In what feels waaay too freakishly similar to what we went through two years ago when HD ended up with a mystery bug to start off the school year, we are now on Day 5 of fevers and headaches and stomach aches for our current 2nd Grader, Miss Raegan.

Because of the nervous-making mumps reports in the great state of Nebraska, I took her in on her first day home sick from school, last Friday. Strep test was negative, so we hunkered down for the weekend, prepared to treat symptomatically/over the counter. And that’s what we did, day after day after day for the 3-day weekend. Not really an exciting way to spend Labor Day weekend, but honestly, I prefer quiet weekends and it is what all of us needed to start off the school year anyway.

But I’d really rather not have illness be the driving force behind our stay-at-home choice. And poor Raegan – she’s so sad that the real week has started now and she’s missing school. Again. (and will be again tomorrow because she’s definitely not yet fever free which is the real marker for returning to the classroom).

In the midst of these attempts to get our big girl healthy, I’m also flashing back to almost four years ago because the last week also feels freakishly similar to having a newborn in the house which we just about did at this time then (Trumy’s bday is this coming Friday). I share the level of the house on which RL sleeps and normally she’s our RockStar best sleeper in the bunch, but not when she’s sick and definitely not with this virus.

For the first time ever, we’ve got a kid having fever dreams. Have you ever had those in your house? Hoby pokes (WA’s version of Holy Smokes; I’m probably going to say it a lot forever, so, fair warning). It has been ROUGH. Poor girl had nightmares for three nights straight and would wake up in major distress each time. Then the last two nights have involved tummy aches and needing Mama at all hours of the night (last night I gave up and just climbed in bed with her) and yep – minus nursing and diaper changing duties (thank goodness), I feel newborn tired today. Both my body and my brain are dragging.

But my main concern is RL. I hate to see any of my babies sick but I really hate to see her sick like this. We’ve got another 48 hours to let this ride itself out and if no improvement, back to the doc office we go. Here’s hoping she is well on her to well before then.