Bamboozled by my own throat

It’s been a very strange, sickly time! I have had strep four times in the last seven weeks. Tyler and Zoe seemed to evade it, healthy as can be, but I’ve been on four rounds of antibiotics and Rowan has had it twice, too. For him, his stomach gets very ill, and then he throws up, gets a fever, and then has the horrible time swallowing. For me, endless weeks of weakness and exhaustion, plus of course the knife in the throat, abated by a floating sort of strength on my first few days of antibiotics, before my system somehow gives up and gets waylaid by strep again.

The last time Rowan had it, I was reading to him in bed as he was writhing in stomach pain, home sick, missing his kindergarten graduation. I said, “I think you need to go try to throw up in the bathroom, Row- -” when he sat up and projectile vomited all over me. It took nearly 6 years, but it finally happened. Stars: they’re just like us!

We’ve replaced toothbrushes, Clorox’d, done all the things. Finally, desperate, I sent Tyler to get swabbed (negative) and took Zoe to get swabbed for strep in case she was a carrier. Her rapid test was negative but two days later the doctor called and said the test had been sent to the lab and it came back POSITIVE. She was a silent strep carrier. The call was coming from inside the house!!!!!

Me getting that call from the doctor

So now we’re all on antibiotics simultaneously, but tomorrow I'll find out if this round of antibiotics is even working or if the strep has now colonized (?!!!!!) in my throat and will need a tonsillectomy. The nurse freaked me out, saying it was the “worst surgery an adult can have” and that it will be “weeks unable to swallow without excruciating pain” (?????). But I’m so wiped that weeks on painkillers in bed with movies and TV and ice cream now sounds like a tropical v-a-c-a-t-i-o-n.

Old me passing a painkiller to new me, post-tonsillectomy

Anyway, I’ve barely been at my desk the last month, just shuffling between doctors appointments, family visits, voiceover recordings, kid ballet rehearsals, hapkido classes, and auditions. I’m supposed to “rest” but unless someone rips a tiny lymph node out of my throat I don’t really have the excuse/reason to put the brakes on everything in my life!!!! I just want to feel WELL again. Our family has had nonstop illness since OCTOBER, starting with the infected pustulent buboe that grew on Tyler’s arm, making him bedridden for days. Coincidentally, that was the last time the sun shone in Los Angeles (I recently read someone describing the sun as having “clocked out” in California and boy does that feel true. I did not move from London for this????? Endless??? Months??? of Grey???????????????").

Me holding my tonsils post-surgery, ready to start my new, energetic life

Anyway, I’ll be back to posting more regularly once the doctor gives me my prognosis tomorrow. Either my missives will be sloppy and goofy, Vicodin-ridden thoughts, or this round of antibiotics will have actually worked for good and I will be well again.

I leave you with a moment that happened to me last week:

Rowan, out of nowhere, in the car, saying “Mommy? You’re my BEST friend. But my penis…is just my normal friend.” I turned around to look at him and was met with the his fully erect penis being waved around the car, pointing at the open window, at me, at the breeze tickling his tiny, beatific face. We’ve finally entered the phallic phase, pholks.

Oh, no….