Wide Awake . . .

I HATE not being able to sleep!

I have been lying in bad for the last 30 minutes WIDE awake. It's 3:45 AM people! No, it's not because I get so much sleep that my body doesn't need any more sleep. No, I think I could go to bed at 7 most every night. Why am I wide awake you ask? Well it all started almost 2 weeks ago. Our friend  Vince took some family photos of us in this great field by a local lake. Well, I consider myself a pretty outdoorsy girl. I know my poison ivy and oak and know what to stay away from. This field looked completely harmless. Boy was I wrong. On Monday (2 weeks ago) Shane and I both broke out in these horrible rashes. Apparently some prairie grasses are sister plants to poison ivy and cause the same HORRIBLE, itchy rash that poison ivy does. We went to the doctor on Tuesday just to make sure it was in fact poison ivy . . . it was. At this point Shane had it WAY worse. It was covering his entire neck. I only had a small patch. And THANKFULLY Hayden had nothing. Apparently children have to be exposed several times before they show any reaction. THANK GOODNESS! Because I do not know if I could handle  an itchy 1 year old. Well life went on. I put up a good fight for a few days just using topical creams. Shane was put on a steroid right away and started to improve. I on the other hand kept getting worse and worse. Eventually, my entire neck (front and back), part of my chest and my hands were covered with an itchy, blistery (yes blistery), bright red rash. My kids would come into school every morning and tell me how my neck looked worse. Thank you children for pointing out what I promise you I was feeling. Well, I had reached my point of being patient. I would wake up every morning (after a restless night of itching) and hope that today was the day it would be better. Finally, I called my doctor and said, "HELP!". They put me on a mild steroid, but it did NOTHING! After 6 days of waiting for it to work, I had to go to the doctor for my 6 month melanoma check up and my doctor saw how horrible I looked and put me on a stronger steroid, that I have to take for 21 days. Yes, that was not a type-o . . . 21 days! I guess poison ivy can stay in your blood stream for 3 weeks! This stuff is NOT to joke with. Well I started it yesterday and they warn you to take it by noon, because it makes you jittery and stay awake. I followed orders, even though I figured I would be fine. I took this same steroid all through college for injuries and let's be honest, I'm a working mom with a 1 year old. . . I'm EXHAUSTED! Not much keeps me awake. Well here I lay, wide awake at 4 am with no hope in sight of falling asleep. With a runny nose (yes I also caught a cold this week) and I know Hayden is going to wake up in an hour because that would just fit how my life has been the last 2 weeks. Like I told me sister yesterday, "I'm just a hot mess!". Here's to hoping my body becomes accustomed to this medicine and I'm not wide awake at 4 am every day, or this could be a LONG month. I look back at this and laugh someday right? Let's hope so!