having a kid. A few examples:

1. Sometimes the child secretes strange unknown liquids from the most unlikely places that you temporarily think they’re really an alien. But a simple search on Google reassures you that they're normal.
   
2. Having an early walker IS NOT a good thing. Because then they want to walk all the time and eat things on the floor like bugs, cigarette butts, lint, rocks, Jolly Ranchers in need of a haircut, etc.
3. Never say the word “Poop” – EVER. Because if you do, it becomes a preschooler’s choice word for everything: “Poop Car”, “Poop Building”, “Poop Baby”, “Poop Shirt”, “Poop Bacon” (blasphemy!)…
4. The Poison Control Center (1-800-222-1222) is the best invention - EVER. Well, second best – KFC is the first best invention. Don’t argue with me because you’ll be wrong. And “no” that number isn’t for calling after eating their new non-trans fat fried chicken.
5. You get sick just by being in the same room as your kid. In fact, you could be outside looking through a 6-inch aquarium thick, space shuttle "approved” glass and still get sick. Just being related is adequate enough.

That guy has a lot to learn…

It’s Days Like These I Wish I Had Magical Powers

Two nights ago, while the wife was at the gym and I was on kid duty (coloring and drawing), my daughter instantly became quiet and start shaking, almost shivering, while whimpering, nearly crying “Dada”.

I freaked out.

I instantly went into First Aid mode (I took a class last year), I began talking to her, making her look at me while her eyes became heavy and started closing while she muttered a few words in-between. She was breathing fine except she was really warm, almost too hot. I’ve never felt so helpless my entire life; a million things were going through my head.
I called our doctor (we have a great pediatrician office that has a 24-hour on call doctor), after a few quick questions, and some checkups, she had a fever and he gave me some instructions on how to soothe her. She was fine after an hour or so, nonetheless still uneasy with rattled nerves. I was told the body could shiver when a fever is rising (nobody warned me about this?) Thankfully it wasn’t a seizure; she doesn’t have any history of it and if it had been she would have been unresponsive and blacked out.

We watched her throughout the night virtually taking turns, with a doctor on-call waiting to see if we should take her to the local hospital.
Next day- she was fine. As if nothing happened - acting normal, playing, talking, asking for stuff she couldn’t reach. Her temperature was hovering around 100, nowhere near the 105 the previous night. We were told if she was acting normal, she should be O.K.

Last night, it happened again, nearly the same routine. Except this time led us to the local hospital where they began performing a bunch of tests on her. There’s nothing more horrible for a parent than having your kid in a hospital, crying, wanting you to protect them, and you can’t. I wished so hard that I could take her place.
Then came the waiting. Waiting for the results of all the tests while feeling like nothing else in the world matters than to see her happy, saying funny things, and playing again.

We found out she has pneumonia and everything is going to be all right (after 10 days of antibiotics and check-ups.) Later, she was back at home playing and talking to the dog. It really is hard to imagine that this was the same kid a few hours ago. Because if it were me, I would be asking for KFC, somebody to rub my feet, and maybe a t-shirt or some kind of award to hang on the wall that says “I survived. Make me cookies.”

The Downside Of Parenting: The IRS And Having A Virus Monkey In The House

My daughter came home sick on Friday after spending all day with a few other kids. This wasn’t just any kind of 'sickness' and definitely not the kind we’re used to. Nope, this was the evil kind.
The moment she got into the car she started spewing like the love child of Chucky and the Exorcist - it freaked us out! (Would you believe that this is our first experience with this type of sickness in her 18 months of life.)
Weird junk was flying all over the place - onto her, the car, the wife, the iPod(!) – with her arms flailing in the air like Richard Simmons, and putting her hands in “the line of fire” and then back onto herself. Yup, and it just kept coming out, intermediately, as if she had some secret chamber in her that we didn’t know about until that moment (human’s really are 90% fluid – no doubt about that anymore.)

It continued at home throughout the night. The poor thing couldn’t sleep and just wanted to cuddle the whole time - which is about the only upside to her being sick - except for the times she started spewing again (I’m really considering inventing vinyl sleepwear for parents...)
As a parent it really breaks my heart to see her in so much pain; I really wished I had some magical superhuman powers, like He-Man or Oprah’s 300 billion dollars, to make it all go away - but I don’t. I’m just an ordinary human being that plays the accordion just like everybody else. My powers are being a human pillow, a Pedialite waiter, and knowledge of the infamous BRAT (banana, rice, apple, toast) diet - watching her eat, and then watching it come out again (thar' she blows!)
We knew it was finally over the next day when she started asking for Potato Chips and Chicken again. What a relief! All was right in the world once again - birds started singing, the sun came out, and David Hasselhoff arrived home safely that morning without a DUI and black eye.
That’s until the wife called me at work crying on the phone, revealing to me that she now has ‘the darkness’ in her.

Now, I’m afraid to go home. Scared, really anxious and worried about getting sick too. It feels as if the IRS, armed with their butterfly nets, are waiting for me to come home tonight. Sitting on my living room sofa listening to my Tom Jones CD’s, and playing with my Nintendo Wii…(help me Oprah…!)