The Sickness
From James Donahue’s Journal
It began when I received a call from the school. Susie’s teacher said our daughter had become very ill and was throwing up. She asked me to take her home. I checked out of the office, drove directly to the school and picked up Susie, then drove her home. Fortunately Doris was not working that day and was available to care for Susie. She was really sick.
I went back to work. That evening, however, I came down with whatever it was that Susie had. I became deathly ill, began sweating, running a fever, and then began vomiting and experiencing extreme bouts of diarrhea, sometimes at the same time. In about the time it would have taken me to drive Susie home from school, Doris also was stricken. This was the worst virus we have ever experienced.
The other children, Aaron and Ayn, both got sick in the night, also in about the time from the moment they got off the bus and walked in the house that afternoon, until the virus hit them. I think Jennifer was on the way then, but was not yet born so she missed the fun. That is unless babies in the womb also are hit by terrible illness when their mothers are sick.
We were too sick to do more than move from the bed to our bathroom and then back to bed. The illness lasted for two or three days. With only one bathroom in the house it was a trick getting lined up at that door in time to avoid vomiting on the floor. I actually saw some humor in the way there was constant traffic by all five of us to and from that room with the only toilet in the house.
Doris, always watching over our medical needs, realized that we were getting dehydrated since we could not hold down even a glass of water during this terrible time. She got us chipped ice from the refrigerator to sip on, which helped. Finally, when she stopped throwing up, and Aaron began showing signs of improvement, she crawled out of bed, got dressed, and drove Aaron to a party store just down the road from where we lived. They brought back some large cold bottles of Vernor’s Ginger Ale and Seven-Up, and we all started drinking this in small sips.
By the next day we were all on the mend, and soon back to normal. As I said, this was the worst bout of influenza we as a family have ever experienced. We had no idea what it was, but it ripped through our home like lightning and for a while, I thought it might kill us all. I never heard what happened at the school where it all began.
From James Donahue’s Journal
It began when I received a call from the school. Susie’s teacher said our daughter had become very ill and was throwing up. She asked me to take her home. I checked out of the office, drove directly to the school and picked up Susie, then drove her home. Fortunately Doris was not working that day and was available to care for Susie. She was really sick.
I went back to work. That evening, however, I came down with whatever it was that Susie had. I became deathly ill, began sweating, running a fever, and then began vomiting and experiencing extreme bouts of diarrhea, sometimes at the same time. In about the time it would have taken me to drive Susie home from school, Doris also was stricken. This was the worst virus we have ever experienced.
The other children, Aaron and Ayn, both got sick in the night, also in about the time from the moment they got off the bus and walked in the house that afternoon, until the virus hit them. I think Jennifer was on the way then, but was not yet born so she missed the fun. That is unless babies in the womb also are hit by terrible illness when their mothers are sick.
We were too sick to do more than move from the bed to our bathroom and then back to bed. The illness lasted for two or three days. With only one bathroom in the house it was a trick getting lined up at that door in time to avoid vomiting on the floor. I actually saw some humor in the way there was constant traffic by all five of us to and from that room with the only toilet in the house.
Doris, always watching over our medical needs, realized that we were getting dehydrated since we could not hold down even a glass of water during this terrible time. She got us chipped ice from the refrigerator to sip on, which helped. Finally, when she stopped throwing up, and Aaron began showing signs of improvement, she crawled out of bed, got dressed, and drove Aaron to a party store just down the road from where we lived. They brought back some large cold bottles of Vernor’s Ginger Ale and Seven-Up, and we all started drinking this in small sips.
By the next day we were all on the mend, and soon back to normal. As I said, this was the worst bout of influenza we as a family have ever experienced. We had no idea what it was, but it ripped through our home like lightning and for a while, I thought it might kill us all. I never heard what happened at the school where it all began.