Epidemic at day care

Today, there was a spate of runny, poopy diapers at day care. We received an email in the early afternoon which stated that half of the kids in the infant room had been stricken with diarrhea, suggesting some sort of communicable affliction. Two episodes warranted a courtesy call, while after three events, the kid needed to be taken home. I'd been unable to check either my voice mail or email before Abby called me about the event. We didn't know whether Margaret was in the ill category much less the "take home" classification, but I found out that she was in the latter group when I went over to check on her. Which made for an interesting walk home as I carried her in the Baby Bjorn. Every little rumble in the diaper area, which was right next to my stomach, literally made me jump even though I'd put her in two pairs of pants. In the end, we made it home without incident, and Margaret seems to be ok in general since, as the caretakers at daycare told us, she's still happy and busy, but she just went through two sets of clothes during the day.

You hear these horror stories about day care centers as incubators for germs. So far, we've been ok. Margaret has had a few colds which, since lots of snotty infants are in her room, may be partly due to her exposure to them, but nothing serious. This is our first instance of an "alarming" mass event, but it wasn't a big deal in the end. Admittedly, her daycare room was pretty pathetic when I picked her up, but it wasn't clear whether that was a function of lots of kids wandering around in diapers without pants (what's the point of putting on pants when you'll have to change another poopy diaper soon?) or kids with gastrointestinal distress. Margaret didn't seem to be in any real discomfort, and she appears to be recovering well at this point.