Quarantine

The news lately is filled with the words ebola and enterovirous. They are both diseases that are causing trouble for many people.  As I was listening to the news the other day, they were discussing the family in Texas, whose father has ebola, and mentioned that the family was quarantined for 21 days in their home.  They are not supposed to leave their home for 21 days!

Could you, right now, stay in your home for almost a month and have everything required for a normal, every day routine??

Think of all the items you use every day.  From fresh foods all the way to toilet paper. Do you have at least 3 weeks worth of food and supplies?  

 Before A Quarantine....

• Always have at least a month's worth of food in your home. (I highly recommend a three-month supply, but we'll start with 1 month)
• Water storage will also be necessary. Make sure you have a few cases of water on hand.
•  Hand sanitizers, lysol, bleach, Clorox wipes, etc.  Whatever your choice of cleaner is, store it!  I would recommend not using sponges, but have paper towel, or small towels that you can wash in hot water.  You don't want to spread germs, you want to kill them.  This is also your first line of defense before getting sick!  Wash your hands often!
• Have a few simple meals ready to go and store all the ingredients together.  If the cook of the family becomes ill, it will be handy to have meals ready to cook, stored all together.  
• If your family becomes ill, think of foods that would be comforting, and kind of bland.  Crackers, soups, applesauce, jello, pudding, ingredients for smoothies (freeze-dried and dehydrated fruits are great for smoothies), liquids like Gatorade, water, and juice.  Remember the BRAT diet: banana, rice, applesauce, toast. (and when I say "ill" I mean a flu or other sickness, not ebola. If you feel you might have ebola or enterovirous please go to the hospital)
• Whatever over-the-counter meds you use should be stockpiled in your home.  If you have children, you'll need children's medicine, adults need the adult strength.  Think of cold medicine, fever reducing, pain relieving medicine, etc. 
• Do you have ice packs, heating pads, or a hot water bottle?  They can go a long way in helping someone feel better.

As you go about your day tomorrow think of all the things you use, and eat, and drink during your day.  Do you have at least a month's worth of each item?  If not, make a list of all the items you're in need of, so you can start shopping and begin adding to your stockpile.  Your friendly neighbor may become not so friendly if you have to be quarantined. Take the time to prepare for your family today!  You can't count on someone being there to help you.

Are You Ready For The Stomach Flu?

The stomach flu hit our home this past week. Of course sickness seems to happen in the middle of the night.  A child wakes me up and says they don't feel well, or they come in to tell me they already were sick in their room.  In either scenario I can't help to think at the time, how would I deal with this if we had no indoor plumbing or electricity??  I don't want to think about washing sheets in the dark in a bucket, but really, how would this play out in an emergency situation?  Do you have the necessary supplies to deal with a sick family member? 

There are several items I feel are a necessity when someone has the stomach flu.  These items are needed whether it's an emergency or not, so stock up on them and have them in your home.  

We always keep a few unused buckets on hand for when our children are sick.  Towels come in handy for keeping the floor from getting soiled, and I would also include paper towels or toilet paper to clean up any messes.  Having a few plastic grocery bags, or garbage bags, on hand will also keep the germs from spreading when you throw out the mess. Disposable gloves and face masks will also help the germs from spreading, and should be changed when dealing with more than one person who is sick.

 Disinfectants and cleaning products will be necessary in a situation like this.  I try really hard to keep the virus from spreading to all 5 of my children. One problem with being a germaphobe is the compulsion to sanitize everything in sight when one of my children has the stomach flu.  I like to have my cleaning supplies stocked at all times. Clorox wipes are probably the easiest thing to clean with, but homemade cleaners work just as well.  Cleaning all areas where someone is sick will keep the germs from infecting other family members. Hand sanitizers are a great way to clean hands without a lot of water.  Whatever works for you is what you need to have on hand. 

