It's a Monday

Well things have been kind of crazy here at home.  Ashton is on the mend, but I came down with a serious case of stomach flu.  It started with a headache on Friday morning and became progressively worse.  I thought the worst was over Saturday, but by the end of the night I was in a ton of pain.  It would build up and peak.  Daniel called a friend of ours, who happens to be his doctor and he advised us to head to the ER.  There was a good chance that my gall bladder was giving out or my appendix was making a statement.

A dear friend from church came over to sit with the kids (Daniel's mom can't be around Ashton while he's sick, due to her chemo) and we headed on down.  By then the pain the rolling pain was slowly getting better.  After some time they determined that I was not pregnant, I was sent off for x-rays.  The x-rays showed that my gall bladder looked normal and my appendix was not causing any trouble.  But from the looks of things, my stomach bug may have caused a good little section of my intestines to take a break for the weekend.  To be sure, I had to have a cat scan.

About that cat scan.  You have to drink two doses of contrast an hour apart.  The first nurse brought in the contrast and mixed it with a small amount of ginger ale (maybe 6 oz. in all).  It was horrible, but just a small cup was manageable (thankfully I had already had some nausea medicine).  Then another nurse came in a few minutes later with a HUGE 20 oz. cup filled and told me I needed to drink it.  I told her I had already downed a much smaller cup.  She assured me that it would taste better with the Gatorade in larger amounts.  Ha!  I didn't buy it and unfortunately found out she was wrong as I forced it down an hour later.

All said and done, the cat scan was pretty laid back.  They had to do the IV contrast as well.  That's a weird feeling.  As they first inject it, you start feeling warm, especially in the back of your mouth. And then it moves down your body.  Now can you stand a little humor?  I had to clinch because the warm, tingly feeling makes you feel as though you are going to... um... let's say relieve yourself on the table.  It was very upsetting to not be sure if that was happening or not!

The CT scan came back at 6:30 in the morning and confirmed the x-ray.  Nothing worse than a virus. We made it out of the hospital at 7 a.m. and headed home.  Our friend packed up Sarah and Brenna and took them to church and to a 4th of July festival in Pickens.  But due to the contrast, I'll not be able to breast feed Brenna until tomorrow. She hated taking drink from cups or bottles and is fighting this like crazy.  But tomorrow it'll be back to normal.  I'm trying so hard to get her ready to be weaned in August, but she's not buying that at all!  And this forced break is not making her any more ready to stop!

Last night Daniel took all the kids out while I stayed at home to rest.  We were a little worried about Ashton because he wears out so easily.  He's pretty tired this morning and is showing some signs of having a lighter case of the stomach flu.  Overall though, he did pretty good on his outing.  I'm hoping that when I take him back Friday for a checkup on the mono thing, he'll get a clean bill of health and be able to fully return to normal activity. 

As for the rest of us, I'm praying that all this illness is on it's way out the door and we can return to our healthy existence!