Worst Week

Last year, Chip and I enjoyed the cancelled television sitcom, "Worst Week." It was probably short-lived because of the painful predictability, but Chip and I enjoyed it nonetheless. It was fun to laugh hysterically at the idiocracy of the main character and laugh even more at all the miserable things that continued to happen to him and his family. That is, we used to laugh hysterically. Until it happened to us.

Monday 2AM: Kendall wakes up with a stomach bug. It continues (about 15 times) through the early morning hours until mid-morning, when my stomach bug quickly came on board.

Monday 10AM: I beg my mother via text messages to come and take care of my daughter. I'm going downhill fast and don't think I can care for her. Luckily she's laying on the couch in a dehydrated stupor, slowly sipping water and watching cartoons, sans blinking.

Monday 12PM: I think I may be dying. I'm crying and begging for mercy. The stomach cramps have ensued.

Monday 2:00PM: Thanks to a mix-up with a doctor's appointment, Chip has a few hours free and takes me to the emergency room. I wait for over an hour to even be seen in triage and I am crying in front of all the other patients, staff and volunteers. Not my finest moment. I nearly pass out on the triage nurse. I mean, I had to prove my point somehow.

Monday 6PM: We're home after fluids, demerol and phenegren. I have no idea of the exact time, much less who was caring for my children or even what day it might have been or who is the President of the United States.

Tuesday morning: All is relatively well. I'm still in a drug-induced fog (I don't do well with one of those meds, so two was a little over the top) so Chip quickly dresses the kids for school (Kendall is jumping and skipping through the house, hydrated and begging for her school friends). I sleep until noon. I wake up, even cook dinner for the rest of the family and have a relatively good day...I picked the kids up from school, bathed them by myself and all was good. I sat at the table, had a light dinner and even a snack before going to bed feeling great.

Wednesday 5AM: Repeat "Monday" for Summer. Called my doctor's office and went in for more fluids.Because of my dehydration, they tried 4 times before finding a vein. Good times. While Chip was visiting on his lunch break, my heart starting racing pretty badly. Long story short, doctor called an ambulance. I know, I know. It sounds WAY more dramatic than it was. I felt like a little old man being wheeled out of ETMG. My heart was a lot better by the time I got to the hospital (a side effect of the dehydration, nothing to be concerned with, my Friends!). My nurse there even remembered me, she was the triage nurse I almost fell on top of on Monday. This is SO not a place I want to be recognized. They started me on more fluids and convinced me, kicking and screaming, to spend the night and continue getting fluids until Thursday.

Wednesday, Rest of the Evening: Boredom ensues at Blount Memorial Hospital, but Chip is happy as he can watch the 6 remaining scholarship players for UT play basketball on TV. We laugh at the fact that I am a patient on the Coronary Care floor (the only one without a walker, it appeared). My nurse didn't quite know what to do with me. I literally answered "no" to 6 pages of health history questions geared for heart patients.

Thursday 2AM: Cooper wakes Chip up, throwing up. Repeat "Monday 2AM" to an exact tee, minus the sick adult.

Thursday 6AM: I get a text from Chip updating me. We've ran out of family members to expose to this virus and there probably isn't enough money in the world to pay someone to cross our threshold. Chip decides to cancel patients for the day. The extra staff to cover for me is called and even more patients cancel because of the forecasted snow "storm."

Thursday 1PM: My mother picks me up at the hospital after I wait 4 hours to be released, a process which took 37 seconds and 2 signatures. I come home to Chip, who is exhausted and has a horrible head cold, but is at least not vomiting. Kendall is safe at school and the rest of us nap for a couple of hours.

So far, Friday finds us iced in ("snowed in" is such a strong phrase) and quite happy with that. We have no place to be and no one would want us around them anyway. The kids are bouncing off the walls (what else is new?) and the adults are completely and utterly exhausted. But, no one is ill, no one is in the hospital and life is the best it's been in 5 days, to say the least. Hopefully our "worst week" story ends there. Please pray for Chip, Grammy, Mimi and Grandad who were very much exposed to this horrendous virus. Thank you to all our friends and family who were praying for us and asking to help. Sorry for no pictures...Or, better...you're welcome for no pictures.