Grateful

Thankfully, we as parents haven't been through much sickness with our kids. They've never had official ear infections (though Lucia has occasionally complained that her ear has hurt when she has had a bad cold), Lucia has only had the stomach flu two or three times, and Rhea twice, I think. This last weekend, Alexa had her first real bout with sickness. It was SO sad to watch. She was a little irritable Sunday morning when we put her down for her nap. Usually, we put her in her bed and she might make a few sounds for a couple of minutes before falling asleep. But this time, she would quiet down, then fuss, get quiet and then fuss again. She also was not in her regular sleeping position on her belly with her thumb. We just assumed it was her teeth.  With this many teeth coming in, you're allowed to be a little irritable!  (This are just the top ones, she also has two more coming in on the bottom.)

But I thought it was a little odd since she had taken most of her teething in absolute stride, and now that the main ones were through, her irritability didn't quite make sense.

We thought about my staying home from church so she could take her regular nap, but then decided that if she awoke in time to leave, we'd all go together.  She did wake up, much earlier than normal, so we all headed to church.  The service hadn't even started yet; we were sitting and chatting with the people next to us, telling them how Alexa was having a rough morning, when, out of nowhere, she started projectile vomiting!  It was ALL OVER me, some on the pew and some on the lady next to me! We picked up the other two from their classes and headed straight back home.  Over the course of the day, she kept throwing up until nothing was left in her little system. And even then, she would try to go to sleep, only to be woken up minutes later by the urge to dry-heave until she could cough up some stomach fluids (sorry for all the details).  All - day - long.  I finally decided to make her some stomach-calming herbal tea with a little salt and gave it to her with a medicine dropper, but even that didn't stay down.  She continued to vomit throughout the night.  If I had to estimate, I would say she threw up 20 times or more.  It was so sad to watch!  She was completely limp, motionless on the bed, didn't move at all.  Poor, poor baby.  She wasn't interested in nursing, so I started looking up rehydration drinks, teas, etc, but if she couldn't keep any of it down, I just didn't know how to help her (short of taking her to the hospital for an IV).  So... we decided if by Monday morning she wasn't holding down tea or interested in nursing, we were going to take her to the hospital.  Finally at 6:45 a.m., she woke up and wanted to nurse.  Unfortunately, that all came back up again (maybe she had too much?), but beginning at 8:30, tea and milk started staying down.  It was really pitiful how parched her lips looked and how she was DESPERATE for the bottle of tea or milk that first feeding.  When we had to temporarily take it to refill it, she was absolutely heart-broken and cried and cried and cried until we could give it back to her.  But the sight of her downing half a bottle of liquids was absolutely delightful!!  I am reminded of how grateful I am to live in a country were I have hospitals available with IVs for babies who may need them, and I felt with the moms in many countries around the world who watch their sick infants and young children get ill like this and have no recourse. 

Thank you, Lord, that our sweet Lexi Belle is better, and thank you for giving her extra chunk to lose!! (She's noticeably lighter and thinner and her diapers fit her better again (I was getting ready to go up a size, but now I won't have to quite yet.))