The aftermath

We have been sick for about a week now.  I've thought a number of times we were on the upswing, and hopefully now we really are.  Crazy.  As soon as the dinner was over, Bennett woke up with pink eye the next morning.  Before lunch Silas had it, by bedtime Graham was getting it, Ansley woke up with it Sunday and before breakfast was over that morning Colin had it.  At first I thought the problem was primarily pink eye, except that Bennett had an extremely high fever, so I took him to the doctor Sunday afternoon and found out that he had ear infections in both ears.  I got a prescription for eye drops for everyone else and thought we were doing better.  Then Monday night Colin started running a fever, so Tuesday I took all 5 kids to the doctor, because Silas was extremely fussy, as was Graham, and well, everyone else was going to Ansley may as well.  At that point, all of the boys had ear infections in both ears.  So all 4 boys were on antibiotics, and Ansley was still on eyedrops.  So I thought by the time Wednesday was over we should all be in good shape.  Wrong again - at bedtime Wednesday, Ansley started running a fever.  Thursday she woke up fine, so I waited a little bit before calling the doctor.  By lunch she had told me that her ear hurt, and I had determined something was wrong with Bennett.  He slept until 10, and wanted to only be held.  He was a limp noodle in my arms.  Graham didn't have a whole lot more life to him, but he would at least eat and drink like normal.  On top of both of them running a fever all day, Bennett would hardly eat, and wouldn't drink.  So I was starting to get worried about him being dehydrated and was pretty sure that by the doctor would want us in the hospital.  So we didn't get in to the doctor until 4:30.  By 10 that night, we had chest xrays and iv fluids and iv antibiotics and confirmed pneumonia.  It had been a year since any one was in the hospital, so I guess we were due.  He was still pretty lethargic Friday, although he did wake up a couple of times and he ate a little - still wouldn't drink anything.  But Graham was going downhill fast at home, so we made an appt. for him.  He too, was suspected of having pneumonia, but it took over an hour for R. to get him to the hospital because we had this awful storm.  Roads were closed, huge hail had been coming down, trees had fallen, power lines in our neighborhood had caught fire, so the power was out at our house where the other 3 kids were with a dear sweet friend who later cloroxed my whole house (THANK YOU!).  At any rate, the final diagnosis was a nasty virus that the whole family had, turned bacterial pneumonia in the babies, and after a few rounds of antibiotics and observation and xrays, and Bennett had oxygen once b/c he couldn't breath (which left a nice tape mark on his face that is just now going away), they let us come home.  Russ and I had a date in the hospital watching 'The Notebook' which I had never seen, but really liked (another sweet friend loaned this to me for us to watch while she bravely had the older 3 kids sleep over at her house).  And I didn't cry that much, until I was driving home from the hospital today and thought about it again. Anyway, we're home now and I ate brussel sprouts for lunch to try to counteract the week long eating out and hospital food.  Hopefully this time, we're really on the mend.