influenza

For the first time, this year everyone in our family got a flu shot. Unfortunately, it didn't vaccinate us against the strain that struck our household immediately upon our return from Texas.

Blake got sick first. He developed a cough on the drive home, and by Wednesday, our first evening back, he was feverish and miserable. He went to the doctor the next morning and came home with a diagnosis of bronchitis and a prescription for an antibiotic. He stayed in bed for most of the next few days and slowly started to feel better.

Meanwhile, Matthew started to get congested. By Friday evening he was cranky with a fever of 103, and it was clear that the coming night would not bring much rest. And indeed it did not. While Blake fought off his fever in bed, Matthew's own temperature soared to 104.3. I rocked and bathed and did my best to comfort my absolutely miserable baby boy throughout the entire night. Neither of us slept more than an hour and a half.

In the morning I took him to the doctor where he was quickly diagnosed with type A influenza and given a prescription for Tamiflu. What followed next was a wild goose chase to track down the Tamiflu, which apparently, because of the early start to this year's flu season, is in short supply. I finally found some and administered the first dose with the hope that I was doing so within the small time frame in which this drug is effective.

Perhaps because Blake's illness had progressed enough to develop into bronchitis, he was not even tested for flu. But because his symptoms matched almost identically to Matthew's, we're all pretty sure he was dealing with flu as well. Obviously it was highly contagious. The pediatrician warned me that if anybody else in the family started exhibiting the same symptoms, we should get them to a doctor right away if we wanted Tamiflu to be an option for relief.

Sure enough, by early Saturday evening Garrett was feverish, so Blake rushed him over to the urgent care. Just before bedtime we managed to track down one of the few open pharmacies that still had Tamiflu in stock, so we dosed him up quick and sent him to bed.

By this point it was pretty clear that none of us was going to church the next day. Instead we focused our efforts on rest and recuperation, and it seemed to help. By Monday morning Blake felt well enough to return to work, and Garrett had been fever free and his usual chipper self for 24 hours, so I sent him off to school. (Either Tamiflu works miracles, or the strain Garrett caught wasn't nearly as bad.)

Though Matthew is still pretty congested and my kitchen counter still looks like a small pharmacy, everyone is doing much better, and Caleb and I have (so far) been just fine, which is a relief. Also nice is how well we've been taken care of by our friends in the ward. We've been given so many meals, I haven't had to think about cooking for almost a week, and my fridge is still stuffed full! While illness is never a fun thing to deal with, these good people have made wading through it much more bearable. We are truly blessed.