Journaling

My daughter, Erin, gave me a beautiful birthday gift this year. It's a bunch of questions, each typed on a strip of paper and folded up and put in a beautiful jar. I've been asked to journal my life by answering the questions. I actually started this project years ago, when it was given to us (not so prettily) at a Relief Society meeting. I was about twenty typed pages into it, when the disk it was saved on got damaed and all the months of hard work were gone! I've been meaning to "get around" to doing it agan, but now I seem to be getting the prodding I need. My kids have suggested I post it to my blog. Some of the questions I will, some I won't. I find it bordering on narcisistic endulgence to post the answers in such a public forum, but to humor my kids, here goes:

What do you do when you're sick? What are your go-to fixer-uppers to make you feel better? Write about getting sick as a child, as well as an adult.

There is a difference in being "sick" and having "ailments", to me. Sick has always meant rather short term, acute, as opposed to longer-term, more chronic. Thankfully, I have never been long time sick. Like with cancer. The last time I was really sick, it was Thanksgiving about 5 years ago. We had planned as a family to go to Mohler's condo in Bryan Head, UT. Michael came home from school on Tues. with a fever. I took him to Urgent Care and while he was dehydrated and feeling puny, the dr's assure me that if he "just stays away from everyone" we should all be ok. Now, all our grandkids at the time were going, as well as Howard, me, Mike, & David. Tyler, Kevin Sarah and Erin and all their kids. We checked with everyone and it was decided to go ahead and go. BAD IDEA. The first or second night, Caylee got sick. She was just a baby at the time. The next night, I got sick. When I get a fever, I wake up every few minutes, SURE that an hour or two has passed, only to look at the clock and see it has only been 15 minutes! I couldn't sleep, had nothing to read and thought I'd go downstairs and watch a little TV, but when I got downstairs, Tyler was sleeping on the floor with Caylee and I had to go back upstairs. We ended up going home early from the trip on Friday, instead of Sunday. Got home late Friday night, and went to the dr. on Saturday AM. "Congratulations, you're my first case of Influlenza, this year" said the dr, after I waited 2 hours to be seen. Seriously, I thought I was going to die. Dropped Rxs off at the drug store, went home and asked Howard to go back and pick them and some water up for me. I surrounded myself with the humidifier, a thermometer, the TV remote, Tylenol and the phone. My fever was about 103. And I proceeded to "be sick". For about two more days. Finally, on Sunday, the worst had passed and I went downstairs, feeling pretty ignored and sad for myself that Howard hadn't checked on me. Only to find out that he had been sick himself in the downstairs bedroom!

When I feel sick, I like to have a hot bath, especially if it's winter time, and crawl under the covers. I like to eat chicken noodle soup. and make hot lemonade with lemon for a sore throat. And remember my mother. My mother was the BEST nurturer. I had measles and Rheumatic Fever when I was little, as well as a tonsilectomy and chicken pox and a plethora of ear infections. She was always so patient and caring and attentive. I like to be checked on and catered to, unlike Howard, who wants to be LEFT ALONE.

When I had Rheumatic Fever, I was 5 and spent 5 days in the hospital. She was there every day, at least part of the time. One night, when I started feeling a little better, she bought me the Little Golden Book of Chicken Little. She read it and I don't know now why I thought it was so funny, but Goosey Lucy and Ducky Lucky had us laughing ourselves sick! I had my tonsils out when I was 6. We spent the night in Mansfield with friends after the surgery, in case of post-surgery bleeding, I guess, and I was bummed that I couldn't have some Hershey Kisses because my mom thought the points on them would hurt my throat! Seriously??? When I was 7 I had Measles, and was home from school sick in bed for two weeks. Someone brought me a small bell. I would ring that when I "needed" anything. I know she hated that stupid bell. I was so weak, she had to carry me to the toilet and brought me food in bed. Light hurt my eyes and I was just SICK! A year later, I got the chicken pox. The worst part about that was it happened in October and I had to miss going to the State Fair in Shreveport. My brother went and brought me back a big, green & white Teddy Bear, which I had for years and years. SO disppointed to miss it. We didn't get to do many fun things, and the Fair was a highlight of my life. To this day I love corn dogs! When I was 14 I got sick at school with the flu (see first part of this blog; it was a lot the same. Crappy).

That's about it. Did you love it? How boring was that?