Quarantined!

For those who have not heard the latest hurdle we are facing, it is boils. A few weeks back Ellie had one, and so did two members of the Leonard family. We went to the lab and had them analyzed and it was determined to be MRSA staph boils. Poor Michelle has been fighting them forever, I think she has had seven. Ellie has had three now, and Kevin and I have had one. They are quite painful, sometimes bringing nausea along with all of the swelling and pressure. Kevin has one the size of a lemon.

Michelle found a pharmacy here that has the right kind of antibiotic to fight MRSA, so we are all on it right now. She has taught me the ways of vigorous hand washing with special hand cleaner. We have to rid ourselves of this, it will not just go away on its own.

Pastor Mike told us today that our familly is officially quarantined! He made an executive decision for our own good. Today we got our antibiotics to begin. They last for six days.

I woke this morning with great plans of disinfecting every inch of our house. I contemplated making the kids soak in bleach water, (just kidding). However, early this morning I woke to my backdoor and entire living room floor covered in ants. On Tuesday I found a whole nest of them in my laundry. 126 made it through the washing machine. I know, because I counted them as I pulled them off the clothes I was hanging on the line. Here we go again, sigh. Our spray ran out a couple of days ago, so I had no ant killer. I have been killing ants all day, literally. Since we were out of spray I decided I would just vacuum them. They were coming in faster than I could get them up. It was crazy.

Now remember, everything in Belize bites. Letting them just come on in and getting comfortable was not an option. I poured salt across the stoop where they were coming in, (someone told me that might work), they crawled right over top of the salt. Then Ellie spilled something as I was vacuuming ants out of the kitchen (where they had decided to visit)...now I had ants, salt, and salt water to clean up. It wasn't even 8am. I knew then this was going to be a long day.

I finally decided to try hot sauce. So I poured hot sauce on the stoop...they didn't cross it. They did however come through the door frame, where the wood had separated from the concrete. Great. So I found the caulking gun. Couldn't be too hard to use right? Well, I figured it out, and I have globs of white stuff all around my door to prove my efforts. I'm hoping it will really "dry clear" like it says on the outside of the tube. I know this is hard to imagine, but I was vacuuming non-stop and it wasn't enough. I would stop long enough to take out the bagless container and have the boys run and empty it way in the back by the trash cans.

We went to town at one point to get the medicine for the boils, when we got home, the ants were all over again. Now though, I had to make dinner. Sigh. I never did get anything disinfected. No germ free house. No clean door knobs and MRSA free light switches. There were germs still lurking all around me, and ants as well!!

Michelle had told me earlier in the day of a visit her and Pastor Mike had made in a village. The woman had to walk 3 miles to get to the bus station to ride to work. She had no running water, no electric, but she was happy. Michelle told me her home was so peaceful. This lady cooked over a fire, and invited Michelle to come up so she could show her how to cook over a fire too. Michelle told me seeing her really put things into perspective for her.

I realized, she probably deals with ants too. I wonder what she does? I'm sure she sprays them, so did we and they just come back. I'm sure she doesn't have a vacuum with no electricity. So does she sweep them all the time? I was not joyful today killing ants all day long. I was annoyed that I couldn't get them to stay out. How come this woman had more joy than I did? We are probably in the same situation with the little invaders, and I have more power to rid my home of the nuisance than she does...yet my attitude was short, I was annoyed and frustrated, greatly lacking in any type of joy whatsoever. Perhaps God sent me the ants to show me how rotten my attitude really was, and how thankful I should be.