The Crud

Since Mallory has been born, her immune system has been VERY strong.  Christopher is the same way.  He wakes up with a sore throat, drinks a glass of orange juice and voila!  Mallory did not go to a traditional day care, she was not exposed to all the germs and bacteria that day care kids are exposed to and I am aware that is part of the reason she hardly ever got sick.  On the other hand, she has always been an active kid so we have had her enrolled in quite a few activities and spend plenty of time in mall play areas and restaurant play lands to which she has had her fair share of exposure to the crud.  Whenever Mallory would get sick, you never really knew because she was always her "normal" self.  She never let a runny nose ruin her day.  There was one time she had a low grade fever which turned into an ear infection.  All she did was sleep when she had that fever and all we had to do was keep a close eye on her.  Easy peasy.

I am not naive.  I knew when Mallory started going to school our luck would change.  Last year around this time she got the sniffles and a loose cough that lasted maybe a week.  She also contracted Hand, Foot and Mouth disease which of all the symptoms that come with that the fever blisters were the worst.  No real fever, no vomiting, none of that.  We were still feeling lucky.  

This school year has been much, much different.  Since Mallory started her second year of pre-school in September, she has had a runny nose.  Albeit several different versions of a runny nose, it's been constantly runny.  She will go several days without one, but for the most part, it's ever present.  Right before Christmas she contracted the Fifth's Disease.  She did not get major symptoms to that but her face took a beating with the rash....

It took Fifth's about two weeks to take it's course and leave for good.  Since then she has had a runny nose.  This past week we added a cough and a low grade fever from time to time.  She also had a battle with pink eye.  It's VERY different this time around with Mallory.  She is pretty lethargic most of the time and 2.5 hours at school WIPES her out.  She has been such a trooper with her daily activities still giving it a good effort.  We have kept her home from school once and always give her the choice if she wants to go or not.  Case and point today, we gave her the option to skip swimming lessons.  She said she wanted to go and would try very hard.  When we got to class we learned she was the only student.  This means she gets one on one the whole thirty minutes with no breaks.  Twenty minutes into the lesson, the tears started rolling.  She was completely exhausted.  For the last week or so, she's been napping daily and today was no different.  I had to wake her up after two hours. MY POOR BABY!  

I am not used to this with my child, it's very new to us as parents.  I know we've been very lucky to have such a healthy child.  I really hope this is not the way of the future.  Everyone I know with kids tells me "it's just gonna get worse" and "wait till she's in middle school".  I would like to believe since Mallory has been a very healthy child so far, this is just a bump in the road.  Please let it be!  There is one thing I will NOT complain about and that is the extra snuggle time.  It's been at least a year if not longer since Mallory fell asleep on me.  LOVED IT! 

So, with all this being told, you should know I spent the weekend and today cleaning our house and disinfecting everything (thanks to Jessie for the hospital quality disinfectant).  MULTIPLE loads of laundry.  Towels, sheets, blankets and pajamas.  Over and over in the washing machine/dryer.  I have also completely broke down each bathroom and cleaned the living day lights out of them.  All while I too battle the runny nose, stuffy head, sore throat because why not have it passed on to me?  It's only fair right?  I feel bad for Christopher as he's been keeping his distance to the best of his abilities in hopes of not catching anything.  My goodness.  The crud.