The post where I tell you about Hell and how I visited there for a spell

Buckle your seatbelts, friends. I am fixin' to tell you the story of our hellish journey to Asia. But first I'd like to send a shout-out to our sponsors, who made this horrific story possible:

-- the US Army (and its BFF- Budget Cuts)
-- MRSA
-- children
-- layovers

Now that we've got the official business out of the way, let's begin.

It all started when we got kicked out of housing early Friday morning. My children were running around with blackened feet, courtesy of my floors that I had no intentions of mopping post-movers, and I was running around like a chicken with my head cut off trying to tidy up the place and make it appear that I actually cleaned it. The clearing inspection on our house went like this:

((housing lady getting out of her car and approaching my house))

I run with two wet paper towels to the sticky mess I just found in the laundry room and frantically scrub the floor as she's ringing the doorbell.

**ding dong**   scrub, scrub, scrub!

(side note: She's TEN MINUTES EARLY. When every second counts, this is killing me.)

She comes inside and comments that we still have things to take out of the house. As we throw all of our last minute belongings out into the front yard, she inspects the rest of the house. This takes all of five minutes. She comes back downstairs and we wait to hear what all she is going to charge us for. Holding onto the counter, and gripping baby thighs like the Death Drop roller coaster handle, we listen as she says, "Y'all have really kept this place up nicely! When did the movers leave?"

Struggling to comprehend her brand of humor, we mutter "yesterday."

"Really! You would never know movers were here by how clean your house is."

Well lady, don't go taking off your shoes or looking at my kids' feet because you will be so disappointed in your inspection skillz.

We got out of there quickly (before she realized her mistakes) and dumped the kids at Vickie's house while we ran a bunch of last-minute errands. (Side note- we really miss this part about living at Ft Campbell.)

We spent Friday night in lodging on post. Saturday morning (after many painful/tearful goodbyes), we got on the road and headed for Atlanta. We arrived in Atlanta eventually, but not before we got stuck in miles of traffic in a storm. Don't worry people, THE FUN ONLY CONTINUES.

We got a hotel near the airport and visited with both of my grandparents. On Monday morning, we checked out of our hotel and made our way towards the car drop-off area. It wasn't at the airport of course, so my awesome hotel-next-to-the-runway find was kinda for nothing. We hung out at this car place for a few days (kidding- only a few hours) and then took a taxi van to the airport. Our flight didn't leave until 10pm. We arrived at the airport at 2pm. After going through security and finding our gate (which wouldn't be ours until many many MANY HOURS later), we decided we'd go to the USO. Which was located outside of security, naturally. After we drove everyone inside the USO absolutely bonkers and drank a sufficient amount of their coffee, we ventured back through security and on to our gate. The plane was delayed of course and we waited some more. But at least I didn't have the only screaming kids there. (Bonus.)

We got on the plane finally and headed to Seattle. The kids slept a bit on this flight and overall it was easy. We got off in Seattle and met up with the fabulous Lauren! How sweet is she to drive all the way from Portland to see us?! And she brought so many goodies and didn't seem all that disturbed that my children were acting like beasts and I appeared to be on drugs. (I wasn't, but that would have been nice.) We arrived in Seattle around 1am and our next flight to Korea didn't depart until around 8:30am. You might be wondering who constructed such a f*cked up travel schedule for us, and that is where I really must extend a huge thank you to our first sponsor, the US Army. (We were told, however, that if we had pets, we would be able to get a direct flight. Which, I'm sorry, NO SENSE DOES THAT MAKE. And yes, I considered adopting a cat or hamster or something just to get the direct flight.) It was around this time in Seattle that I noticed Molly was getting unusually hot. Like feverish hot. I searched every bag and could NOT find my thermometer, but luckily had remembered to pack infant ibuprofen and tylenol. So I started alternating those in hopes that her fever would go down. I figured she had an ear infection and was just generally tired from the random bits of sleep she was getting.

Eventually we had to say goodbye to Lauren and the US and boarded our flight to Korea. Which was actually a flight to Japan, but you get the idea. We were headed in that general direction. Both kids konked out before they even cranked the plane and I posted a picture to Instagram and Steve and I high-fived each other because clearly we are the most awesome parents ever and this was actually going to work out. Except we should know by now what horrible luck it is to ever think you have it figured out, and an hour later (AN HOUR, PEOPLE), they were both up, screaming, crying, and Molly's fever was back. I kept alternating medicine and I know I was getting the judge-y eyes from everyone because they had no clue she was sick, they just kept witnessing me pumping her full of medicine. Her constant screaming was also very endearing. She laid on me nonstop. And if I somehow convinced her to sleep in her carseat for a minute, Sam needed to lay on me. No meals were had and I feel like we missed every single opportunity for a drink. By the time we landed in Japan, we are all tired, starving, dehydrated, and Molly was still sweating from a high fever. SO MUCH FUN, YOU GUYS.

I asked about medical care for Molly in Japan. They said our only option was to go to their ER, but by the time we would be seen, we would definitely miss our connecting flight to Korea. So we waited in the terminal. And for reference, this was not an airport in Japan. It was a flight line on one of the bases and we just walked straight off the plane, across the runway, and into a half-air-conditioned building with chairs. Then they (ever so slowly) refueled the plane and allowed us back on (two hours later). Molly still sick, Sam still not sleeping, and Steve and I at our wits end.

We finally land in Korea. AMEN AND HALLELUJAH. My grand plan was to get checked in to our room on base, give Molly a cold bath, and get her checked out at the local hospital the next morning. Naturally our platinum sponsor has a way of ruining my grand plans.

