A pox on you.

So that's Chicken Pox done and dusted. Thing One came home from school with it in December 2008 kindly sharing it with Thing Two who erupted in pox two weeks later suffering infinitely worse. Then a few weeks ago I spotted a suspicious red spot on The Toddler. I though nowt of it, It's not that unusual and yet a small insidious voice inside my head, The Doom Imp, gleefully  hissed 'Haha a pox a pox on your house!' Known to speak paranoid bollocks I reserved my judgement and pretended to ignore the little head Imp despite feeling another spot on The Toddlers back that was somewhat related to a blister. Afterall I'm a hermit, where on earth could he have got it?

Alas it was indeed The Pox and pretty soon The Toddler was all out rocking the spots. I must confess the depth of my shallowness was revealed when my heart went squelch like an over ripe fruit at the appearance of them on his perfect little face as I silently bemoaned 'no, his face, not his face!' Yet the worse effected area by far was that which lurked under his nappy. The poor little sod was covered with the rampant pox, even between his teeny arse cheeks which made for a rather harrowing chore of cleaning him after a dump. Convinced that in conjunction with the warm weather the Pox would fester and go skanky (Yes, that is a technical term) we made the rather brave decision to have nappy free time. This had the rather unexpected effect of The Toddler deciding to ruddy well potty train himself, just like that. In the past week he has had a mere two wet accidents and they were that epic he'd obviously merely forgot. Even his night nappies are suspiciously light of a morn despite still feeding throughout the night.

He was admirably perky and indeed somewhat chipper throughout the whole pox ordeal with only one 'poorly' day and one utterly horrendous night. Phew.

So whilst exercising my google-fu, as one does, I came across a rather absurd practice of pox lollipops. Yes, indeed! How grossly bizarre! Now pox parties are an age old happening (not one I'd ever personally partake in) but to buy and have posted lollipops and tissues used by a child with the Pox in an attempt to infect your own child is a tad macabre even to me. I understand that It's often much less severe to have the Pox as a child then as an adult and many parents are relieved to get it out of the way yet I cannot ethically process deliberately infecting a child to something which although oft minor in the grand scheme of things is still rather uncomfortable and indeed can make a child remarkably poorly and awfully miserable.  So the thought of consciously subjecting a child I profess to adore to this is a hard concept to digest. Not to mention the sheer ick factor, I mean really? A lollipop licked by a stranger? Even the voice of doom is positively shuddering at that.

But yes, he caught it by sheer chance from gods knows where and is now plagued with the last few remaining scabs so Hoorah and all that jazz. Phew. Thank fuck that's the Pox over and done with.