One flu over this cuckoo's nest (well, three)

So as I think I mentioned previously, my kids are sick. The youngest one sounds like a chain-smoking gangster from a Godfather movie, and the older two have fevers, coughs, sore throats, the whole shebang.

Well, it started with my daughter last week, and she hasn't really made much improvement over the past several days, and now that both boys are sick too, I decided to take them all in to the clinic to get them checked out and make sure it wasn't anything more serious. You know, better safe than sorry, all that hoopla.

But here's the thing.

I hate the clinic. With a capital H.

The clinic is, in and of itself, a vector for disease.

You go there with a simple ear infection or whatever, and end up leaving with swine flu, avian flu, appendicitis, an ingrown toenail, and split ends.

It's like the intersection of every single illness in your entire county.

In short, it's just gross.

But what do you do? Avoid it and risk your kids getting worse? It becomes a calculated risk. Severity of current illness + odds of catching something new/worse + risk of current illness becoming bad enough to warrant medical attention later on anyway = clinic or no clinic.

Given the severity of this year's flu season, the ages of my children, and my propensity for hypochondriac-ism for said children... well, I decided it was worth it.

And it wasn't that bad. We were in and out in a decent amount of time (and several pumps of hand sanitizer later) with no ridiculous wait times or shuffling between rooms. I think when you make a single appointment for three sick children, they get that you aren't messing around.

I'm a donkey on the edge!

(Shrek quote, go with it)

So my kids have the flu. Mildly so far, and their lungs are clear, which relieved a lot of my panic when the word influenza was initially uttered. Bed rest, fluids, lots of Disney movies and boredom.

But now I'm on the lookout for swine flu, pneumonia, sinus infections, and especially those damned ingrown toenails. Pretty sure they're contagious too, no?

And I already seem to have caught the split ends...