Most Illingest.

We are sick! We all got the flu, it turns out, sometime around Monday. Mazie and Vivian have been home all week and Richie is so sick he can't do ANYTHING. The poor man is so ill that doesn't even want to eat - those of you who know him may find this shocking. It turns out, that's because he has PNEUMONIA. That explains the -er- colorful coughing and 102 fever. And, I suppose, could explain his reluctance to eat. Don't worry; he went to the doctor and got on a Z-Pack today.

Wouldn't you know that what was supposed to be my first week of big-time study for boards has been neatly absorbed by 1) being so sick I couldn't learn 2) caring for a family too sick to go about their business. I have shed tears over lost time, but now I am trying to right my emotional ship and take stock of the time I have left, which is ample. I padded my study time because I expected interruptions. I just didn't know they'd be so profound and come so early. This doesn't leave me much wiggle room for the remainder of the two months before January 31st, though.

This flu has been bad, but not as bad as The Infuenza of '07. That one was so bad that all our fevers (adults included) were over 102. I almost passed out in Food Lion trying to buy Motrin and Gatorade. The flu has become almost unrecognizable to me because I compare all illnesses to that horrible horrible incapacitating flu. Now, as far as I'm concerned, if I can stand, then it's not the flu. We had actual positive flu tests - so it's "the flu" (but still doesn't hold a candle to '07's).

So some of us are not nearly as sick as we could have been. Richie, on the other hand, has fared much worse. We started out neck and neck. Then I got better and he didn't. Then he started to feel worse. He has taken up a cozy residence on the couch, among blankets and slanting sunlight. He's overheating, but he's old enough to control his own thermostat so I try not to say anything about it. My main job is to deliver liquids and dose him appropriately with fever-reducing and phlegm-disrupting medications. It sure reminds me how much he does around the house and for our girls when he isn't able to do any of it.

Lots of times, being a mom in med school is fine - I just wish I had more time for my family and more time for medical school in a wouldn't-that-be-nice sort of way. This week, though...this week hurts. Because the stakes are high (boards are very very important) and because the time I'm spending isn't really quality time (although I'm trying my best to make neutral time into quality time). I'm about to rely heavily on Christmas movies and early bedtimes to get us through the rest of this illness, though. We had big plans for Christmas cards and stuff...but those plans are definitely in jeopardy now. It is what it is.

Meanwhile, there's nothing like a good meal and some Christmas music to keep the spirits high. I am thankful to have a basic quality of life that's really very good. I think about Grady and the guys milling up and down Edgewood. The people with shopping carts, talking to themselves. If you have nothing, not even a hope or prayer of dragging yourself out of it (as in no family to fall back on, no education to leverage, possibly a criminal record around your neck like an albatross), you grab at comfort or escape. I think it makes perfect sense.

On a lighter note, Mazie and Vivian are listening to a Magic Treehouse CD, "Pirates Past Noon," on which there is a chapter entitled: "Vile Booty." (Insert snickers) Really? What was Mary Pope Osborne thinking? No matter, we all think it's hilarious.