We were immediately (in a hurry-up-and-wait sort of way) herded off the plane and into a customs briefing. From there, the shepherds led us down into customs, where we had to wrangle the 9,487 bags we had (while carrying a sleeping Sam who REFUSED to wake up and Molly attached to my front- oh we were a pathetic sight, you betcha) and then out to the buses. (We flew into Osan, but had to be bused up to Yongsan.)

I fell asleep on the bus ride and Steve kept waking me up so I didn't get knocked unconscious by the headrest in front of me. (Take me out, headrest! Let me go towards the light!) We finally arrived at Yongsan, where I planned to take the kids and chuck them in bed. But wait! Another briefing first! By this time, being awake for over 50 hours, I am over it. Completely over it. I don't even attempt to smile at people and I inquired again about medical care for Molly. I am told that the only real option is to go to the ER. I tell the lady that this is a living hell. She backs off because I think she's seen a crazed woman like this before. Finally a timid-looking soldier comes over to me and says that I can go ahead and check into our room (down the hill from the briefing). I refrain from making out with him on the spot and instead, thank him and begin dragging the kids down the hill to the hotel. I check us in and go up to the room. It's amazing. Air-conditioned and there's a bed in there. Really, those were my only two wishes at that point. I begin to strip the kids down for baths (because holy crap the germs), and that's when I see it. A big black ugly spot on Molly's back, near her armpit. Instantly I knew that that was what had been causing her high fever. And instantly I knew that I couldn't let it wait until the morning. So I cried while I gave her a bath and apologized for not seeing the bite/welt/spot on her before. I made a confused Sam put his shorts back on and told him I'd bathe him later. I rushed downstairs, prepared to bust into the briefing and make a huge scene to get Steve out, but luckily he was already down there, attempting to maneuver the eight thousand bags we had.

We took a cab to the ER and they pretty much had no clue what it was. A bite maybe? They drew blood (I cried while they dug for a vein IN BOTH ARMS MULTIPLE TIMES) and gave her an IV and sent her home with an antibiotic. We were scheduled to follow up with the pediatric doctor there the next day at 1pm. Except the next morning, Steve got word that our bus was pulling out at 12:30. Because of course. Molly appeared to feel a bit better the next morning, but was still acting tired and clingy and generally not herself. We cancelled the appointment since we wouldn't be there and got on our bus. We couldn't get a bus straight here of course, so we stopped at Camp Red Cloud and had another hour plus "layover" until the next bus came and brought us to Camp Casey. We got off at the Casey Bus Terminal and then.... nothing. No one met us there (hello sponsor that we just HAD to have??), no one told us where to go, and we didn't know what to do. So Steve goes inside to see if anyone can point us to lodging, and luckily, it was really close. Not really that close when you have eleventy billion bags and two kids to haul, but still doable. Right then, as I was sweating my guts out and begging Sam not to throw rocks at the plate glass windows, the heavens parted and some Southerners pulled up. "Throw your bags in here! We'll give you a ride! This was us just a few weeks ago."

Oh these sweet people took our bags to the hotel and then helped Steve figure out who to call so he could check in with his unit. After all that was finished, we collapsed into bed and hoped everyone was on board with my plan of sleeping for 15 hours straight.

Except that didn't happen, of course. 3am and rarin' to go! We waited a mother-lovin' eternity for the breakfast place to open at 6:30 and then took a cab down to the TMC (medical clinic on post here- no hospital). I told them that surely something was still wrong with Molly because her fever was still raging and she wouldn't calm down. The doctor here immediately said it was MRSA and gave us a new antibiotic. You can imagine how fun all these doctor visits were when we weren't "in the system" or switched over to the right version of Tricare yet (overseas versus stateside Tricare). So fun! We were told that we should go BACK to Yongsan to follow up with a pediatrician there (? because of their accuracy in diagnosing her the first time?) and they would put a referral in for that. Too bad we can't schedule that appointment until we are officially registered in Tricare Overseas! And too bad it's Friday and that sht isn't happening til Monday at the earliest! Oh well! Have fun with your super sick baby in that tiny hotel room!

The new antibiotic seems to be helping. We are starting to see more of our regular Molly and less of the super sick psycho baby that took over her for a while. We journeyed down to Yongsan yesterday (by bus- that was super fun) and the pediatrician said that she cannot confirm nor deny that Molly has MRSA without doing a culture, and there wasn't enough goop left in her boo-boo (for lack of a more graphic word) to drain (ew). But since the current antibiotic seems to be doing the trick, keep that going. We were also told to do warm compresses three times a day for 20 minutes each time and I just looked at her with the crazy face because what child is gonna sit still for that?! Twenty minutes?! It would be a miracle if this child sat still for two minutes. So naturally I'm half-assing that part of the regimen. We have another follow up appointment this Friday (except it's up here at Camp Casey and I'm scratching my head as to why we can't just keep seeing the same people, wherever they might be) and hopefully they'll be all, "She's healed! Quit waking her up at night to give her this crappy tasting medicine!" Anyways. I'm getting carried away.

Despite this horrible HORRIBLE experience upon arriving, I still can't help but love it here. The people are so nice, I am in awe of everything- from all the signs I can't read to the insane way everyone drives, and can't wait until we move into an apartment so I can just lock myself in a bathroom and drink some wine every now and again. Amen? (Side note- we sign our lease this afternoon! Ahhhhhhhyayayayayayayayay!!!!!)