When you really want your mommy

I haven’t been adding much lately, because we’ve all been sick, and not just “cough, cough, sniffle, sniffle" sick, but violently sick. The kind of sick that makes you writhe in agony praying for a release that only death can bring.

After four days of agony and no indication of letting up, we reluctantly decided to go to the doctor. Now I say reluctantly, because this is one of the drawbacks of living without a car, despite the great public transportation. Because when I’m sick, and I can barely make it down the hall to the bathroom, the thought of dragging myself, my husband and my 17 month old son, into the 40 degree weather, down to the bus stop, onto the bus and down to a doctor’s office which we’re only vaguely familiar with its’ location is less than appealing.

So, after we manage to get to the doctor’s office, we have to argue with the receptionist in our broken German and her broken English to take us despite the fact that our insurance cards haven’t arrived yet. After about an hour, the Doctor, kind soul that he is, takes us back into his office, where I almost cry when I realize that he’s going to treat us. He tells us it’s viral, to take some Imodium AD, go home, and we’ll feel better tomorrow.

Only, we didn’t feel better the next day, nor the next day, and the Imodium, it didn‘t work. After the ordeal of going to the doctor the first time, we were even more reluctant to go the second time. Though, this time we were more prepared, we found a quicker and easier route, and there was no arguing at the front desk. The doctor was surprised to see us again, but quickly realized that we had more than just the flu. Being the good German doctor that he is, he’s not going to prescribe an anti-biotic until he’s confirmed that we have a bacterial infection, and to do so he needs a stool sample.

Now, Paul and I have spent almost a week swallowing a pharmacy of anti-diarrhea drugs to get the poop to stop, but the one time we really want it to come, it’s not forthcoming. We knew that eating is the most likely way to get our bowels moving, and it just so happens that the doctor has a bunch of health cookies that he willingly provides for the task at hand. Now, had we not been in such a weakened state, we might have noticed the over eagerness of the doctor in pawning those cookies off on us. Because those cookies only loosely resembled cookies. They more closely resembled birdseed. After only eating bananas and apple juice only week, we were supposed to figure out how to eat these things. It was like holding your nose to swallow bad medicine. We couldn’t even eat two.

The doctor recommended some biological medication and live culture yogurt to help reestablish the natural balance of bacteria flora in our bowels, kind of like yoga, only for the intestines. And after two days of this new course of treatment, while we wait for our lab results, we’re finally feeling better. I’m adding live culture yogurt to our permanent grocery list.