Mixing the Good and the Bad

October 14, 2017

Bradley had one of THOSE days... both wonderful and troubling.

He wan't feeling very good.  Any time we left him he would cry and cry, so much that his little voice was getting hoarse by the evening.  We are troubled because we know it has to hurt his throat, so is his throat sore from crying or is his throat sore because he has come down with strep throat that has been running through his classroom?  That's worse case, we're hoping that he is just fighting off the effects of his flu shot.  The girls haven't shown any side effects or flu like symptoms, but they have a lot stronger immune systems than Bradley does.  Of course, every new school year we have to wait for the first bout of illness to run through his classroom and we see how Bradley is going to be able to fight off each new round of bugs and germs.  The trouble is that I get hopeful that each year he's going to be able to fight off each round, and each year he proves how vulnerable he is to this stuff.  It's interesting actually, his teacher and the aides all say the equivalent to me; they get used to him looking so healthy and doing so well, then he'll come down with a mild cold that never stays mild and they just look at me in shock, commenting about how he goes south so quickly.  Yeah, I know.  Sigh.

So, we're a little troubled and keeping a close eye on Bradley to make sure he is not headed down a difficult road.  He spent a lot of time doing two things today, walking between the living room and the kitchen constantly...and watching his movie.  The walking back and forth gets frustrating because once you hit 10,000 steps on your Fitbit...I mean come on, how many more are truly necessary without looking like you're going for over-kill.  And he only wants to sit and have one popsicle after another after another.  The problem is, he knows how to open the freezer, pull out his popsicles and then sit on at the table expectantly.  When you give him one, he goes and grabs another one.  And then when that one is gone, he goes to grab another...  we started cutting him off.  It was all fun and games, except he would start to freeze his throat and then he starts to gag a bit.  And there's the whole issue that he will only eat popsicles turning his nose up at any other food...uh...not enough calories to cover his dietary needs.  So he started getting cut off of popsicles and only given them occasionally.  But my kid is slick, after figuring out that the popsicles had disappeared from the freezer, he checked a couple times and just knew we'd done something shifty with them.  He waited for his chance, and his first opportunity when one of the girls left the garage door unlocked, he was out the door and finding his coveted popsicles in the freezer in the garage.  Good grief!  We have to keep that door locked!  Some families have to keep their garage door locked so that their little ones stay away from power tools; not our kid, he zeroes in on the popsicles.

So we get him to give up the popsicles for other food.  He helps me get his mustard and lunch meat out of the fridge in order to make him a sandwich, and he eats those again.  He has returned to his peaches with a vengeance like to the extent that I have to keep telling him one a day buddy, one a day.  Same with the lemon pudding.  He thinks that all he needs to eat is peaches and pudding.  He's eating more again, but good God, the amount of time that he spends zeroed and focused on one thing with the refusal to have anything else is frustrating for us.  But he did eat, so that's something.

And then there was the time we spent watching him with his movie.  There are times he will choose to try to copy whatever movie he is watching.  Yesterday he was trying to copy Boo from "Monster's Inc" - the part at the end where she's screaming and laughing and crying...really loud...while we were in a quiet doctor's office...while the doctor is listening to my daughter's lungs and trying not to laugh at my son.  Today it was "Pitch Perfect" and he was trying to copy the hand signals...luckily all the clean ones, and then trying to match pitch if you will, and even trying to say a few of the same sayings...again, luckily the clean phrases.  Good times indeed.  It was so hard to not laugh and let him know we were watching because as soon as he knows that we are watching he stops dancing, signing, or mimicking.  I think he gets shy.  But I think it's about the cutest thing ever.

So he's sleeping now, for a little while anyway.  And then he'll be up visiting me at some point, but hopefully a good night's sleep and one more day away from the flu shot and he'll be recovering and not feeling so bad...or he'll feel worse and we'll be visiting the doctor on Monday to find out where we are with him.  We just have to do that once in a while.  With him having allergy shots in the past almost year, he has been stronger and has been sick less often...here's hoping that he fights off the strep that hit his classroom and keeps healthy.  We can certainly hope.  His little voice is always cute, it's even super cute when it's hoarse, but I hope he leaves that behind tomorrow and gives me his little whispers that lets me hear his voice and the quiet little words that he gives me.  Love that little guy and all the stuff he has to tell me...hands or whispers...or the occasional really loud yell that echoes a bit.  HAHA...

Life is about the good and the bad and it's about the days that it's all mixed together.  Today was a day  like that.  Meeting the Challenges here at home and in the middle of this 31 For 21 Blog Challenge.  Have a good night all!