Alligators and The Marlin

Dull surprise, I've been doing things the hard way again. After all of this time of trying to nap Josh by holding him until he fell asleep, we've accidentally discovered a kinder (to me), gentler (to both of us) way to achieve the same results...and I have the psychology of a three year old to thank for it. We just needed to add alligators to the mix. You read that correctly. "Al-li-ga-tors". According to Josh, we are getting invaded by alligators that climb all over each other and pile up in every room of our house. So, I'm running with it. With a little firm coaching, we've "convinced" all of those cranky alligators to show up only around nap time and bedtime. We'll start "seeing" a few of them peeking around the corners a little while before he's supposed to crash, maybe a nose under the couch or a tail behind the refrigerator, that type of thing -- so Josh knows when they are arriving. Then, we have to tiptoe carefully around all of the alligators, because if we bother them with too much noise or movement, they will try to bite our toes. Josh quietly climbs into bed, and covers his head. Then I have to remind him to shut his eyes and be very still -- because not only are these alligators really cranky, but they are also very silly...and think that if He can't see Them, They can't see Him....Josh thinks this is hysterical, but complies by scrunching up his eyes and trying really hard to be still under the blanket. Every once in a while, he gets too ancy, and I have to point out that several alligators are glaring him down, and looking hungrily at his toes...and he settles down again. What used to be a drawn-out battle is now fifteen or twenty minutes of giggles and cuteness...and then he's out. (I'm not kidding myself. Though I'm feeling like I just swiped Wile E. Coyote's "Super Genius" badge, I know he always says "Super Genius" right before he eats a big ol' cliff-sandwich. Now that I'm not only depending on this routine, but actually writing it down in the blog, it will cease to work. Yipe!)


I'm also working on a different tactic to cut the tantrums off at the quick. First, I'm working on my consistency...something that I haven't been, well, consistent with...I've been getting frustrated with the fact that Josh seems to ignore me so often, but that he'll usually snap to when someone else tells him the exact same thing I did. Jon says I never follow through...that I start the 1-5 count, but don't get to three, and I have a tendency to slack and slide on the time out routine, and Josh isn't quite certain when I'm serious and when I'm not...so it's frustrating for everyone. The last few days, I've tried sending him calmly and quietly to his room (and for me, the calm and quiet is just as tricky as the follow-through...when I'm riled, I'm perfectly happy letting anyone and everyone know I'm riled...and that hasn't been much of a help to the situation either). Then I turn off the television, and pull up my kd lang "Hymns of the 49th Parallel", and the music automatically changes the mood. The time outs don't last as long...the tantrums simmer down faster -- we both simmer down faster .. and life goes on a little easier....and the way life has been going on of late, I really need things to start getting easy, pronto!


