The flu

While living in the Ozarks, we owned a home which had been refurbished from near ruin by the previous owners. Built in the late 1880s, it was the perfect home for a family with four children and a big, black Labrador. Best of all, the kids had plenty of room upstairs while mom and dad had plenty of room downstairs except when someone had  the flu.

When unexpectedly awakened early in the morning by a ringing phone, I can’t help thinking it is someone bearing bad news. I mean, everyone knows, good news is never announced before the crack of dawn.

Last Saturday morning, the Madden phone rang just past 7, which for us is early on the weekend. Regardless, I had had a long, restless night trying to sleep in the upstairs bedroom of our baby girl, who was recovering from a weeklong case of the flu.

The best I can recall is hearing the phone ring at least four times before Coach answered it.

I must have dozed right off again because the next thing I remember is hearing Coach in the upstairs hallway outside baby girl’s bedroom.

“Is everything alright?” I asked.

“Where’s the thermometer?”

“Thermometer? Who was on the phone?”

“Clara. She isn’t feeling well,” Coach said referring to our older daughter.

“But, WHO WAS ON THE PHONE?” I asked yet again.

“Clara.”

“Clara?” I thought, trying to figure out why in the world she would call her daddy on the phone while they were both in the same house.

“She called from her cell phone to tell me she isn’t feeling well and wanted some orange juice,” he said. “I want to take her temperature.”

“I think the thermometer is on the den coffee table,” I explained as I unfolded myself out of baby girl’s bed and made my way down the hall to Clara’s bedroom.

“You ok, honey?” I asked as I kissed her forehead the mama way to check for fever.

“I’m burning up,” she said.

“You sure are,” I agreed. “But, did you really just  now call daddy on your cell phone and ask him to bring you some juice?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Ah, the age of technology,” I said with a laugh. “You must be feeling really bad then, right?”

“I’m aching all over.”

By this time, her younger brother was up and sort of awake due to the commotion.

“Is everything ok?” he mumbled as he entered the room.

“Yes, but Clara’s running fever,” I replied. “You had the thermometer last night, didn’t you?”

“It’s right here,” he said giving it to me.

“How are you feeling?” I asked him.

“Awful.”

“Good grief,” I said. “Get back to bed. I want everyone resting all day today.”

And then with a little relish announced, “And no one is going to school on Monday.”

“Funny, mama, you know there’s no school on Monday,” Clara said.

 “Just checking to see if you’re paying attention.”

Later, after checking on baby girl and making sure her siblings were resting comfortably, I returned to the warmth of my own bed downstairs.

To date, three Maddens have had the flu while Coach and I wait our turn.

In the meantime, we are getting plenty of rest, drinking lots of fluids, and, most important, keeping our cell phones close at hand.

Painfully funny

In the spring of 2002, Stirling was a high school baseball coach. Through a fluke of fate, he ended up on the receiving end of a hard hit fast ball while pitching batting practice. This column recounts our time in the ER and my attempt to bring humor to the situation.

For the past few weeks, our family has been dealing with everything from stomach flu to walking pneumonia. Just as one bug finishes its dirty work, another one stops by to wreak havoc.

It has not been a pretty sight, but it has been interesting.

Every year just before cold and flu season, an uber-organized friend of mine has what she calls a sick drill. Similar to a fire drill, a sick drill is designed to help prepare the family for the worst a contagion has to offer. Mom puts a bucket at each child's bedside and a moment or two later calls out,"1-2-3-PUKE."

The first time she tried this, her daughter managed to get it right, while her son, in an attempt to defy gravity,  put the bucket over his head.

As the matriarch of a household inhabited by three members of the male species, I find this situation humorously typical.

My husband thinks I'm obnoxious.

What he doesn't seem to appreciate is my sense of humor is what keeps me sane.

Because we are as different as night and day, there is never a dull moment in our household. He takes everything very seriously while I snicker and laugh my way through the trials and tribulations called life.

This arrangement was tested to the extreme last spring.

As an almost half-century old high school baseball coach, my husband insists on pitching batting practice to players at least one-third his age.

It was during one such batting practice that my coach-husband was standing behind a safety screen, pitching. The batter hit a hard line drive straight for the pitcher's mound.

Somehow the errant baseball found its way through the screen and managed to bulls-eye the aged pitcher right between his baby blues. My husband was left with an open nasal fracture, neatly outlined by baseball
tread marks.

Due to an inordinate amount of emergencies that evening, we had to wait a bit for an ambulance to arrive at the scene of the accident and once we finally arrived at the E.R. we continued our wait for another 12 hours.

Being a dutiful wife, I attempted to keep things light with a few humorous anecdotes - comments that I suppose could be perceived as unsympathetic.

"Well, dear, look on the bright side," I suggested. "With your nose split open like that, you could always work nights and weekends as a nickel slot machine." or "Do you think the surgeon could do a George
Clooney number with your nose?"

My husband was not amused.

But there was a method to my madness, and now I have scientific proof to back me up.

Recently, I came across an article entitled, "Too much sympathy can worsen spouse's pain." The article used terms like "solicitous spouses" (a.k.a. sympathetic spouses) and "non-solicitous spouses" (a.k.a. unsympathetic spouses.)

Guess which type I am?

The article explained how recent studies indicate those married to a non-solicitous spouse actually fare better in the long run. It suggested that in order to facilitate quicker healing, one should downplay the patient's pain by distracting him or simply leaving the room.

In my opinion, this means I was on the right track that horrific evening my injured husband and I spent together in the hospital. After all, I was sincerely trying to distract him the best way I know how - with humor.

But if the truth be told, he’d probably preferred I had counted to three, put a bucket over my head, and simply left the room.