52 Weeks of Personal Genealogy, Week 11 - Illness and Injury

Week 11: Illness and Injury. Describe your childhood illnesses or injuries. Who took care of you? Did you recuperate in your own bed, on the couch in front of the television, or somewhere else?

This challenge runs from Saturday, March 12, 2011 through Friday, March 18, 2011.

I was rarely ever sick as a child. I never had any of the usual childhood diseases for my era. You read that right, no chickenpox, no measles, and no mumps. Even when mom thought I had finally contracted chickenpox or measles in junior high, it turned out not to be the case. To this day, I've not experienced the delight of those childhood diseases, and I definitely don't want to experience them at this point in my life.

While I rarely ever got sick, whenever I did it tended to be weird stuff. First there was the aforementioned time that mom thought I had the measles or chickenpox. That episode was one of the few times I got to stay home from school due to illness. You see as only the second generation that really had a chance for education and with both of my parents being teachers, I didn't get to stay home for any and every little thing and I have the perfect attendance awards to prove it.

Back to the suspected measles or chickenpox. After two days of being home and feeling like my head was going to explode with every move I made, mom finally hauled me off to the doctor. The verdict was we don't know what it is but it's definitely not the measles or chickenpox. In college, I would have a similar episode minus the pounding headache and again, it wasn't measles, chicken pox, or the shingles, which my best friend and roommate thought it was. Years later I learned since I had never had chicken pox, there was no way it could have been shingles.

What other strange things have happened? Constipation. Yes, that's another you read that right. Constipation in an of itself isn't terribly bad except in my case, I had two episodes in my young life (elementary school) that if the folks hadn't called the doctor, I probably wouldn't be here now to tell you about them. The first episode was the worst. None of the usual remedies (enemas, laxatives, prune juice, Castor Oil) worked. The main thing I remember is being in my bed for days, not wanting to eat, and whenever I did it would just come right back up. After about two days of this, my parents were worried and for some reason I remember dad being more worried than mom. My doctor basically lived at the end of our street and came almost as soon as mom called. Without being graphic, let's just say that the blockage was removed with my doctor's assistance. He told my folks that it was a good thing they called when they did and that none of the usual things would have ever worked. After my second near fatal episode, I was sent to the hospital for x-rays to see if there was anything wrong. My doctor told the folks there was nothing wrong and that I was just being lazy. How dare he? Anyway just in case (I think my doctor was already tired of removing the blockages), I was put on a prescription for the problem for the remainder of elementary school years after which I never endured another episode of near fatal constipation. As added precaution, mom also made sure I had a tablespoon of Castor Oil each morning as well as a glass of prune juice each day.

Outside of my usual bouts with colds and the accompanying bronchitis, which I still have to deal with, there were no other serious illnesses that I remember from my childhood.

As far as injuries, I had the usual dings and scrapes that come with being a child but nothing like broken bones. I think the worst was when I jammed my thumb when daddy was trying to teach me how to roller skate.

So there you have it, an almost idealistic childhood from an illness and injury standpoint.

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52 Weeks of Personal Genealogy is hosted by Geneabloggers and was created by Amy Coffin of The We Tree Genealogy Blog.