I’m typing this with one hand as I hold Henry with the other. Poor little guy is recovering from malaria. He’s watching Elmo on one side of my screen while I hunt and peck this post out on the other. We both have sticky cinnamon-speckled, med-laden applesauce smeared on our faces, limbs and shirts. This residue is the wreckage of getting a two year-old to swallow medicine that makes soldiers wince. In fact, it’s believed that the drink gin and tonic originated with British soldiers in India searching for a way to make this particular anti-malaria medicine more palatable. It’s so bitter that even the smallest taste triggers that righteous rendering mechanism which some call the chunderer. Believe me, Emily and I each took sympathy bites and there was a  moment when we thought we would be fighting over the toilet. Poor Henry is taking this stuff three times a day for a week.

We’ve had to get real creative with how we administer his meds. At first we tried a spoonful of nutella with the pill crushed up inside. He caught on quick. Then we turned to applesauce. (Good job we thought to  bring it from Yaounde; not sure it can be found here.) Applesauce was an instant winner, problem was it didn’t completely mask the bitter taste. So we added cinnamon to the recipe and sprinkled a little sugar on top–a spoonful of sugar really does help the medicine go down…for a season. Next hurdle to overcome was that any lingering taste invoked that guy whom we just termed the chunderer. The strategy needed a new step. Henry needed something to wash it down with. Introduce juice. And for this special occasion undiluted juice. Daddy: applesauce and vicegrip duty. Mummy: juice duty. Applesauce, juice, applesauce, juice…repeat ’til medicine is down. And hope that it stays down. Unfortunately, Henry will probably never be able to eat applesauce, cinnamon or drink “tropical blend” juice again.

Poor little guy. We could tell that he wasn’t quite 100% shortly after we first arrived.  The nasty cough he developed led us to believe it was croup. With rest and fluids we hoped he would recover in a few days . He, however, didn’t get better with each passing day. Finally, Emily noticed that he’s breathing seemed a little shallow. So we called up a doctor we met during our exploratory trip up here back in June. She said we could bring him right in and she would check him out. Her tropically-trained suspicions proved true when Henry’s malaria test results came back positive. As much as we hated hearing the news, we were so glad to have such quick access to expat medical care. It wouldn’t have been that easy weeks ago in Yaounde. But here at a nearby mission hospital, $5 later (!) and we were out the door with a consultation ($3) and medicine ($2).  If only it were just as easy to help this little guy get better. Ice cream on the way home from the hospital did seem to help though.

Halfway through his regimen he’s improving gradually. What a trooper. But what a scare for me and Emily, not to mention how Henry must feel. Just google “malaria.” It’s a serious sickness and our baby boy’s got it. We’ve been assured he’ll be alright. Young parents of young children living in a new location with strange diseases need lots of assurance. Thanks for praying for us!