Shig-a-what?

We've been getting the lab results back over the last couple of weeks.
Most everything came back negative except for Kidus testing positive for Hep A. Weird how it was just him and not Biruk too. Thankfully, Hep A is unlike the other Heps in that there are no long term affects and once you recover from it you're immune for life.
The positive result wasn't any huge surprise since it's not uncommon for kids from Ethiopia to come home with it. We were planning on them being positive and had gotten immunizations for Jerry and the older boys since they were the ones traveling.

We debated about getting the rest of us immunized against it and finally decided that it's better to be safe than sorry. Yes, it doesn't leave lasting damage, but it's not a pretty virus either.

Unfortunately, our actions weren't as good as our intentions.
We never did make it in to the doctor before the twins came home.
It was pretty scary a couple of weeks when we became so sick and found out about the positive test. A lot of our symptoms matched Hep A (although there never was any jaundice) and I was pretty worried.
We made appointments and went in for lab work.

It was a relief to find out last week that the Hep A results came back negative. (and yes, everyone is immunized now!)

Still, I knew what ever we had had was SOMETHING...it was too acute to have been a regular flu virus.

Yesterday I got a call from Mikayla's pediatrician and she said that the results were back from her stool samples and that she had tested positive for something called Shigella.

Huh?

I like to think of myself as being pretty informed in the field of any and all potentially lurking viruses and nasty bacterias that might someday infect one of my precious babies. I spend quite a bit of time lying awake at night worrying about them and scan headlines for any new ones that pop up around the world.
This one caught me unaware though.

Apparently Shigella is a bacteria, a major cause of diarrhea and dysentery (diarrhea with blood and mucus) throughout the world and is transmitted through food or water or person to person contact. (you know, the trusty old fecal-oral contamination route- not a pleasant thought)
It's not an uncommon bacteria here, in the U.S...it's usually passed around in day-care settings, nursing homes, etc...

I have no doubt as to the source of contamination in our case since both Kidus and Biruk had diarrhea when Jerry got them and we haven't been anywhere but home the first several weeks.
It didn't show up on their labs because they must have been over it by the time we did the cultures.
We tried to be so careful, wiping down toilets and anything else the boys touched, washing our hands and theirs constantly, but these are little boys we are talking about.
Kidus is fully potty trained and once he figured out how toilets work you couldn't keep him out of them. Biruk is mostly potty trained, but he has had a few poop-in-the-pants-and-down-his-leg episodes.
Somehow Mikayla was exposed and the rest of us who got sick must have caught it from her.

If I never see it again it would still be too soon; that was one monster bacteria!

When the pediatrician was spelling the name Shigella out for me I mistakenly wrote down a 't' instead of a 'g'.
I blushed when I realized my error because I never use language like that, but I have to admit that in the case of this illness the name would be appropriately fitting!