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January has been an excruciating slog.
Starting Christmas Eve, both Royal and Graham incurred hand-foot-and-mouth. Then we had less than a week of semi-wellness before they both developed new coughs and runny noses that have lasted to this present hour.
Royal’s sleep has been hit-or-miss, and the combination of sickness and sleeplessness has made him the crabbiest toddler-terrorist I’ve ever witnessed. He’s hit, bitten and slapped Graham and Amie, thrown full cups of hot chocolate on the kitchen floor, and cried incessantly for hours with no means of satisfaction.
Royal: “I wan dis!” (translation: I want this. Pointing to a cup)
Amie: “Ok, here you go” (hands Royal the cup)
Royal: “No!!!” (Takes the the cup and throws it violently at Amie, hurting her foot and shooting milk across the floor. Then throws himself on the ground and wails for an hour).
(Pause for five minutes, then start over)
Graham and Royal have scarcely been at school, either because their classroom was closed by DHS or because we were waiting for a negative PCR COVID test. And we’ve been waiting for negative PCR COVID tests every week. So the biting and screaming scenarios happen on every day and at every moment that one of us looks away from them for longer than ~30~ ~15~ ~5~ 2 seconds.
The “respite” in all of it was that one week, Graham was home and Royal was at school, then they swapped places the next week. There was more peace the few hours they were away from each other, but it kicked up the minute we brought them home. And Amie, although she enjoyed the one-on-one time with them both, was unable to accomplish anything she set out to do because of their constant interruption.
That’s all horrible by itself, but each day there’s something more.
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We’re getting medical bills because our doctor thinks we have an insurance carrier we’ve never heard of and can’t bill our actual carrier until we’ve confirmed the correct insurance (again).
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I open the refrigerator for the tenth time today, only this time a glass drops from the top shelf and shatters across our kitchen. Immediately, Graham wants to see and loses it when he’s warned that he can’t go in the kitchen until we’ve cleaned up the shards.
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Graham’s PCR COVID test is negative, but there’s no means to deliver this news to his school except to drive forty minutes to the office, pick up a printed copy of the results, and physically deliver them to the school.
Oh yeah, and Graham takes hour-long naps at school and can’t sleep until 9:00 p.m.
I could go on. Anyways, yeah, it’s been “hard”.