Fancy Pantsy

The flu has left me mostly with some battle wounds. A little run down, a little pale, with a lingering cough and sore throat…and 2 huge, evil, painful canker sores!

As for the cough and sore throat,  tea and some Go Naturally organic honey candies that my sweet friend supplied are helping to soothe.

As for the Canker sores…ugh. I was so miserable. They hurt so badly, and any of the numbing  treatments I tried wore off the sores within minutes-but left the rest of my mouth annoyingly numb for hours! So, today I hit the drugstore determined to find something to give me relief. What I found was OralMedic. I was a bit skeptical of it’s claims to work in one treatment…but willing to try anything.  I actually was so desperate that I tried it in the car before I left to go home. Well…I was amazed. It actually worked. Since using it about 9 hours ago, I have felt no pain, whatsoever, in my canker sore area. I can feel the sore is still there with my tongue, but it is completely de-sensitized. My whole mouth is not numb though…just the sore itself. Amazing. One bit of warning though…where the directions say “A brief “stinging” sensation is experienced immediately upon application”, a more appropriate statement would be “upon application, it will feel as though a swarm of hornets has entered your mouth and begun to sting you all in the same spot”. It was worth it though.

OralMedic is not available in the U.S.

Suckers!!

I am starting to feel better (I am not feeling too awful from about 1 hour after I take Advil until it wears off…but the 1-2 hours between when the Advil wears off and I can take the next one and it has started to work, I feel wretched!), so I will now post some Halloween pictures. They aren’t great, since we did not actually go Trick or Treating! The girl went with a friend and only had half  her witch costume (and her make-up) on when I took pictures, and Charlotte did not wear a costume. I may be a party pooper, but I simply refuse to dress a baby who is too young to eat candy or get Halloween in a costume and drag them around the neighborhood asking for candy…or even dress them in a costume just to take a picture and take it off again. If we went to a Halloween party, I may have considered it…but we didn’t so no costume for her.

So, the girl:

Also, we did have an awesome barfing Jack O’Lantern:

two days ago. too weak and achy to say anything else…

1) I am sorta sick of debating and reading and worrying about the vaccine. It is a flu vaccine people…no different than any other flu vaccines. Every single ingredient in it, except the flu strain itself (which changes every year)  has been used and tested for years, and used in many other vaccines. If you normally take or give your kids the flu shot, or any other vaccines, there is no reason to obsess over this one being a scary one. The adjuvant is new to the flu vaccine, but not new to vaccines at all. There is an interesting article about this here.

2) There is nothing wrong with deciding not to get the vaccine either, and I acccept and support parents that tend to be more critical of vaccines in general and the sort to question and maybe even avoid this vaccine …but it I do find it somewhat annoying that mainstream, vanilla, “do whatever the doctor says” type parents shave suddenly jumped on the “H1N1 vaccine is an evil, dangerous, pharmaceutical conspiracy” band-wagon.  Not that this attitude is “wrong” exactly….it just has me scratching my head.

3) I am one of those parents who does tend to critically analyze everything, and although we do get the “main vaccines”, we do not do chicken pox or roto-virus, and decided on the flu on a year to year basis. I have decided myself, the man and the girl will get the H1N1 vaccine. At the end of the day, I am yet to hear of any deaths or adverse reactions to the vaccine, not so with the virus. I am not so sure about the baby…and am still deciding. She is just a few months older than the 6 month cut off, and breast-feeding (which I think is the best thing one can do for a baby’s immune system)…and I am just not yet sure.

4) I find it incredibly frustrating that on the news all you see is that everyone needs to get vaccinated…but unless you are willing to spend 6 hours in a line up with everyone else breathing all over you and your kids, it is not happening. I am hoping my doctor’s office has it next week, but not holding my breath!

5) This may all be a moot point since as of this morning Charlotte and I both have low grade fevers. I am also a bit body-achy and head-achy-and she is okay, but currently taking an unheard of morning nap. Not sure if it is H1N1, since the temps are not high and no coughing or sore throats…but still no fun!

I leave you all with a cute comic my friend passed along: