What do you do when you get sick in a foreign country and your husband is away on business and no, you do not have live-in help (or any regular help for that matter, aside from a house cleaner on Fridays)?
You give the kids the run of the place and hide in your bedroom. You hope they watch only their movies (I'm pretty sure I put all those DVDs of The Wire back on the high shelf) and that they don't go blind (and dumb) from too many hours playing Super Mario on the Nintendo DS. You emerge from your room only to make them microwave popcorn for lunch and to demand that they put the furniture back the way it was. Later, you call your lovely downstairs neighbor, the mother of a darling 3-year-old girl whom you've only just met, and ask if you can send them down for supper, and you shoo them out the door with two frozen pizzas.
With the kids finally under competent adult supervision, you walk to the corner, hail a taxi, and tell the driver in your poorly-accented Japanese the address of the internist down the road, the one who speaks English, whose name you got by calling the international medical information hotline, the one listed in Tokyo: Here and How, the $45 tome all the other ex-pats convinced you to buy, but that you only now appreciate.
The doctor tells you that you've got viral gastroenteritis, gives you a shot and sends you home with some pills and says don't eat for two more days, just take a few sips of water now and then.
I better at least lose a few pounds in this deal...
1 comment:
Ooooh poor Maryanne! I feel for you. Being sick as a single parent is the WORST. I had a stomach bug yesterday. (It started at work. While I was in a dress, trying not to puke on it. Good times) When I got home I let Nicholas watch about 5 hours of "Caillou." I vowed never to let him watch that stupid bald-headed whiner but here I was, breaking that promise. I am glad you found the lady downstairs. What a relief. And I AM much skinnier today!
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