In the last few weeks, we have been seriously slapped by the Bad Karma Bunny. On President's Day, we had a family visit to the dentist (Josh's first time there). Now, usually, Dr. H. & his staff are really on the ball -- and since we had Josh with us, I was depending on that -- but this time around, we happened to choose the day when he was cross-training his staff. Instead of looking at Josh first, which had been my (hoped-for) plan, he pulled in Jon for a cleaning and checkup, and then called me in (before I was even finished filling out Josh's paperwork) to look at my jaw...What would have normally been a quick and easy situation ended up being a two hour wait in a small-cubicle room where I stayed busy keeping a VERY BORED toddler from the many, interesting dental tools...so that was eight different kinds of fun right there. I was also informed that my bruxism had caused nerve damage in my jaw, so I could expect another visit the following week to get *drum roll, please!* a root canal - Joy! We rescheduled, with the initial plan that Jon would drive us up and get a filling taken care of at the same time. Josh was waaaaay cranked by the time we got home...and the fun didn't stop there. Once we were home, I discovered that the power cord to the dishwasher had been chewed to bare wire by some of our winter refugees. Since I hadn't actually seen any varmints in the kitchen this year, I fear that wire has been in that condition for several months -- SCARY!!! The next day was story time, and Josh had a great time running around with the kids, and making a Monkey-(Curious)George scarf, and I was able to snag some killer cinnamon rolls...I am so happy that our town now has a taxi service...just getting out once a week really does so much to lift my spirits... When we got home, we dealt with the alligators, and then in the late afternoon, I started to deal with the K2 mountain of laundry that had sprung up in a tectonic shift...Luckily, I discovered (before I turned the washer on and burnt out the motor) a message from Tim informing me that the pump had stopped working - again, Joy! (I think it's a cosmic conspiracy that pump always keels when there are mass quantities of dishes in the sink, clothes by the washer, and I am in dire need of a fire-hose-style-scrub-down.) The upshot was that we had no water for two days. Argggggh! But, wait, there's more. On Friday, Heidi and I trekked over to get my re-test (she was there to keep tabs on Josh) only to discover that the antibiotics for my jaw had guaranteed that any test results that day would automatically come back Abby Normal. After Heidi left, Josh and I went to the mall, and then home -- where I tried and failed HORRIBLY to convince him to take a nap -- and then we charged back to town to snag ol' WhatHisName when he got off work. Literally ten minutes before I got to Jon's office, Josh was violently, violently ill. The only good news is that he got most of it on his clothes and not his car seat, but the bad news is that I didn't have a spare outfit for him in the car, so he had to wear one of Jon's shirts until we were able to get him another at the store. According to the weather report, we didn't have the option of getting him immediately, as we were due for another clump of snow storms, and we needed to get an emergency stash of groceries. I didn't chalk it up to anything other than a greasy breakfast and motion sickness...but in retrospect, I wonder. Saturday, Josh started spiking a series of low-grade fevers. Mom and Harry were really unhappy (and to a point, a bit frantic) that we hadn't taken him to the doc's or the emergency room, but since none of the fevers got much higher than 102, and we knew we'd be told to give him Tylenol and fluids until/unless it got to at least 103, there wasn't any point. Josh and I spent the night in the living room...and it was rough. He was listless, and achy, and his eyes were red, and all he wanted to do was be held. Sunday wasn't much better...while some of the fevers subsided, he started vomiting every half hour. Monday, I drove up alone to deal with my root canal - (which wasn't even close to the horrific experience I'd so often heard about - though my mouth tasted like glue for three days afterwards), then Jon got a ride with Harry and drove us home. By this time, Josh couldn't even keep down water, and after several failed attempts to get fluids into him, we took him to Urgent Care. He was diagnosed with a middle ear infection and gastroenteritis. They managed to give him some pink stuff, which stayed in him just long enough to do some good, but by that time the flu was making life miserable for him in other ways. His fevers continued to fade in and out for the next few nights. His stomach (and lower regions) rebelled at every point, yet at 3:30 every morning, he'd wake up screaming and demanding hot chocolate and cinnamon rolls...it wouldn't have been so bad if he weren't so determined to have the very things that would make his stomach want to curl up and howl. Thursday night, I finally thought that he was on the mend enough to send him to his own room to sleep - which meant that I was able to sleep in my own bed too....and Ohhhhh, God! It was pure heaven not a moment too soon! After sleeping on the floor those last few nights, my poor back felt like I'd done eighty miles of potholes in an old truck with wooden wheels and a shot suspension. Josh slept through the night, got sick one more time this morning, but is keeping most of his food down. Friday, we tried re-retaking the test...and for once this week everything almost went smoothly...except that the sample was mislabeled - (and I was the one who discovered that!) Barring further outtakes from a Laurel and Hardy clip, we should have our answers in two weeks. I'm still inclined to believe that it's all much ado, etc., but again the way these weeks have been going, it's probably better to wait and see.


One full Sunday from the beginning of the fevers, and Josh finally seems to be back to normal -- he is bossing us around, demanding, bouncing, being silly...being ornery, throwing tantrums - the usual... and the plague has finally moved on ... to Jon's head. So, on to round two. Theoretically, we have an official date weekend coming up, and so I've graciously granted Jon permission to be as sick as he needs to be this week with head rubs and hot tea for the asking, just so long as he knows that he needs to be sorted out health-ily by this weekend. My goal is to hang up my Nightingale hat this Friday, or be snorting Kleenex and Chicken Soup myself by Saturday. I know which one I'm rooting for.