Down
- Last night I went to bed around 9:30 exhausted. A little after 10 I was awakened to the sound of Calvin screaming. I went to investigate and he was crying in the middle of his room. As soon as he saw me, he flung himself into my arms. I tried to calm him down but he was inconsolable. I sat in the rocking chair and held him. He’d put his head down for a couple of minutes and then cry out and change position. It seemed to me that he was hurting. I blame it on teething. I’m pretty sure he has another set of molars coming in. Anyway, I left him to go downstairs and retrieve some ibuprofen. I gave it to him but, sadly, it doesn’t work right away. So Calvin dozed fitfully for about 45 min until it started working and then slipped into a deeper sleep. I manage to transfer him back to his own bed around 11:30. Since I was already tired, losing more than an hour of sleep was not ideal.
Ups
- Nana and Grandpa, Jaeger’s parents, visited arriving Thursday morning and just left this evening. Yesterday Nana, Calvin, and I went to the children’s museum in Denver. Calvin had a lot of fun. I think the highlight of the trip was a big fire truck that the kids could scramble up and down on. They also had little fireman hats and jackets for the kids to wear.
- Calvin turned two today. We had some people over to church and had an Asian-themed meal featuring Jaeger’s Sushi. Then we had German Chocolate Cake with Coconut Sorbet for dessert.
Calvin Moment
- In church today they sang happy birthday to Calvin. I had just finished playing offertory so Nana and Grandpa were watching him. He stood up on one of their knees and beamed graciously at the congregation the entire time they sang to him. I think he’ll make an excellent benevolent dictator.
Did you have a problem with Calvin or yourself being sick after attending the Children’s Museum?
When I took my nephew and niece to the Children’s Museum in our city I was admonished by co-workers to sanitize their hands and my hands obsessively during the day and take extra care not to touch mucus membranes until after we had left and sanitized our hands one more time.
As it turned out, I forgot. I washed my hands after using the bathroom like normal but didn’t sanitize them otherwise. I played on some of the exhibits with my niece and nephew and probably touched mucus membranes in my nose or eyes without thinking. Two days later I was quite sick with some kind of cold-flu variant. I’m not sure how my nephews and nieces were fine because they left the next day.
My co-workers claimed their kids and-or themselves always got sick after visiting the Children’s Museum unless they sanitized like germaphobes while there.
Did you or Calvin get sick close enough afterwards to tie it to the Children’s Museum?
Yes, Calvin got sick after visiting the Children’s Museum (I didn’t) but I think it was due to a sick kid at daycare instead of the museum. The day he skipped, a girl was sent home from daycare with a temp of 102. I suspect that she was infectious the prior day when Calvin was there.
I understand the desire to be obsessively clean in hopes of staving off an infection. However, I’m not convinced that’s the best approach. Calvin’s doctor is a fan of the hygiene hypothesis (http:–www.webmd.com-parenting-features-kids-and-dirt-germs) which basically asserts that our society tends towards being too clean which may be a factor in the increase of other health problems later in life. Of course, I do still believe in washing hands and taking reasonable precautions. However, I don’t think you can prevent toddlers from touching things they shouldn’t so the hygiene hypothesis makes it easier for me to relax and not overly stress.
I also think that we stress about staying clean to avoid being sick but don’t stress enough getting enough sleep and eating nutritious food. That weekend Calvin did eat a lot more sugar than usual. Whether or not sugar itself can reduce immune responses, it certainly replaced healthier foods that might have helped keep him healthy. For instance, he had German Chocolate Cake for snack on Saturday instead of his normal banana. That couldn’t have been healthy but it was a special occasion so I try to take a balanced approach :)