Quarantine??

I know you're probably all tired of listening to me whine and moan about my issues, and even my DH says I'm looking for trouble. So I'm trying to take advice of others to heart, and thank you all for your advice and comments (either through the blog, or emails). L's ear feels fine to him so far, after almost a week of being on cefzil (I think that was the name), but we will take him to the germ factory otherwise known as the clinic to get his ear looked at again on Monday. (And he will be instructed to NOT TOUCH ANYTHING while we're there!)
This weekend I'm hoping to accomplish a lot of my To Do list, providing no one gets sick, that is. And speaking of that, is it weird that I want to encase my family in a giant plastic bubble for the week? All I've heard lately is "this person is sick" or "my friend's kid is sick" or "we were all sick last week" from everyone I talk to as well as friends' postings on Facebook.
Ugh.
To top it off, one of the girls I look after, S, was up all night last night puking, dry heaving and crapping. Oh god. She was here, at my house, ALL DAY yesterday! It totally makes me want to go bleach my whole house. Instead, I'm sitting here blogging about it. Not that I have a choice, I have three kids under 3 today, so it's not like I can leave them unsupervised while I go upstairs and disinfect for the next two hours. But mark my words, I will be doing some of that for sure once they're in bed. Thank god for naptime!!
The three toddlers in question have colds now. I've been wiping their noses all week. I don't know if this is the cold I had the week before, or a new one. I wish there was someway to tell, like some sort of colour-coding to the snot pouring out of their noses.
"Oh I see J has blue snot, that's the same as M and me last week, but C's is purple so that's a different virus."
That would be kinda handy. At least I'd know I was either fairly safe from getting it again or quite likely to get another virus.
So the question is, what next? I seriously want to keep my kids away from all other children and dirty contaminated surfaces for the next week. It makes me want to pull them out of school for the start of next week. But considering they're already going to be missing a week of school already, I'm not so sure I should. Maybe the teachers could send their work home to me? Hmmm... However, I'd also need to close the daycare in order for us to truly be quarantined and that's not going to happen so ingress there's not much point. Only at home, I can nag them more about washing their hands. So, what to do, what to do…

A Little Bitchy Bloggy

Yesterday I was steaming mad. Madder than a one-legged waitress at Ihop.
I have policies in place in regards to illnesses and the children. These policies are to help prevent the spread of illnesses and mostly to stop me from getting sick! These stupid parents don't seem to understand that! If I get sick, I have to CLOSE THE FREAKING DAYCARE!! How hard is that to understand?? So not only are they going to have to care for their own sick child and take time off work for that, but sending them back to daycare earlier than they should is going to cause them to have to take time off work again when I CLOSE THE FREAKING DAYCARE!!
One of my policies is "24 hours diarrhea and vomit FREE". That seems pretty easy to understand, doesn't it? If your child has had diarrhea or vomited in the last 24 hours, then they can't come to daycare! I've read numerous articles that state that even after a person's stomach virus symptoms have resolved, they can still be contagious for several days. Now, I realize I can't ask parents to keep their kids home for several days symptom-free, but I think 24 hours is fair. And there are always those kids that haven't puked for 12 hours, you think they're ok, and then they start all over again. I don't need (or want) that in my house!
So yesterday, parent M drops off her child S and tells me in the morning that she had a quiet weekend, she may have a cough, and that she wasn't herself the day before. When I questioned that last part, did she tell me she had been sick?
No.
She danced around that whole part of her day and told me that she "just wasn't very bouncy or her energetic self".
So she flat-out lied to me.
Because come lunch time and I'm serving the kids grilled cheese sandwiches (just the thing for an upset stomach), and S takes two bites and informs me that her "tummy still a little bit hurts" so she didn't want anymore. I asked her if her tummy hurt yesterday. Yes. I asked if she threw up yesterday. Yes. Twice.
Well.
And here's where I'm a doormat. I wish I had the guts to call her (M) up at work and ream her out. But I thought face-to-face would have been better. But by the time her mother arrived five hours later, my anger had mostly cooled and I wimped out. I had whole speeches prepared in my head! Why oh why didn't I let her have it?!
Because I'm a wuss.
A wimp.
A doormat.
I hate confrontation.
And of course, I'm still angry.
I did question M about the whole thing. Her excuse was that her daddy thought that it was food poisoning, get this.....................
from unwashed celery.
Whatever.
I HIGHLY doubt that. Because seriously, even though I've been lucky to avoid food poisoning (I think), I do know people that have had it, and it ain't pretty. I'm pretty sure you don't just throw up twice and move on. And I'm fairly certain that fevers are usually involved too. Along with terrible stomach cramps and diarrhea.
And considering how stuffed up and nasal S sounded this morning before I dropped her off at her bus stop, I am fairly certain that it was some sort of CONTAGIOUS virus!!
Regardless of that, I just don't understand how selfish people can be. And people that call themselves Christians too! I'm not religious particularly, but I do try to live my life in an honorable and caring way, trying to think of others before myself as a Christian would. But it really gets under my skin when people who flaunt that they are Christian, and baptize their children and make it seem like they're better than you for it, don't even live by the rules their church sets out for them!! Being selfish is a sin, right? Or am I wrong?
This woman will skip off work any old time she pleases for herself because she's "too tired" that day, or she "needs a break".
Seriously? Is that an honorable work ethic?
She doesn't have a stressful job. Not really. She's not a doctor, or lawyer, or police officer, or air traffic controller, or anything else high-stress like that. No one's life depends on her success or failure, she doesn't answer to a tyrant boss, she doesn't even have long shifts.
She's a high school music/drama teacher. Not even a chemistry teacher, where she may be working with volatile chemicals.
Nope.
I don't doubt that her job is important to someone. Probably even many someones. I'm sure that students connect with her in ways that they don't with other teachers. So in that respect is it fair for her to take off a day because she's tired? If students are counting on her, how would that make them feel to know that their teacher can't be bothered to deal with them that day? Nevermind that we, the tax-payers are paying for her salary, and in consequence to her day off, also her replacement's salary.
Now I ask you, is that not a selfish attitude?
I don't take a day off work unless I'm bed-ridden. Literally.
I've worked through many sleep-lacking days, days when I've been nauseous, days when I've had debilitating stomach cramps, days when I've been too dizzy to walk a straight line, days when I've had a broken arm and days with colds so bad I couldn't stop blowing my nose or coughing. Because to me, I think, I'm letting too many people down if I do call in sick and I am still functioning reasonably well. I know I'm part of a much bigger picture here.
Anyway, back to the selfishness. My point is, is that taking time off work for legitimate reasons like you are sick or your kid is sick is fine. We all have to do it.
But thinking only of yourself is not fine. She sent her child here without thought to the other people she was infecting, the other parents who will have to take time off work, the other kids who will be miserable, and last but certainly NOT LEAST, her own child's discomfort!! Why is it ok for her to take a day off work when she feels like having a day off, and not ok to take one when her own daughter is actually sick? I'm sure that S would far rather have been in her own home. That kind of thinking is just backwards to me.