It's official. I'm losing it.
I mean really - how long can a person be trapped in their home before losing their sanity? 1 day? 5 days? 10 days? HOW ABOUT THIRTEEN DAYS PEOPLE?
Oh and it's not just me losing it. The kids are losing it too. No school yesterday and today due to state teacher meetings or something. So here we all are. Like it's the dead of winter and we're trapped in the house. But it's fall, lovely lovely fall. And I missed Halloween. And Warren missed school. And Elaine missed school and Mike missed a week of work. And...
Elaine's fever won't go away. It comes down it goes up, it hangs around 102. (By the way, at a temp of 102, Elaine totally wants to play and run around, wtf?) Mike, Warren and I are still coughing - well past contagious (so they say) but coughing. Mike's sounds like bronchitis. Warren's is semi-constant. Mine's annoying and goes nicely with my nasal congestion voice which is totally hot. Mike and I have slept in the same bed once in these past 13 days. You see, our bed is sick island - I think I explained it before. So the fever person (or persons as was the case with Mike and W for a few days) must stay there. I mean we wouldn't want it to spread to everyone would we? OH WAIT, IT ALREADY DID. Snap.
And now there are horrible habits to break. Eating whenever you want wherever you want - mainly in my bed. A kid has a fever of 104 and wants a popsicle, you bring it to them! Both of my kids feel we must all be in the same room at the same time. I mean, they were scared before, but now, OH MY WORD they are everywhere I am. "I'm going to run downstairs and put a load of laundry in." Within 2 seconds one of them is yelling for me. "Mommy? Where are you? We need you up here." "Why?" "We just need you up here with us." People, the sun is shining, the lights are on, the tv is on where they are, there is gatorade and motrin and cough drops and for the love of God could a gal get a second to herself? And could that second not be used to watch Nickelodeon? Or read children's books? Or color pictures?
Well it was only a matter of time before I snapped. And snap I did. Dropping the f bomb because I had told them to wind down and watch a movie before bed. And they were being wild. And I reminded them again, and they carried on and then my head spun around and steam came out of my ears and all the frustration of the past 12 days came spewing out of my mouth in a torrent of rage as I yelled for them to calm the f down. Yelling to calm someone down -makes perfect sense, no? Because why? Because they were jumping around while watching the movie. Makes perfect sense to be so hateful, doesn't it?
No worries. I pulled it together-ish. I calmed, made them put on their pjs, and then told them to calm down or it was straight to bed and I freaking meant it. And that time I used freaking instead of the other one. Good move, no?
Don't judge me. Or do. I don't care. I've been in this place too long. TOO LONG.
Please Lord make Elaine's fever go away. Let's all get our energy back and stop coughing and get back to normal - whatever that is. We have meetings and homework and appointments to make up. I'm sick of doing extra laundry. I'm sick of handing out motrin doses. I'm done with taking temperatures. Let's have a family dinner at the table (we'll have to take the laundry off to do that, and get Elaine out of her pajamas.) Let this swine flu nonsense end, please!
