Yep. The Little Dude has the Chicken Pox. It was only a matter of time. Last week we got the news that a classmate had it, and this week we heard about another. I saw a few spots on his neck on Thursday night and hoped it was just one of the myriad weird rashes that we with our sensitive skin are prone to. But when I went to wake him up on Friday morning I did not even have to turn on the light to know he had Chicken Pox. I could feel the bumps on him in the dark. And since we have not vaccinated the Little Dude yet (aaaaand cue controversy) I knew we were next.
This is day three of Chicken Pox. He's managing pretty well, so long as he is not tired or hungry, and so long as I'm not attempting to put Calamine lotion on him. THAT is for sure not his favourite thing!
I don't know if you can see it, but he has a chicken pock (is that the singular, and "pox" is the plural? I feel like it is. Humour me if I'm wrong) on the inner edge of his upper eyelid. Isn't that the worst!? It makes me cringe inwardly, but I'm trying not to let him see it because it does not seem to bother him. Thank goodness.
But he was done with pictures pretty quickly. Patience is in pretty short supply around here.
Though he was willing to model his gloves. He wears these at night to keep him from scratching. The only way this works is because they are so cool. With the glow in the dark skeleton bones on them and whatnot, I didn't even have to ask twice!
So far our best coping strategy for dealing with the discomfort of Chicken Pox though has been reading. Reading stories aloud. Between Hubs and I we read out loud to the boys for most of the day yesterday. L.D. is pretty tired and listless, so he is very happy to be tucked up against one of us, listening to a graphic novel like the Lizard of Oz (aka The Marvelous Land of Oz, by Eric Shanower and Skottie Young) or hearing a couple of chapters about life on the Prairie with Laura and Mary. Or any number of endless picture books from our latest library trip. Sophie's Squash and Hugless Douglas are current favourites. And the Little Guy has never met a read-aloud story he did not like, so he is happy to listen along too. And at those crisis moments of the day when no one is available to read, like the dreaded hour before supper time, we are supplementing with a judicious amount of medicinal Magic School Bus and Veggie Tales. Its all about distraction.
On a side note, our resident three-year-old could not be happer! (For now. Give or take a 12-14 day incubation period.) And it may just be in contrast to his pretty miserable big brother, but the Little Guy is in the BEST. MOOD. EVER! He's practically skipping around here, reveling in his good health and high spirits. I wouldn't say he is doing it to spite his brother, but it sure is annoying him never theless. Its like when you work in an office, and you go in on that day that you have a cold and PMS combined, and you are super annoyed to be there and there is a little black cloud hanging over your head that all the coffee and chocolate in the world could not dispel. And then your co-worker comes waltzing in all excited about a new pair of shoes and dancing to their favourite song, and being all like "Can you BELIEVE this weather? SO gorgeous, right!?" and you just want to punch them? Yep, that is the dynamic between my two kids today. There has been a lot of "TELL HIM TO STOP SINGING!" I feel bad for them both. And also me. I certainly feel bad for me.
Anyhow, as my wise Mother always says: "This too will pass." Though sadly, it won't pass in time for us to attend our big family Thanksgiving Dinner. Sigh. But the aforementioned wise Mother who is also a very kind Grandma has promised to deliver us our very own pumpkin pie and has already dropped off an organic chicken for us to roast and a jar of our her own home made apple sauce. We'll miss the company of course, but so long as there is pumpkin pie, there will be peace.
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