When They Get Sick....Oh, Brother.

January 19, 2008

Thank goodness for this place; it's the only one where I can safely

vent and I know everyone here will get it.

DS (9) had been on a med change from Risperdol to Abilify, and it

clearly wasn't working that well and he had been in a downward spiral

of obsessive thoughts, generally short-tempered. Well, you all know

the routine. 4 kids in his class were really sick and 2 threw up in

the class. Just great, right?

Anyway, then he got a nasty cold and an even worse chunky cough, and

became afraid he was going to vomit if he coughed in school. So there

was a week of him already being more fragile and then we had the worst

of all possible scenarios...a SNOW DAY.

So he DID get a day off. A day where he was whiny, bored. etc. and

completely OCDing about not wanting to go to school and throwing up there.

I knew getting him back to school would be a nightmare. But he was a

good little man and pulled himself together and went on Tuesday. Then

he threw up in school.

So he got another day off and I took him to the doctor, where he was

diagnosed with cough-induced asthma. He got an inhaler which he's

completely obsessing about using.

But the doc said it's completely normal (but gross) to wake up with a

chunky cough and with all the mucus suddenly flowing into the stomach,

for a kid to throw it all up again.

I was able to convince the boy he could go to school on Thursday,

right up until he threw up again while waiting for the bus. So home

again we go.

Friday he was a complete wreck about going to school but I forced him

to. You know the cartoons where someone is hanging off a cliff and

the other character very slowly pulls off one finger at a time?

That's what it was like.

At 11, I got a call from his sped teacher (he's in a special program

for kids with emotional disabilities) who said he was completely

flipping out about throwing up in school, but if it was okay with me,

she was going to force him to work through it.

I came home at 4 yesterday, asked how school was, and he said, " Fine.

Can I have a friend sleep over? "

It all turned out well, but it's so funny how I forget from crisis to

crisis.

Being sick really turns my little man into a mess. MUST remember, right?

Dana

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