Family Affairs

My daughter had a much better night but now the vomiting has started again – she simply can’t keep even a sip of water down, let alone a Tamiflu pill. Thankfully the duty doctor popped round to see her after her shift to check on her dehydration levels. She put on a gown and mask as she walked in through the door. Both my daughter and I had to wear masks which made me feel very unclean and like I was in some sort of sci-fi/horror movie. It’s very stuffy in the mask – it made me feel as if I was about to pass out, or perhaps that was just my breath. It was all very surreal and slightly pointless as after she had taken her blood pressure and checked her temperature she then asked her to remove her mask so she could check her lips for dryness. Apparently you also check for dehydration by squeezing the skin on the forehead and seeing how long it takes to ping back to normal (I would clearly be put on a fluids drip immediately – mine doesn’t ping back at all it just stays there all puckered up) and she checked her hands. All were OK last night, but her lips are really dry this morning, so not looking so good. I still don’t want her to have to go to hospital though if we can avoid it.

Just before the doctor arrived my ex husband appeared to drop off some provisions and pick some stuff up for the boys. He refused to touch anything and did a virtual body scrub with antibacterial lotion on the way out. My youngest child had bought a “Get Well” card and sweets for his sister (HOW LOVELY IS THAT?) which he went to give her, whilst at about the same time my teenage son tried to nick her laptop charger (which caused her to go mad and increased her headache ten fold) and hold his breath at the same time. He then tried on my mask and panicked that he’d got my germs so also did a ridiculous wash everywhere even up the nostrils job with antibacterial stuff. Fingers crossed that he doesn’t get it – he won’t even be allowed on the plane. I don’t know if South Africa are checking the temperature of all the passengers when they alight from the plane like they are doing in the Far East and even isolating people sitting in seats nearby, but it’s not worth the risk and think how many other people he could infect. The good thing is that because it’s the summer holidays and they generally wouldn’t choose to spend even a minute in each other’s company my older two children have not seen each other at all and my youngest child has been at school. So no close contact.

It’s all very strange being stuck at home with my daughter, having cancelled all my plans today. The world goes on without us whilst we just sit in a little oasis of calm (with a bit of vom thrown in). I feel OK today, I can’t even say I’ve got piglet flu at this stage. The name doesn’t really help though does it. You couldn’t get much worse than the word “swine” frankly – maybe “vulture flu” or “tapeworm flu” but I’d rather have “hippopotamus flu” or “dog/cat” flu or even “squirrel flu”.

The advice has clearly relaxed since the early stages of the virus in order to let the world continue doing what it usually does as they realise that it’s impossible to contain. They are not suggesting that we isolate everybody who has been in contact with her for 7 days – I mean my son was watching a heart operation on a 1 week old baby two days ago (who survived – hooray) so it doesn’t bear thinking about if he was harbouring an infection then (although because it’s passed via aerosol type droplets or touch it wouldn’t have been a threat, I don’t think).