Stomach Bug & Bad Cold

Augh, it's been a rough....I mean ROUGH week in the Grant household. Where do I even start?! First of all Landon has had a bad cold for about 2 weeks now. Him and I had it at the same time in the beginning but I was able to get over mine in about 5 days. Landon has held onto his and still has it to this day. I'm sure he'll constantly have 'something' since he goes to daycare with 3 other babies and about 10 kids. There's bound to always be something going on around there. :( Anyway, his cold has kept him from sleeping 'soundly' except we are shocked but thrilled that he continues to sleep through the night (yay for Mommy & Daddy!). He has been coughing lots, sneezing constantly, a runny nose and is super congested too. Poor thing can't breathe half of the time, especially in the mornings after he wakes up.

Not sure if it was coincidental or what, but the evening he got his shots is when the stomach bug started and the diarrhea came on full force. This was Wednesday evening (Dec. 23rd) and he didn't get over these symptoms until Wednesday, Dec. 30th....a full week of a sick baby with a stomach bug AND cold does NOT equal a whole lot of fun. Thursday the 24th was Christmas Eve and we celebrated that evening with my family in Washington. We were looking forward to a fun evening but about half way through the night (during gift opening) is when the crying and screaming came on...and lasted for DAYS. At this point Jeff and I didn't know for sure what was going on but we knew he was obviously in alot of pain as Landon never cries unless he's overly tired, in which he'll stop and fall asleep within 5 minutes. Well the crying was not stoping so Jeff and I spent the rest of the evening upstairs at my parents house, trying to calm him, while everyone else was downstairs having a good time. Unfortunately we missed out a little bit and weren't able to get pictures with my family of Landon's first Christmas. It was a bit of a bummer but nothing we could do. My poor baby was so sick and he was letting us know. Tylenol or nothing would ease the pain...the only thing that took the crying away was when he'd fall asleep.
Friday was Christmas Day and we were hoping Landon would feel better. Thankfully in the morning he was in pretty good spirits so we took some pics and had him open his gifts (wink wink) and then he took a nap before heading over to Jeff's family's house for the day. Well I'm not even kidding when I say that 5 minutes after walking through their door the fun began....lets just say we didn't get to relax or enjoy much of the Grant's Christmas, as we spent the entire night upstairs with Landon, trying to rock him to sleep or at least calm him. Nothing would work...and he wasn't just crying but he was screaming crying so loud for hours on end. He would fall asleep for a little bit and then wake screaming again...you could tell he was in so much pain and all I wanted to do was cry with him. You feel so helpless and it's so sad to see them hurting like that. So unfortunately once again we weren't able to get any first Christmas family pictures. But we will still hold the 'memories' in our heads, as it was still very special having him there with us. It's just unfortunate that he was so sick on his first Christmas.
Well the crying, screaming, sickness didn't stop there...like I said it continued for an entire week. And because of his diarrhea he then got a diaper rash and would scream everytime we changed him. Poor little guy has had a rough time. Sunday evening we decided to take Landon to the OSF Peds after hours since he wasn't getting any better and I wanted to make sure he didn't have an ear infection or something we could get treated. Dr. said he looked good so we just had to patiently wait it all out. On Monday evening Landon passed the stomach flu to me and I was up getting sick most of the night and had to call in sick on Tuesday. I laid in bed and slept most of the day and didn't get out of bed until 9:30pm that night just to eat some pretzels and go back to bed. Daddy did a great job of taking care of me and Landon. Let me say it's soooo nice that Jeff is so hands-on and so good with Landon and knows how to do everything, as I never have to tell him what to do, he just knows how to do it ALL. Thankfully my mom (Mimi) watched Landon this day so he wasn't anywhere close to me and so Jeff could have a little break. Mom said he was really good and smiled and giggled lots. Because of this we knew he was starting to feel better. On Wednesday Jeff's mom (Nana) watched Landon while I was at work and so Jeff could have another break. That evening is when we finally witnessed Landon feeling better and getting back to himself....his happy, giggly, smiley self. :) What a relief and joy to have him back!!!!! It's been one very LONG week but we managed to make it through and I feel that we're stronger parents having to go through that.

Landon.....happy or sad, good or bad, we love YOU just the same. You are our precious little angel!!!!