The Illness Stakes

[lathany]

Last Wednesday, at work, I received an email from bateleur informing me that I may need to be at home on the Thursday because the duo were ill and he seemed to be coming down with it. Thursday morning he was OK, so I went into the office, but I came back that evening to find him exhausted on the sofa with half the lights out. I stayed home on Friday to look after the others and consequently had the grimmest weekend that either bateleur and I can recall because the duo were just well enough to be upset and grumpy about being ill (earlier in the week they'd been quiet or asleep). Come Sunday, I was obviously coming down with it myself but, fortunately, bateleur was getting better so we shared childcare across the day. I was off work yesterday and I'm off again today.

However, I'm already feeling an awful lot better and, unless I have a big relapse, I'll be in work tomorrow no problem. However bateleur still hasn't full recovered and only Ryan is back at nursery (he went back today). Now Ryan was off all last week (although we think it was something different at the start and that he caught this on Thursday), Bea has been off since Wednesday and bateleur since Friday. That means at least seven days for Bea, five for Ryan and five for bateleur all compared to my (likely) three days. Plus bateleur's worst day involved lying in a heap in a dark room with the strongest "over the counter" painkillers whilst mine involved me reading or sitting in front of the computer with a couple of ibuprofen. Not to mention that he completely lost his appetite whilst mine just took a small dent.

Do I have a better immune system? Do I have a better day-to-day lifestyle (surely not, bateleur eats the same, but with more salad, and walks the kids to nursery)? Is it just this particular illness that I've shrugged off quickly? And, as far as meals go, am I just greedier?! Maybe I'm lucky. Maybe I should be touching wood about not having a relapse. But I've noticed this more and more since we've had the twins. I get something and shrug it off quickly (a couple of twenty-four hour bugs and the odd cold); whereas bateleur tends to be ill more often and usually for longer.

When I went down with pneumonia back in the spring of 2000, a colleague (who often commented on health issues - he's married to a doctor) remarked that now I was about to turn thirty, I should expect to find that illnesses knocked me out more. However, apart from that one time (which was technically when I was in my twenties), this hasn't been the case. But am I the exception or is bateleur?

Comments

[cardinalsin.livejournal.com]

I seem to get ill less than frax, again without apparent rhyme or reason. I think it's probably because we're harder than them. ;)

[lathany.livejournal.com]

:-)

[cardinalsin.livejournal.com]

No sooner have I said this, than frax has gone down with... something. More news when we've worked out what it is.

[lathany.livejournal.com]

She has my sympathy. Is she still at work or has she gone home?

[cardinalsin.livejournal.com]

She's by now (I hope) on her way home, from Wolverhampton. 'tis a bad day to be ill.

[lathany.livejournal.com]

Yuck! A long journey is unlikely to help things along.

[killalla]

Maybe you've got better immunity, as you've been exposed to more stuff, seeing as you were primary caretaker for the twins for the past few years? Of course this would only work if your immunity has improved over the last few years, and possibly if it gets worse now that you're back in an office. But it's a thought.

[lathany.livejournal.com]

Possibly. Although I'd have expected to be exposed to more stuff through London public transport and the office air-conditioning than through being at home with the twins (plus the weekly small groups of playgroup and parent and toddler group).

[undyingking.livejournal.com]

I think I recently heard of research that found that women in general have stronger immune systems than men. (This may also explains why they are more prone to auto-immune diseases.)

[lathany.livejournal.com]

Explains me, but not cardinalsin. Although that's not exactly a large sample size.

[undyingking.livejournal.com]

And he may well be a freak of nature ;-)

[cardinalsin.livejournal.com]

Yes yes, never mind that - what about my immune system? ;o)

[ao-lai.livejournal.com]

It's the sort of thing that sounds reasonable...

Yet just to confuse things, despite my otherwise poor health, mundane things like ordinary diseases seem to bounce off me with little to no actual effect, touching wood of course. (Or maybe I'm just good at ignoring them...) My sister, on the other hand, is constantly anaemic and comes down hard with stuff all the time. (But then she does work in a hospital...)

[lathany.livejournal.com]

So the doctor career worked out for her then? Or did your parents stop paying for her consecutive PhDs?!

[ao-lai.livejournal.com]

Yes, she did finish it, and is now working in Bath (I think). The second Doctorate seems to have taken... :)

[bateleur.livejournal.com]

You're not being fair to the budding scientists on your friends' list here. Missing data: Prior to about 2000 or so, I had better resistance to illness than you did (or, indeed, than almost anyone).