A day for the record books

Today has been a day for the record books. What kind of record, you ask? How about the how-fast-can-children-drive-their-mother-to-want-to-commit-herself record.... Oh yeah. One. Of. Those. Days. Elizabeth, who's been sick since Monday, had been up several times in the night coughing but was seeming to at least feel better. However, with that cough, I wasn't going to chance sending her to school. Fight #1 -- she WANTED to go to school. Ugh. Almost gave in but I called Jonathan and he said that with her complaining yesterday of an ear ache and with our kids' high pain thresholds where ear infections are concerned, he wanted her taken to the doctor. After I got home from dropping off Nathan and Caleb and called for an appointment, I realized Caleb had left his homework folder at home. Loaded the 4 back into the car and all the way there, I was contemplating -- "You know, the handbook says that we have to take stuff to the office if the school day has already started but with Caleb's classroom having a door that is right by the parking lot, should I park and drag everybody into the office or just park in front of their door and leave everyone in the van to run it in?". I opted for the follow-the-rules option and was in the process of dragging everyone out of the van. Carrying Lydia is the problem -- carry her in her carrier and my hips hurt, carry her in my arms and my hips hurt, not to mention I'm usually trying to hold Timothy's hand nor how difficult it is to get the stroller out. I knew I'd only be out of the van 5 minutes at most so I could tough it out, right? So, here I am, nearly halfway to the office when Caleb's teacher yells at me from their door telling me I should have just ran it up. AGH! I was okay with that.... Shouldn't be complainy, right? Back home we go. Things were relatively uneventful until after I picked up Caleb. Got some lunch which was kinda gross (Burger King had way overcooked nearly everything). Then, just moments before I was going to put Timothy down for his nap, I smelled it. Someone was in the hand sanitizer. Didn't really bolt out of my seat. After all, it couldn't possibly be Timothy. I had cleaned off the edge of the kitchen island last week after I realized he could reach the edge. But, oh no -- somehow, someone left the hand sanitizer somewhere within Timothy's reach. He's sitting on the floor, a few drops of sanitzer already on the floor, his hands obviously coated in it. When I call his name, in the middle of my firm "That's a NO NO", he wipes his sanitizer-coated-hand right across his lips. He ingested hand sanitizer. Back of the bottle states it clearly -- "If ingested, call poison control or seek medical treatment immediately". Called the dr...."Call poison control", they said. Poison control says to watch him for signs of drunkeness. Google that sometime -- "toddler ate hand sanitizer". Turns out, hand sanitizer, when ingested by children, can cause alcohol poisoning and it only takes about 3 squirts to kill a toddler. Fantastic! Fast forward to 3:15 when I'm trying to get everyone in the van for Elizabeth (and Timothy's) doctors appointments. I wasn't thrilled about having to take all six of them to begin with so my mood probably wasn't the best. But then comes Caleb -- holding a hand full of pills that I've never seen before.
"Caleb, where did you get those pills?"
"They were on John's bed," he says.
March (stomp?) out to the van -- "John, were you playing with these pills?"
"Yep."
"Where did you get them?"
"I got them from Crapaw's house last night."
Seriously, when he says "Grandpa", it sounds more like "crap-paw" -- funny!. Called father-in-law -- "Missing any blue and yellow pills?" Sure enough. They were Trilipix -- a high cholesterol drug of my mother-in-law. You've GOT to be kidding me?!?! First the hand sanitizer and now high cholesterol pills!....The doctor's office visit was pure torture -- in this tiny little room that had to have been 110 degrees, with 6 kids, 2 of whom were trying to make and fly paper airplanes. And, then surprise -- our pediatrician had a resident shadowing him and he was going to exam them both first. Resident didn't fully understand Timothy's history (I didn't have him there for the sanitizer -- I had him there because of his stridor/cough) so it was forever explaining things to him. He leaves, 30 hours later our doctor finally comes in but I can barely hear him over the now crying Lydia and the 2 boys still trying to fly paper airplanes. He looks at Elizabeth and thinks that, despite the resident's opinion, she might have strep. So then we had to wait for a strep test. I'm pretty sure my skin was crawling at that point. No strep for Elizabeth -- looks like she and Timothy both have a case of croup. Since Elizabeth is starting to feel better, she should be all better by the time the weekend's over. We're watching Timothy more closely both because of his health history and the fact that he hasn't been sick that long so he might actually get sicker before he gets better. Had some dinner and I'm headed to the grocery store soon. And I'm leaving the fighting, crying, coughing, whining, extremely LOUD children behind me with my husband. Someone say a prayer for him.
And that, my dear friends, if you've hung on long enough to read it all, is today's dose of what-it's-like-to-raise-6-kids! Not for the faint at heart, huh?