Whoop, whoop.

In the first week of December, Steve came home with a terrible cough that was making the rounds of his firm. It was a hacking cough, but no other symptoms. No fever or mucus. He didn't miss any work or anything. He wouldn't have even gone to the doctor's except that he already had a physical scheduled.

He told the doctor about the cough. The doc listened to his chest and said it was probably a virus that was turning into bronchitis. He gave Steve a prescription for antibiotics.

The cough persisted. Steve called the doctor, who renewed the prescription. A few days later, Ian started coughing. I held him home from school for a couple of days, but sent him in for the half day before Christmas. After all, Steve's doctor thought it was no big deal.

They both kept coughing. Right through Christmas with all the parties, through the in-laws' five day stay at our home, the twenty guest Christmas Eve party, the post-Christmas parties. We socialized a lot during those couple of weeks. 

Last weekend, Steve started doing a little googling. He wanted to know why he was still coughing after six weeks, and why Ian was coughing so hard that his little face turned red and he struggled for air. Steve ended up on a wikipedia page for whooping cough. He called me over to look at the page and we looked at each other. Could it be? No. Couldn't be. Weren't there vaccinations for that? There wasn't a whoop sound, really. Just the gasping for breath.

I sent Ian to school the next day, but scheduled a doctor's appointment for that afternoon. I told the doctor the symptoms. The doctor looked at me. Could it be? No. Couldn't be. He was vaccinated. Let's check, just in case.

The doctor walked out of the room and swiftly returned with equipment. Restrain him, he said. And before we were aware of what was going to happen next, he shoved a six inch Q-tip up Ian's nose and wiggled it around. Ian was understandably pissed off. He called the doctor "you twit" — no idea where he got that word, but I suppose it was better than "you asshole."

On Thursday, I came back home after spending the morning at the supermarket and the gym to find my answering machine blinking furiously. Messages from the doctor's office and the health department. He had whooping cough alright.

Everybody was in panic mode. I had to pick up Ian from school immediately even though he wasn't contagious anymore. His school nurse was ready to have a cow. The health department made me identify all the people that we saw in the past month. Everyone, including the non-sick ones, had to go on antibiotics in case we were carriers of the disease.

Then I had to call all those people we had seen over Christmas to let them know that we had been spreaders of disease. That's always a tricky proposition. Do you apologize? Some people get mad at you when you tell them that you inadvertently exposed them and their children to a disease.

We were dis-invited to two parties on Saturday, and spent most of the weekend quarantined.

When the panic subsided, we reflected on the many medieval diseases that we've been inflicted with in the past decade. Shingles, gout, Fifth disease, and now whooping cough. Next week, we plan on getting scurvy.

The public health officer who quizzed me for thirty minutes on the origins of this particular outbreak was surprised that my husband brought it home from work. Steve said that the entire floor of his office had been coughing like this for weeks. It is somewhat amusing that vast numbers of Wall Street employees have whooping cough, but don't know it. It's like biblical retribution or something.