Scenes from a pandemic

Dawn Morrison's daughter Liv with the contentious Yoshis.

I just broke up a fight between enraged twins. They were fighting over stuffed animals—Yoshis—that one of them tied together with a skipping rope. When I got to the basement, they were pulling on the rope like a tug of war, and trying to rain blows on each other at the same time. All of us were yelling, in between hacking coughs. Fed up, I threw the whole works into a closet, which caused Max to burst into tears. "Yoshis are in prison!!" he cries.

This is the face of H1N1 in our house.

We have been sick since last Saturday, and the doctor said we are contagious for seven days. Now that the initial heart-stopping fear of the dreaded H1N1 has passed, we are now bored and miserable. The kids are well enough to torment each other, and me, but that's about it. They're still too sick to go to school, go outside and play or go anywhere for that matter. As for me, I miss the outside world. Shack-wacky doesn't even begin to describe it.

I know we are extremely lucky and there is a lot to be thankful for. Some families have lost loved ones to this, and for them, the statistics don't matter.

For most of us though, I think I have to agree with my doctor: It's just the flu. It's a different strain of the flu, but it's just the flu.

I posted an article from The Globe and Mail earlier this week from a woman who said her 10 month old got H1N1 and she was relieved. I know what she feels like.

I'm not happy that we have it—it is a truly miserable illness. But now that we do, I no longer feel the H1N1 hysteria caused by mixed messages from the media. "It's a very mild flu for most Canadians," the messages say. "But then again, you could DIE!"

We spent a few days zonked out on the couch "without the strength of an aspirin," as my grandmother would say. Max's fever was worrisome, but it started coming down yesterday, just as the doctor said. The cough is really terrible and keeping us up at night, but that too should start to go away. We've been through every Disney movie in the house (twice) and the kids are officially sick of all electronic devices. There are only so many crafts you can do at the kitchen table.

I just gave Max his Yoshis back and the kids are quiet for the moment. If I can just keep them from flailing at each other till Saturday, I can say we truly survived H1N1 '09.

Dawn Morrison, with Dalhousie's Communications and Marketing Office and the mother of eight-year-old twins, edited the Dal website, www.flu.dal.ca, before calling in sick.