The toddler

The toddler is well! Praise the Lord, as the 3 yr old said!

Imagine purging up to 10 times or more a day and having a bad diaper rash on top of it all! But it is all over, by the grace of God! And the best sign that she's all ok is the return of her appetite! Lol! Dh says she's making up for lost time to regain her chubby cheeks. 2 days of raging high fever and purging for 8 days sure took its toll on her. She lost so much weight.

If anyone is interested, I gave her Nurofen for her fever and lacteofort for the diarrhoea coupled with acidophilus. All these unfortunately had to be forced fed to her with great drama.

Her appetite  was not good so foodwise, she would only eat rice porridge (basically plain white rice boiled with water) and some meat/fish that the rest of us had. She refused to take any crackers or biscuits. The only thing that she looked forward to eating was bananas! I gave her those huge Del Monte ones, not the small local ones. And that actually helped her the most.

Me

I, unfortunately, did not fare well. On the 3rd day of her stomach flu. I had another cough and cold attack. This time I was so congested, I couldn't breathe. And when I tried to breathe through my mouth, it triggered a major coughing bout. I coughed so badly (and I thought the last bout was bad!) that my whole body was in PAIN.

I told dh that if I weren't pregnant, I'd have a lovely abdominal muscles by now! My entire body was tired and painful from the incessant coughing which was worse during the night coz of the post nasal drip.

I took my antihistamines and cough suppressent (when the cough was dry and ticklish). I even put Vicks Vapor Rub on my soles and socks over it as per the myth going round. It worked all of ONE night! So the next night I was back to coughing every 10 minutes or so. I had to sleep sitting up.

I popped my Vitamin C (3 x 1000mg) and garlic pills (3x/day) and prayed and drank lots of warm water and tried very hard not to yell at the kids  After 6 days, I was on the road to recovery! I am still coughing but only occasionally. What a relief!

Obviously, not much work has been done the past week and I have so many articles that I would like to put up on the website but sigh, they're now all on KIV since getting back to homeschooling is priority for now.

Thanks for praying for us! And I pray that the bug stops here!

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Articles for the Christian SAHM can be found at :

www.BuildingUpMoms.com

Posted by Julia Chua

Serene, I am also coughing madly and badly esp at night. I have to sleep on 3 pillows so that I'm inclined. So the garlic supp actually helps? Could you advise which brand or type did you go for? And I assume it's safe to consume during pregnancy TIA!

Posted by MamaLim

Warning!!! I am a believer in supplements so obviously my take on them is biased :)

Garlic and Vit C boost immune system. Sugar and processed foods lower immue system. So I take this combo when down or feeling out of sorts. Some people take echinacea as well but some parts are more effective than others so since I can never remember which is which, I just skip it :)

I am a member of GNC so I stock up on my birthday month or my dad's birthday month :) I don't know if any other brands are as effective since I have not taken them before.

But if you are really daring, you should take garlic au naturel!

All the best to getting rid of the coughing bug!

Edited : Oops I forgot to add that yes, this combo is safe for pregnancy. The tip on overdosage of Vit is to see if you have diarrhoea - that means you are overdosing so cut back till you aren't purging.

BTW you need to know what sort of cough you are having and if it is due to your nose being congested (post nasal drip) or just due to a ticklish cough.

Edited by MamaLim on Nov. 11, 2008 at 3:23 AM