Monday, January 9, 2012

Lit's Guide to Survival

survivorman-logo1

I'm a survivor. Or I will be. It's true. Ask Bean. He caught me recently perusing this website for a survival kit for our home. He at first thought I was weird, then got worried that all my promising to him that the end of the world is NOT going to happen this year was just to appease him (which it most definitely was...shh). You see, ever since I was little I've always created emergency/disaster scenarios in my mind and tried to figure out how I would survive them. They didn't always make sense because I was like six, but I was very serious about it. Here are a couple scenarios I remember coming up with as a young first grader, and how I would survive:

SCENARIO 1: We suddenly run out of air to breathe.
SURVIVAL TACTIC: Turn on the hair dryer.

SCENARIO 2: I'm lost in the jungle with no food.
SURVIVAL TACTIC: Make butter.

Now I know I was no Survivorman, but I was trying. I also used to sharpen sticks by rubbing them on coarse sidewalk and hide them in my tree and under my bed in case we suddenly came under attack and had to protect our home. It's very possible I was not what you would call a "normal" kid.

Anyway, I still do this. Often. Not the stick thing because neighbors would think I was weird, but the disaster scenario thing. Especially late at night when I can't sleep because I'm a mom and sleep is a long lost friend I hope to see again some day when I'm like 60. Depending on the type of disaster I'm imagining there are a slew of things to consider, like do we flee to the mountains? If so, what sort of supplies and food rations will we need to survive the winter? Do we need to think about planting our own crops? How do we defend said crops from bandits? (Because you know there will surely be bandits after a major disaster). Are there zombies involved? What sort of means for communicating with other survivors will we have? Is there a radiation cloud nearby somewhere? Will we have enough water? Should I start taking some sort of martial art? And that's just the beginning. The list of things to consider just goes on and on.

So, my question is, am I the only who does this? Also, what survivor kit should I get?

Thursday, January 5, 2012

The story of the rash

So a few days before Christmas I noticed this rash on Fin's face. I posted about it on facebook to get advice and called the doctor, but ultimately it was decided it had to do with some molars coming in and it would go away. As the week progressed it got worse and spread to her torso. By Christmas Eve it was everywhere. We were sitting in church and I could just tell she didn't feel well. I started to panic because of this episode of Oprah where Brook Shields talked about being in church with her daughter and seeing a flash of red in her daughter's eyes and feeling compelled to get it checked out only to find that if she hadn't, and her daughter hadn't had this necessary eye surgery that she would have gone blind. I could have that entire story wrong by the way. It may not even have been Brooke Shields and it's quite possible I dreamed it. But needless to say, I was worried. And Brooke Shields's story wasn't helping.

When we got home we called the doctor and got an emergency appointment for 9am Christmas morning at a different office than our usual one. So the next morning, we woke up, skipped any and all Christmas festivities and headed straight for the doctor's office. The doctor there diagnosed Fin with a yeast infection and a strep rash all over her body, and prescribed amoxicillin and two ointments for the yeast infection. The rash only got worse. It covered I would say 90% of her body at this point.

I will now show you a picture I took of it with my camera phone (which is clearly the worst camera phone in all the world):rashphoto

Not good. Sooo a couple days passed and I called the doctor again. We got to see her regular physician this time and he immediately said it looked to him like some sort of allergy. We went over everything she could possibly be allergic to that was new. The only things we could come up with were the new carpet in the family room and the Christmas tree. Other than that there had been no new foods introduced (other than a taste of peanut butter the week prior). He said to give her Benedryl and keep her off the carpet and away from the tree. So we spent the next 4 days in our basement (which is finished and nice, so don't feel too bad for us).

Luckily the rash did improve and is now back to where it was probably two days before Christmas. It's very dry (she screams when we put lotion on it because it stings), and it's mostly on her torso and face. It's nothing like it was, but it's still there. It has been 2 weeks and 2 days since I first noticed the rash and over the past few days nothing has changed. So I ask you, Internet, do I schedule another appointment and have them run a blood test for allergies? Or do I just continue to let it go and see what happens? I don't want to overreact, but at the same time I want to know what it is, and if she is allergic to something, to stop her from being exposed to it. Help!