Fluids and simple snacks will be necessary for anyone who is throwing up.  Notice that the drinks I chose are not darkly colored, who wants to clean up dark red off of the floor?  Water is also needed to clean out buckets and other messes.  Keep enough on hand for drinking and cleaning.  And remember the BRAT diet when someone is sick.  Bananas, Rice, Applesauce, Toast....All are available in a long term form.  Bananas come dehydrated, and so does applesauce.  If you have the ingredients to make bread then toast could be made.  Rice is a long-term storage item and shouldn't be hard to keep on hand.  Chicken noodle soup is something my kids ask for when they are starting to feel better, and not the homemade kind.  They want the canned version :)

My children got over the flu pretty quickly this time, but I can forsee a situation where sanitation does not involve indoor plumbing, and keeping everyone healthy will be a top priority.  A few other suggestions for dealing with illness in an emergency situation are:

• Have a variety of pain relievers for adults and children to help with fevers and body aches.
• Have all the supplies to be able to wash sheets, blankets, towels, and clothing.  Click HERE to see how to make a manual washing machine.
• Have a portable toilet.  I would suggest having more than one of these on hand.  Click HERE to see more info on a luggable loo.    
• Any comfort items that your family may be used to when they are sick.
• If you can keep the sick person (or persons) in one area of the house, the illness will hopefully not spread to other family members. If there isn't a way to keep the ill in separate room, have sheets or blankets that can be hung to partition off the sick from the healthy.

The Doom and Bloom Handbook- Review

I feel an important part of any food storage are books of all kinds, but especially books on first aid.  You can have all your information stored on you computer, but if there was no power you will need a hard copy of your stored information.  I have been trying to slowly add books to my storage and I was really excited to purchase this book, but.....

The Doom and Bloom Survival Medicine Handbook was highly rated on Amazon so I decided to add it to my preparedness library.  I was expecting a book on how to administer medicine, first aid, and other treatments so I could have all that information in one book.  But it really was a reference book on what you could come across in an emergency if you were the only medic available.  It gave descriptions on different things you may come across in a societal collapse like snake bites, sanitation issues, all types of infections, high blood pressure, etc., but not how to treat many of them.  I guess I was looking for more of a medicine how-to book than just an encyclopedia of different medical terms.  And for the price of around $30 I was really hoping for more.  On a positive note, Dr. Alton does go into herbal medicine and essential oils a little bit and I do agree that we need to have those in our storage.

This is a review from someone on Amazon that bought the book and it summed up how I felt about it too.....

"I just did the first read through on D&B and it is a good book. There is a great deal of information on herbal pharmacology and the effective use of antibiotics and wound treatment. Where it looses points is on the constant references to other books and youtube videos. I think this book could have been more stand alone given the obvious skill and knowledge of the authors. I would have liked to have seen more on long term care and the austere nature of techniques we would end up using in a post collapse situation. I also think the book could have done without the add for their trauma kit they sell. So while it is a wonderful supplement to whats out there it is not a one stop shop. so 3.5 star"

Surviving The Flu

Swine Flu, we hear these two words on a daily basis now. I hope and pray that you have not been affected by this flu. If you have been you have probably learned what would help and what didn't while you were sick. My children haven't been sick, but they get quite a few headaches and we were down to the last bottle of Motrin. It made me think about how much medicine that I would need to last a year and I realized that I definitely don't have enough. I know all moms can understand the helplessness when children are sick in the middle of the night and nothing seems to work. Well, I don't want to have to worry about getting pain reliever for my children and stocking up on medicine and sickness related items are my focus for awhile.

Click HERE and read a handout from a mom who was ill along with her children and came up with some great ideas of what to have on hand when you and your family become sick. It is labeled a Moms Survival guide, but I think it applies to all of us.

Some items that I always have on hand are hand sanitizer, sports drinks, 7-up, crackers, pain reliever, Clorox wipes, and other disinfecting cleaners. I am a germ obsessed mom and I have to be able to disinfect everything when someone becomes sick in my family. I don't want the virus to spread to everyone.

Medicine In Your Food Storage:

I have found Walmart to have the lowest prices on their store brand medicine. It contains the same ingredients as the name brands and is usually half price. Look around as you shop to catch the deals on over-the-counter medicines. October and November are the 2 biggest sale months for Rite Aid and Walgreens for medicine. So watch the ads and save big! Stock up on the medicines your family uses.

You might want to also check with your pharmacist to see if you are able to get more than just one months worth of your medications. Especially if they are medications you can't go without.

Make a list of medicines that you and your family use and decide how you will can get enough for at least a 3 month supply. Look for sales, or maybe just by one extra every other week when you grocery shop.