The last month or so around our house hasn’t been the greatest. Debi came down with an ear infection. Toren likely had one at the same time, but we didn’t realize it right away. Eventually they were both on antibiotics and each of them tried multiple antibiotics before they found anything that seemed to work. Of course, the antibiotics aren’t particularly friendly on the digestive tract. Both Debi and Toren had side effects, primarily diarrhea (yeah, I know, not ideal blog talk). The illnesses coincided with the passing of Debi’s great aunt and finals (more on the funeral soon).
This leads me to my story… Last Wednesday (the 5th) I stayed home with Toren most of the day as he couldn’t go to daycare. This whole time he was having explosive diarrhea, requiring diaper changes pretty much every hour. I put him down for a nap, and when he woke up, I put him on my lap. He usually takes a few minutes to really wake up and want to do something, so I figured he could just cuddle with me while he really woke up. After a few minutes I noticed a smell and realized he had pooped again. It was powerful enough that it leaked out and onto my shorts. If parenthood teaches you anything, it’s to not freak out around feces (hooray for parenthood!). I wasn’t particularly worried about his diaper or the feces on my shorts, but he needed to be changed. So I took him to the changing table, set him down, and began changing him. Lately, Toren hasn’t wanted to sit still on the changing table. Instead, he immediately turns onto his stomach, then pulls himself up to look out the window by the changing table. Sometimes it’s not worth fighting him while he does this as he really freaks out. So, after getting the poopy diaper off and wiping him clean, I let him stand up. I was just about ready to put the clean diaper on when… Woosh! Out comes a fresh batch of diarrhea, right onto the changing table. It was green, gooey, and all in a big puddle. Leave it to an 11-month old inquisitive child to look down at this point, see something that he doesn’t typically see on the changing table, and think it might be fun to play in it. So, what does he do? Before I could start wiping it up, he started stomping in his puddle of diarrhea! Yep, stomping in diarrhea. If you had asked me a year ago if I was ever going to write that sentence on my blog, I would have reconsidered the whole kid thing…
Anyway, the stomping is just the start. Our changing table has, of course, a slick, wipeable surface, for obvious reasons. Once Toren’s feet were coated in the diarrhea, he couldn’t stand up… Woosh! He slipped into the diarrhea as his feet slipped from underneath him, coating his front side in his diarrhea. Mind you, it’s not like I’m a passive observer during this – I’m trying my best to sop up the diarrhea with clean diapers and wipes, but Toren was moving so fast that I couldn’t get to it all before he had covered himself, chest to toe, in his own diarrhea. At this point, I picked him up, let him stop dripping for a second, and carried him into the bathroom. I promptly deposited him into the sink, turned on the water, and gave him an impromptu bath. It took another 30 minutes or so to get him rediapered and the diarrhea cleaned up. It was, um, well, everywhere. And for the sake of anyone planning on visiting, I did a really good job cleaning it up, so you don’t have to worry about it being around when you get here. But it was everywhere.
Oh, and it’s only in the last day or so that Debi has finally started to feel better. After her multiple rounds with antibiotics, she ended up wiping out all of her intestinal flora, leaving her vulnerable to atypical bacteria, like clostridium dificile. We think she ended up with a c. dificile infection, which is really, really nasty (what that means, symptoms wise, you really, really don’t want to know). Suffice it to say, she seems to be on the mend, though she has lost a lot of weight over the last month and it will probably take her months to fully recover. But we’re doing better now and everyone seems to be getting better, even if we’re not all perfectly healthy.
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