Wrapping up the Week

It's been a quiet week in Lake Woebegone Modiin.

On Sunday, while I was writing my previous post, I guess the subject matter really got to me, because I felt faint and weak, and went to lie down. I put my feet up, but I kept feeling worse, so I called the Women's Clinic. They told me to come in, and the doctor there sent me to the ER at Shaarei Zedek. My mom was in Petach Tikva, picking up some stuff from Shai Bar Ilan's Office for the trip to China. Yaakov and I don't have a car (and I couldn't have driven anyway, the way I felt) so I went through the list of people I know, and after careful consideration of all the possibilities, I hailed a taxi. Yaakov met me at the hospital a little while later.

After about a half hour of poking and prodding, they took blood from me and hooked up an IV and gave me a liter of fluids. They also did an ultrasound so we could see that the baby is nice and healthy, and a baby monitor so we could hear the baby's heartbeat. (The baby was pretty uncooperative, so most of what we heard was my heartbeat.)

Then the sent us to another doctor. Although I hadn't had a fever earlier, at this point I did. He gave me two Acamol (think Tylenol), and told me to go back to the doctor who'd sent me to the hospital (he was at the hospital at this point) and get released.

So... after 6 hours, I was released with 2 acamol and a liter of what basically amounted to water...

That was a fun day.

Monday, I felt great. I mean, perfectly healthy. I had some work to do, so I got it done. I took care of all kinds of stuff I've been meaning to deal with at home. Then I went over to my sister's house. Her son had to give some kind of book report in class the next day, and he had read 8 pages of Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing. Eight! Out of 120. The thing is, he's a slow reader - it's a problem when it's not your native language. I read terribly slowly in Hebrew. So I read him the next 112 pages. It took me two hours, and by the time I finished, I felt like I'd been through a war.

Tuesday, Yaakov and I both woke up feeling miserable. We went to the doctor and he couldn't find anything wrong with me, but Yaakov had an ear infection, so he got ear drops and antibiotics. We came home and slept all day. Wednesday we were too sick to do anything, including take me to the doctor. I went to the doctor on Thursday, and I have bronchitis, so I'm on antibiotics too.

Thursday was my birthday. My parents sent me flowers, and my sister gave me a really cool t-shirt that she made herself. She came over with her daughter, Guli (Abigail Rebecca). Guli was supposed to sing "Happy Birthday," but she got a little shy, and I think Poofy scared her a little. He did calm down eventually, and she was able to give him a ball, which he promptly took in his mouth and chewed on. But... back to the t-shirt that my sister made... As you can see, it's a picture of Baby G., complete with umbilical cord! It's a night shirt, because Yaakov thinks that elbows should be heard and not seen or not heard and not seen or something like that... Anyway, it's a nice big comfy shirt and it's seriously cute! She's thinking of offering them for sale on one of those sites where you can make t-shirts and then people buy them and you get a percentage. I think it's a cool idea, although it's odd that the baby's picture is on my chest when the baby is clearly in the belly (of the beast?). By the way, apparently us Americans are supposed to spell it traveling, but that just looks soooo strange that I prefer the UK way. I'll stick to color and gray, though. And don't even get me started on that silly re/er thing, I mean, come on, it's center. If you spell it centre, it might as well say "sentry..."

Yaakov and I had been planning on going out to dinner, preferably someplace with nice, juicy steaks for me and equally juicy burgers for him... but alas, since between the two of us, we barely managed to do one load of laundry and take the dog out for his walks. we decided that it'd be more prudent to order in. So I had a steak sandwich (which was ok) and he had a burger (which was pretty good) and we both had some wings (which were too spicy), and a whole bunch of people called and wished me a happy birthday, and I rambled incoherently to most of them.

Almost forgot. My neighbor Eliyah (with some help from her mom) made me a really sweet birthday card. On the outside, it says Happy Birthday, and inside there was writing from S., Eliyah's mom, and a picture of the sun that Eliyah drew herself. There was also a lot of writing by Eliyah, but I had a hard time reading it. Often times, I find that it's a little difficult to read a 3-year-old's writing, because it seems that each individual 3-year-old has his or her own writing system. Usually by the time an adult manages to learn to read it, the child has given up the writing system and writes using the boring conventions that we all use.

Now it's Friday, and the chicken and rice are cooking. We're both feeling a little better, but still not great. And most importantly, we made it through a kinda rough week... Shabbat Shalom, all.

And hopes for a good week for everyone next week.