The Matthews’ Family and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Week

Yeah, umm, not the best week for the Matthews’ Family!  It started off like this:

That was last Sunday morning.  Austin was still sleeping (he works nights on the weekend) and I was trying to get everything ready for church.  So I parked the kids (Max was literally parked—he was sitting in his new car from Grandma Becky!) in front of the TV to watch that baby documentary.  They loved it and were little angels while Mom and Dad were busy!  But unfortunately, our week went downhill from there!

Monday was my birthday… and the scariest day of my life!  I had had a pretty rough night Sunday night, so I was on the phone with my doctor’s office while the kids finished up their lunch.  I hung up with the doctor and went to get the kids ready for their naps.  Makenna asked if they could go outside and play, but I said no because it was naptime.  Well then the doctor’s office called back.  They were asking some questions about some of my meds, so I went to the bedroom to get them.  When I came back, the kids were outside (because who listens to mom?!?) playing on the swing.  Well I went into the kitchen, finished my conversation, and then walked to the door to tell the kids to come back inside.  Max was walking around the corner (NOT at the swing set where I had JUST seen him!), over where the grill is.  He was carrying a bottle of lighter fluid, was bright red, and coughing up a storm.  I scooped him up and he was soaking wet and just reeked of lighter fluid.  I knew for sure he must have drank some.  I knew there was no way I could quickly find poison control’s number, so I called 9-1-1.

The paramedics soon arrived and quickly determined that he didn’t have any of the lighter fluid in his lungs.  But he was still coughing and having trouble breathing so they put him on oxygen, strapped us to a gurney, put us up in the ambulance, and off we went to the ER.  Max finally started breathing better and then the screaming and crying came!  But the paramedics said that was a good thing because he was getting it all out of his little body!  The ride to the ER was soooo scary!  I couldn’t get Austin on the phone (he was in Gilbert on rotations, 1 1/2 hours away) so I called my mom to tell her to keep trying to get Austin.  I REALLY wanted my husband there at that point!  They just had to have Makenna sit in the ambulance with us, and she was being really, really good but you could tell she was pretty darn nervous too!

We pull up to the ER and they rush us in.  I could hear Makenna (who was being held by a paramedic) say that her “baby brother Max was so, so sick.”  That, for some reason, made me cry even harder!  They put us in a room and we were instantly surrounded by doctors.  Yet Max was trying to fall asleep!  He quickly woke up as he was poked and prodded and x-rayed.  We ended up being in the ER for about 5 hours or so.  Thankfully Austin got there about an hour and a half after we did so I didn’t have to try to care for Max AND Makenna AND deal with my not feeling well all alone!  The doctor ended up saying that Max was ok—they got him on oxygen soon enough that he didn’t have anything in his lungs.  He had a bit of a cough and a scratchy throat, but thank Heavenly Father that he was ok!!!

On Tuesday Max was back to his normal self.  Which meant that he was a holy terror!  Let’s see, just on Tuesday, he climbed up on the entertainment center, turned the computer on and off SEVERAL times, flipped two chairs over, pulled the oven door open on himself, pulled wires out of the back of the computer, climbed on top of the computer desk and was sitting on the printer, ran out the front door before I could catch him and was across the street (twice—both when my visiting teachers left and when the parents-as-teachers guy left!), and oh yeah—I went to get him up from his nap and he was totally naked!  He had pulled his clothes off and peed all over his bed and room!  Yup, back to normal!  Did he not remember the day before and the trip to the ER at all?!?  Here is the trouble maker in the dryer—I was washing clothes and he decided he wanted to be washed too!  And tried to shut himself in there!

On Wednesday, Jenn and her girls came and picked us up so we could go to the library for a music class for Makenna and Natalie (another reason my week was so horrible—Austin’s car was broken so he had to take mine, leaving me carless all week!).  Makenna had a blast dancing and singing with her friends:

 

There are a lot of pictures (all blurry from my phone)cause she is just so darn cute!  I love that she dresses herself in the craziest, mismatched clothes but they still look cute, lol.

  

Poor baby Max just sat in my lap the whole time.  He looked so worn out!

Jenn and I figured that Monday had just finally caught up with him… nope!

On Thursday, Makenna still had traces of a cold and Max had a nasty cold and was SOOOOO fussy!  Austin got off at 1 that day, so we took both kids in for a doctor’s appointment that afternoon.  And… both kids had strep!!!  Are you kidding me?  If our week hadn’t been bad enough, now we had to add strep into the mess?!?  So THAT was why Max was so down at the library on Wednesday!  Oops—sorry all of the people at the library and Jenn and her children!  Didn’t mean to possibly get you all sick!

And then, I think it was Friday, I finally convinced Max to go outside and play instead of hanging on me like a monkey… and he quickly fell off the swings and totally smashed his face up!  It pains me to just look at the gravel burns all down his face!

And so Max has been crying nonstop since Wednesday afternoon… seriously, NONSTOP.  We all feel bad for him because he is obviously sick and then has bangs and bruises on top of that, but on the other hand we are all about to go nuts!  There is only so much crying you can stand!  I seriously think I may call the doctor back tomorrow because this can’t be normal!

So there is our week!  Doesn’t sound fun, does it?  I mean, there have been good things.  Makenna has been VERY good this week.  And last night Morgan Kizzar fixed Austin’s car for him.  Woo hoo for a fixed car and woo hoo for having my car back now!  And on Wednesday night some friends of mine “kidnapped” me and we had a girls’ night out where we decorated some way-cute cupcakes.  And we got to play with the Kizzars last night and have them over for dinner.  And the library thing Wednesday was fun and we enjoyed having the Larson girls over for lunch… but other than that… : D  Here is hoping for a better week!  Or you may all come visit me at a mental hospital where I lost it! ; )