Too Much Biltong

Hi Friends! Welcome back to Contagious Courage- thanks for your visit. Today’s post is merely a short story that happened a couple weeks ago. I hope you enjoy reading as you either relate to, learn from, or imagine being in my situation. Also, considering the contents of the story, I decided to NOT share pictures related to the story. Just pictures of happy Charlie.

So, it’s a story about motherhood. Motherhood to a sick toddler in the bush, in particular, but I think any human can relate to a series of unfortunate events!

Charlie always has exciting things to see out the window!

It happened about two weeks ago. We were in town on a Thursday, running a lot of errands- groceries, picking up seedlings, checking out stoves for the new house, and Charlie was doing so well. Errand days aren’t easy, since it means she’ll be in her car seat for the bulk of the day. But when we know we’ll be stopping at a place for more than a couple minutes, and if that place has a safe spot for a little one to run around, we unclick the straps and out she hops. So a couple Thursdays ago, at the seedling farm, Charlotte got to stretch her legs. While I waited for the accounting ladies to sort out the credit that Ebenezer had and see how much we needed to pay for the 800 spinach and 200 cabbage seedlings, little Charlie ran back and forth from the truck where Brierly was standing outside over to where I was sitting at the reception table. Each time she would run, she’d ask Brierly for a piece of biltong (a natural dried strip of beef, similar to jerky - but southern Africans wouldn’t want me comparing it to jerky since it’s “infinitely better”). Charlotte loves biltong. She has her father’s genes in so many ways and this affection for dried meat is one of those manifestations. So she probably had 10-12 pieces in a span of twenty minutes. Which neither of us thought anything of except that she was happy running around and eating, so that makes for happy parents, right!?

Well later that afternoon, she starts puking. The first projection came when we were back at Ebenezer after the 70 minute drive and helping get the seedlings into the ground. I thought it was because I saw her nibbling on raw garlic cloves that we were also sorting and planting along the spinach beds (a good deterrent for our biggest pest of the brassica family, the bagrada bug). So I assumed that once she tossed her cookies the two times in the garden, (does that count as compost?? Probably not, sorry I asked) I thought her tummy would quickly settle now that the strong fresh garlic made it’s way out.

I excused myself from helping in the demo garden and carried Charlotte the 200 or so yards back to our house propped up on my forearm like I was a ventriloquist with my puppet facing outward, to avoid getting the vomit on myself- it was even inside her shoes. It was a bicep workout like none other.

Just as I’m changing her clothes, I can sense the heaving of a new episode and quickly grab her and dash outside. I thought she would have gotten the garlic out by now?? What’s going on?

Being who I am, my mind went through a bunch of information-seeking questions. With my less than two years experience as a mom, plus studying public health, plus being an avid non-fiction reader- I was going through a mental checklist-

Any fever? No.

Diarrhea? No.

Tick bite? Not this time.

Hmmmm.

Well, she ends up vomiting again and again, unable to even keep sips of water down. Time for a bath!

Visiting a nearby cave that I'll tell you about in another post!

Our current house doesn’t have a bath tub so I have to leave Charlotte lying on a towel while I fill up her bath dish with buckets in the sink. First a bucket of hot water out of the left tap, then two buckets of cold out of the right. It’s a tedious routine on a normal night when she’s feeling well and Brierly is around to help, but that day it was adding to the stresses.

We make it through this out of routine, early afternoon bath without any episodes in the bathroom, and get her in a fresh set of clothes. She wants to put her cowboy boots on. Why not? Anything to make a sick kid happy.

It’s not two minutes later and she’s tossed up more vomit, and it’s covered her cowboy boots inside and out. I let out a sigh. Let another outfit change begin.

Throughout the afternoon, she covers that second and then third pair of clothes and shoes in vomit, we go through 4 bath towels cleaning up the aftermath. There’s no washer and dryer here- it all sits in the bathroom until the lady who washes Charlotte’s clothes comes the next morning.

Just as I’m trying to wipe up the latest deposit on the ground, and Charlie has her clothes off because even though she likes being dressed to the nines I decide we don’t need any garments on anymore, the power cuts. I’m now trying to remember where the puddles of vomit are on the ground as I reach around for where I think I left the solar lamps. I’m also extremely aware that the concrete ground is slippery as it is, and if I catch a puddle with my foot I’ll be a goner to the forces of gravity.

A puking kid, I’m stepping in vomit, in the dark, and I haven’t even gotten to cooking dinner yet.

While this whole afternoon and evening was stressful for me, it was my goal to make Charlotte feel as comfortable as possible. The poor girl was so exhausted from vomiting that she couldn’t even hold her own head up over the bucket. She managed to be a very good trooper and hardly whined. She just did what she had to do for her stomach to feel better, and would sit and rest or snuggle in the moments in between.

She made it through the night peacefully, yet was sick again the next morning once. Then she was good the rest of the day. However, there was a relapse of sorts on Saturday. Then Sunday she was fine and started building up her appetite again. No fever, diarrhea, or any other symptoms ever came.

Just -- possibly-- too much biltong.

Well as parents, Brierly and I have learned a very big lesson: that while biltong is a fantastic, healthy, protein-rich snack, and a great teething toy for littles- it is possible to have too much of a good thing!

Of course, after Charlotte had been sick that whole Thursday, Brierly did recall getting a tummy ache from too much biltong when he was young. That’s helpful to know--- after the fact!

Thankfully, Charlie is back to her normal self now and can handle small bits of red meat once again!

Do you have special (or I guess “terrible”) memories of episodes of sickness compiled with other issues? I’m sure moms with older kids and/or multiple kids can tell more harrowing stories than this one. And if you search back in your memory, are you happy with how you handled it? I think we have split second decisions in trying moments like these where we can choose to lose it or can take a deep breath and choose to not fear, not explode, and be peaceful despite our surroundings. For me, with a prayer and a mug of a favorite beverage, I was able to breath easily again at the end of that night. I was able to trust that she would get better and not lose my cool in the midst of the chaos. And I’m thankful that it’s because of the courage and strength that God gives me. And He has courage and strength to give to you as well.

Thanks for reading, and I’ll be kicking off the Humans of Matebeleland Series again later this week!

Growing in Courage,

Mackenzie