Puke-Fest 2010

Well, Puke-Fest 2010 is finally coming to a close. We've had full capacity with all Rhoda family members participating.

It all started on Saturday, January 16th. We had gotten up early that morning, had breakfast and made it to the gym by 9:00 a.m. We got home from the gym about 10:25 and took baths and showers. We decided to feed the girls lunch a little earlier than normal because we wanted Meredith to take an early nap since we had a birthday party to go to about 1:45 and she would have missed part of her nap. By 12:00, the girls were fed and Meredith was down for her nap. I was resting in my bed watching T.V. and was dozing in and out. I started to faintly hear Meredith crying. I knew she hadn't been in bed that long and I figured David would go in and settle her back down. I actually layed there about 2 or 3 minutes while she cried and then decided to go in and check on her because I couldn't figure out why David wasn't going to her. When I got up, I realized he was in the shower, so he didn't hear her. I go into her room and was greeted with the unfavorable stench of vomit. As I got closer, I realized to my horror that she was covered in it. At first, I was undecided as to whether the crying made her throw up or if she threw up and then started crying. I grabbed her sweetness out of bed and we made our way to the bathroom where David was taking a shower. I stripped her of her clothes and handed her to him to bathe. As David finished bathing her, I rinsed all of her clothes off to put them in the washer. Up to this point, I was all excited that I had gotten a head start on my laundry the day before and only had one load left to go. Little did I know that I would literally burn the motor up on the dryer by the end of the weekend with all the laundry that the Puke-Fest created. Before we got Meredith dressed (thankfully), she threw up again and we realized she was indeed sick. We agreed that I would stay home with her while David took Madelyn to the party. David cleaned up Meredith's bed while I started the first of many loads of laundry. Before we even got the first load started, Meredith had soiled two more sets of clothes with vomit and I was on my third shirt. We decided it would behoove us to just keep her in a diaper. We pulled a large sheet out of the linen closet and layed it in the living room floor. Since she barely slept during her nap, she was very sleepy, but Bless her Heart, she couldn't sleep because she was puking every 5 minutes. Everytime she would throw up on the sheet, I would wipe it up with a paper towel and move her to a dry spot. I figured out very early that I was going to have to conserve materials or I would run out of things to sop up vomit with. I gave her water to drink, but she threw up every bit she consumed. She threw up so much, I eventually had to double up the sheet until there weren't any dry places left. She basically did this all night long, ran a low-grade fever through the night and hardly slept. David and I were up most of the night with her and doing laundry. On Sunday morning, Meredith had thrown up one last time at 5:30. By 9:00, we felt confident that the throwing up might be over. She was happy to just lay on one of us and sleep. David and I traded off giving each other naps. I went to sleep on Sunday afternoon about 1:00 and slept until 3:30 until I was abruptly woken up by the sudden urge to rush to the bathroom where I was greeted by a staggering case of diarrhea! From that moment on, I knew I had CAUGHT IT! Poor David was now charged with taking care of Meredith and me. We brought Meredith into bed with me and she and I just layed there in our misery. As time went on, the awful stomach cramps came on with a vengeance! I had never been in so much pain in my life. During this time, David was in the laundry room doing the 400 loads of laundry we had accumulated and was actually making a dent in it. Madelyn was in the extra bedroom watching a movie. Around 6:00, I heard the familiar sound of vomiting coming from the room Madelyn was in. Sure enough, she puked a load! It was all over the extra bed. More laundry--Aagghhhh!!! I really couldn't do much because I was so weak and was in the bathroom about every 5 minutes anyway. David had to give Madelyn a bath and then take the sheets off that bed to start some MORE laundry. He had such a good attitude about it!! At this point, we brought Madelyn into my room with me and Meredith since were were ALL sick at this point. We put Meredith to bed around 7:00 that night and Madelyn and I were both miserable in my bed. I felt terrible! She felt terrible! She would throw up every once in while, but thankfully made it into the bucket! I actually called my mom about 8:15 crying because I was hurting so badly! I just wanted her to come and take the pain away. I barely slept that night because I was getting up to go to the bathroom so often. Madelyn actually threw up a tiny bit in the bed one time, but at this point, I didn't rip the sheets off because I was sure this wasn't the worst of it. I was right! After I finally was able to get to sleep about 12:00 a.m., I was shaken awake by the horrible sound of projective vomit right next to me at 1:00 a.m.! Madleyn got nowhere near the bucket on this one. She couldn't help it....the only provocation she had was a burp and there it was. I hated to wake up David because he was SO tired after taking care of all of us, so Madelyn and I worked together to get the sheets off the bed and start yet another load of laundry. We remade the bed and were back in it by 1:45. I stayed awake until the first load of blankets was laundered and dried because I wanted my silky blanket back. So, I didn't go back to sleep until about 3:30 a.m. Thankfully, that was Madelyn's last time to throw up. Miraculously, by the next morning, she was pretty much her normal self. No upset tummy, no diarrhea, just a little tired. I guess her immunue system kicked into overdrive. By Monday morning, Meredith had thrown up a couple more times in the night and was still just very lethargic with a fever. I didn't feel nauseous anymore, but my stomach was cramping constantly. Me and the bathroom have become best friends! If I haven't been in the bathroom this weekend, I've been in the utility room doing laundry. Monday morning brought out the true virulence of this bug when David was overcome with it....diarrhea, fatigue, stomach cramping. Also, Monday morning as I was drying the last bit of laundry, I smelled a burning smell coming from the dryer. I felt it was safest to just turn it off and have David look at it when he felt better. David spend the majority of the day Monday sleeping. Meredith was very sleepy and was content sleeping in someone's arms. She didn't eat, but drank lots of water which made me feel better because I knew she wasn't getting dehydrated. Madelyn was her normal self....like she hadn't even been sick. I was still the same....just horrendous cramps and diarrhea after another sleepless night. My dad was off for Martin Luther King Day, so I called him and asked him to come over and be with the girls while David and I took a much needed nap. He did (Thank you so much Daddy!) and we were both able to get some rest. I decided late in the evening that we would be home again on Tuesday since Meredith and I were still running a fever, so she couldn't go to school anyway. David ended up having to stay home again too because he and the toilet had become best friends too! Thankfully, Meredith woke up her normal, jovial self. She was much better today and ate some food. I woke up with the extra special gift of Aunt Flo coming to visit which just added to my cramping and diarrhea. We just tried to rest today and get over the rest of this crap. We had to call out the repairman to come look at the dryer. We basically burned up the motor with all the 426 loads of laundry we did this weekend. He fixed it and it cost us a pretty penny. Pretty expensive illness, huh? This afternoon, David and I finally were able to clean up the house a little bit from Puke-Fest 2010. I went through the whole house with a can of Lysol spraying everything in sight! One good thing came out of this whole mess....it has certainly aided in our weight loss! : ) We are all going back to work and school tomorrow and pray for continued healing! Thank God we are at the finish line!