The Croup

I'm not sure why it's called 'the croup', but I do know that it is the worst--especially when your three children get it back to back sequentially three weeks in a row. I think September 2010 will go down as the month of sick kids for our family. This week it's poor little Ruby's turn, and, while I think she has the most mild case, her bout has definitely been the most difficult for other reasons--namely her age. Sick babies make me so sad. They just seem so helpless--and Ruby certainly falls into that category.

The one good thing (and I'm pretty sure there is only one) about having your children get the same illness back to back three weeks in a row is that you can easily compare their "sick styles". I don't necessarily want to remember the lack of sleep I've experienced recently, but seeing how they react to this trial is worth remembering to me.

Reed was the first to get sick and after last month (the month of travel) it was almost nice to be stuck home for a few days. When Reed is sick he has ZERO energy. He loses his desire to do or eat anything and even his personality goes missing. He pretty much turns into an expressionless zombie that hibernates on the couch and bed until the illness has passed. Reading is pretty much the most active thing he did the week he was out. After a few days of resting I thought he was well enough to go back to school since he hadn't had a fever for a day, but I was wrong. An hour into school they called to tell me that Reed seemed "totally out of it and wasn't thinking". I, of course, felt like a terrible mother and rushed to pick him up. When I got him I asked if he wanted to go straight home or swing by the library to pick up some new books. He chose the library and said he wanted to get books about the body so he could figure out how to stop coughing. We were able to find a few books on why we get sick, but when he got home and read them he was terribly disappointed. "It didn't say anything about how to get better!".

This picture isn't from Reed's recent illness, but aside from sleeping it's just about the only thing he did.


The day Reed was finally well enough to go back to school Max woke up in the night coughing and we started all over again. However one gigantic difference between how Max and Reed respond to illness is that Max refuses to slow down and pushes himself until his body just gives up. I tried to get Max to lay down several times as he watched T.V. or I read him a book, but time and time again he'd be sitting up and playing on the couch when he should have been sleeping. A few times he would be busily playing and all of a sudden he would say "My head hurts," and then he'd lay right down on the floor and fall asleep. Unfortunately, his unwillingness to rest also results in a grumpy and whiny boy, so his week of illness was far from restful for any of us.

I finally did get him to fall asleep by having him lay down in my bed and look at pictures in the Encyclopedia. Worked like a charm.


Ruby is by far the most pathetic of the bunch. She has the saddest little whine that sounds a lot like a desperate cat. Her scratchy little complaint is almost more than I can bear. I hate that there is really nothing I can do to make her feel better. She is incredibly clingy and needy and mostly refuses to be put down. I can tell she wants to be happy and silly again, but just doesn't have the energy to be herself. She is only on day three of her illness (hopefully the worst of it), but already her inability to sleep at night is taking a toll on her (and me). She is a miserable little mess and I can't wait for her to be better.

It's almost mean to take a picture of someone when they look/feel like this.


I think I will read this entry again when I have three healthy kids so I can be more grateful when things are normal because right now normal is looking really good compared to this...