the bug

the stomach flu, aka: the bug, hit our house hard last week and we are still recovering. reese got it first on wednesday night. we spent the next two days laying around on the living room floor watching tv. (reese has become addicted to the tv, so i'll have to work hard on breaking that.) even though i hate having a sick child, i loved all the snuggle time. all she wanted was momma and i was glad to hold her! well, after two days of not being able to keep anything down and becoming more and more weak from dehydration, we took her to the pediatrician. he was very nice, but told us what we didn't want to hear..."you need to take her to the hopsital for an IV, so she can get fluids." :( poor thing. her lips were so dry and her throat too and all she could do was lay her head down. if she walked from one room to the next she'd immediately put her head down on the chair or couch or me or something. :( so, we loaded up on friday afternoon and went to the hospital. the pediatrician there was really nice and did a great job at getting the IV in the first time. i hadn't thought about this, but she said a lot of times it takes a couple of tries to get the IV in a dehydrated person b/c the veins are collapsed and the skin isn't "fleshy" like normal. getting the IV in was the hardest part of the whole hospital stay. i've never seen reese so mad! she was screaming, beat red and her head was shaking. matt did a great job of holding her still. the next challenge was keeping her from getting tangled in the IV tube. matt had to take care of that part b/c that's when the stomach bug hit momma. :( yep, my turn. i'll spare you all my details, but i was able to start drinking small amounts the next morning. the pediatrician was then concerned for me b/c of the baby. it's not good for me or the baby to lose all those fluids. she offered for me to stay in the hospital to get fluids, but we opted to try it at home, just drinking lots of fluids. now i have to drink the pedialyt equivalent that we got at the pharmacy for reese. have you ever tasted that stuff? teri put it well, "it's nasty sweet." it's not fun to drink. i'm pretty much back to normal now though.

back to reese...she had two bags of fluid through the IV and then the tube could come off. that made us all sleep better b/c we were worried about her getting tangled up in the tube. she slept like a champ that night and didn't wake up when the nurses came in the room and if she did, she'd turn over and go right back to sleep. she was so exhausted! thankfully we were at a private hospital (where we plan to deliver baby #2) and had a private room. reese had a crib to sleep in and matt and i both had beds! that made it not a bad hospital stay. i was expecting not to get much sleep that night. well, i guess i didn't, but for other reasons. the state hospitals here don't have private rooms, so like after delivering a baby, you are in a room with like seven other women who have also just delivered! i can't imagine! oh, and your family members, ie: the father, can't spend the night, so you are by yourself. no thanks. anyway...the next day reese was able to start drinking some tea and water and kept everything down. she's slowly getting her appetite back, as am i. her glucose level was down so we had to give her more juice and sugar, but once that came up, we were able to go home.

on a lighter note: i think the funniest thing that reese did while at the hospital was when the doctor or nurse would come in she'd let them stay a minute or so and then start telling them "bye, bye. door." and pointing to the door. ha! we all got a kick out of that. oh, and then once she got the IV out, she would say, "go. go." and stand at the door. she understandably didn't like being there!

so there it is, mine and matt's first experience with our first child in the hospital...in a foreign country nonetheless!

one more part to the story...after matt got reese and me all taken care of at home, went to the store, gave reese a bath, etc. the bug hit him! i think he got it worse than me. :( ...not fun times at the dowiak household this weekend. hopefully this week will be better.