Flu Season

The hype around flu season this year is no exaggeration, at least if my family and acquaintances are any indication.  My wife got the flu shot this past fall.  No help - earlier this month she got the flu.

I again did not get a flu shot this season.  I haven't had a full-blown flu since my first year in law school, ten years ago, a flu which knocked me out for a week and got my WRAP (Writing, Representing, and Presenting) professor a little anxious as he awaited the completion of one of my longer writing assignments. I can typically work sick, but not that week.

I should say I hadn't had the full-blown flu since then. My wife says I have a great immune system.  I admit it's better than hers, and I used to think it was pretty great, but not only do I seem to catch something at least once/year now, albeit typically small and short-lived, I also got the full-blown flu this year.  Apparently I'm not quite the antibody host I perhaps once was. I've also heard that this is a different strand, which might explain why she got it despite getting the shot, and why I couldn't fight it as well as I've become accustomed to.

Certainly I was being foolish thinking I could get by sharing the bed with my sick wife.  Last time I picked up flu-like symptoms, they lasted about 24 hours.  This one began two days after she got it, and it lasted about six full days.

So then, my 7-year old comes into our bed yesterday morning with a fever.  Oh-oh.  Thankfully, it seems to have been short-lived, as it was gone, and without medicine, by early this afternoon.  Perhaps he has an immune system superior to mine.

Hopefully, so does his 5-year-old brother, with whom he shared the same bed the couple of days prior to him getting the fever.  They like to do that every now and then.  The little one is the only one in the household to date who hasn't caught it. Of course my concern first and foremost is for his health, but it is also concerning that my wife and I have used up almost all of our sick time for 2013, and we've only just finished the first month.