Coughing and Other Stuff

My son gets this cough every so often which really sounds bad and he has been coughing for the past few nights. Last night I gave him some cough medicine before his bedtime and he took the cough medicine without any problem but 10 seconds later threw it back up!! He not only threw the cough medicine back up back but also part of his dinner (I really don't need to go into to details because no one wants to read them!!). I can see spitting out the cough medicine because it was in his stomach for all of ten seconds but to have other "stuff" come out is truly unbelievable. The good part in all of this is that it happened in the bathroom and he appeared fine after the incident. Children are amazing and the things they do both physically and mentally are truly astonishing. I am going to miss these things tremendously.

My son was tucked into to bed and about an hour later my wife and I were downstairs heard him coughing. He has a tendency to cough so much that he throws up (sorry about the disgusting nature of the blog tonight!) and even though he had thrown up an hour earlier as my wife went to check on him he had thrown up even more. No, it wasn't a stomach virus or food poisoning it was his cough.

I don't know what causes him to do this but my wife and I are very weary when he gets this cough. Unfortunately this time he wasn't in the bathroom but his bedroom and let's just say it wasn't very pretty!! My wife took him to the doctor this afternoon and the doctor said it was allergies and gave us some allergy medicine (in a pill form, whew!!) and said he should be fine in a few days. No one seems to know how the cough causes the "other" reaction but it happens and the remarkable thing is after my son does his "stuff" he is fine. The resiliencey children have is astonishing.

Yes, there was another story today about someone who embezzled and lost all the money gambling. This one happened in Virginia and you can read more about the story here. This man was fifty years old and like I wrote yesterday the gambling addiction takes no prisoners and makes prisoners of those (like myself) who have the unbelievable desire to make the next wager. I now know it doesn't have to be this way and like the gentleman from yesterday's story I hope this man is getting help because even though life for him seems to have stopped it will get better.

Last night I was able to speak with three people who have been newly affected by the disease of compulsive gambling. Two of them were the compulsive gambler and one was the spouse of the compulsive gambler. After to speaking to all of them I felt good about each of the conversations. The hardest one was speaking with the spouse of the compulsive gambler because what we as compulsive gamblers do to our loved ones is horrendous and it is very hard for anyone to understand how we could do this.

I tried my best and the fact that the spouse of the compulsive gambler wanted more information about the disease was very encouraging because more times than not the spouse leaves. No one could blame the spouse for leaving like no one could blame my wife if she left me. The toughest thing for the spouse of the compulsive gambler is to stay because life changes significantly. I assured this person as long as the spouse was working the Gamblers Anonymous Program and safeguards had been put in place to assure there were no more surprises life will get better. It won't get better overnight but it will get better in the long run.

Most spouses or friends who have been affected by compulsive gambling or even some compulsive gamblers think there is a quick fix and unfortunately this is NOT the case. There is no quick fix it is a life long journey with no finish line. Each day that the compulsive gambler does not gamble is a good day for everyone. It is so hard for some people to understand this concept and I know I was one of them for a very long time. I know I will have this disease with me for the rest of my life but if I continue doing the things that I have done in the past ten months life will continue to get better each and every day.