Gack

The post title today has two applications. One is in reference to the general health of the Parenthetical household, which is on the decline but we are desperately hoping is a merely undergoing a brief dip with a quick course correction to follow. So far I’m getting off the easiest, with just a little more congestion than usual (I have allergies – I’m always a little bit congested) and that burning feeling of I’m-coming-down-with-something at the back of my throat. My wife is on the verge of losing her voice due to a very scratchy throat, and my little guy has a cough bad enough to wake him from a sound sleep (fortunately that’s his only symptom so far). Of course when the baby doesn’t get much sleep, nobody gets much sleep, even if everyone else is feeling hale and hearty. Which we’re not. Gack.

The bigger gack – GAAAACCCKKKK – is the H1N1. It hasn’t hit our household (certainly I don’t think the current discomforts are its handiwork) but it is out there and, I’m not going to lie here, it kind of freaks me out. So far I have stayed fairly calm but it does weigh on my mind. Amusingly enough, I was talking to Little Bro about the swine flu last night and found myself reassuring him that, even if he comes down with H1N1 himself, it’s Not That Bad. Nobody likes having the flu, especially when it hits brutally hard and fast, but it’s not the end of the world. He’ll live. That was actually kind of a revelation for him, because the way the media has been (semi-hysterically) covering H1N1, with all the focus on rising numbers of cases and overwhelmed ER scenarios and vaccine shortages, the unspoken implication seems to be that it is a matter of life or death, not convenience or inconvenience. But I further pointed out that, as far as the wider society that the media speaks to, it is a matter of life and death because the virus can be fatal for very old people and very young children. And of course at that point the conversation trailed off a bit awkwardly because I have a fourteen-month-old.

Fourteen months old may be the worst possible age to be in the fall of 2009. I would get the little guy vaccinated in a heartbeat, but at the moment our pediatrician is currently offering two H1N1 vaccination options: a very small number of injections for high-risk kids, babies under six months and the parents thereof; and the nasal mist for anyone between the ages of 2 and 49. I will count my blessings that my son is generally healthy and not a high-risk kid, but other than that, GACK. I know more vaccines will be available in mid-November, and that is helping me stay sane, but I will be pretty much holding my breath between now and then.

Last night sucked pretty profoundly, because there was very little either his mother or I could do for the little booger while he was coughing uncontrollably and crying miserably, each one feeding into the other. We (mostly she) went through those very little things, which brought forth more screaming, but eventually got him calmed down and back to sleep, more or less. We made it through the night. I’m devoutly hopeful today that last night was a metaphor for this H1N1 season. There’s nothing I can do, realistically, to prevent my kid from possibly being exposed to viruses in public. There’s nothing I can do to magically make the vaccines super-abundant. It’s going to be frustrating and worrisome and exhausting. BUT – we will make it through the night. Now where the gack is my emoticon for “steely optimism”?