I'm home, temporarily. I'm on a 'day pass' from hospital, where I've been for the last ten days and won't be discharged from for at least another two.

That boil on my leg turned out to not be a boil. Or it was a boil but it was caused by a Golden Staph infection. We went away over Christmas and were keeping an eye on it the whole time, knowing I really should see a doctor when we got home. It was incredibly painful and I wanted it lanced so it would be gone - taking the pain with it. Oh and also there was a very large red patch around it, indicating infection. I kept hoping that when it drained the infection would clear. Instead, as it started draining the red patch got bigger and hotter and my foot swelled up. So off to the doctor I went, the morning after we got home. I expected that I would walk away with a prescription for some antibiotics and was happily anticipating the next week and a half at home *with Michael*. His office was closed for that length of time and we had been looking forward for months to that week and a bit at home alone with our new baby.

The first thing the doctor said was "I think you're very close to needing to go to hospital". By that time the boil, which had that morning shrunk a little, had turned into an abcess the size of a golf ball, the entirety of my lower right leg was bright red and my foot was twice its normal size.

She called in a colleague for a second opinion and well, off to hospital I went. Still expecting at that stage to be in for a couple of days of IV antibiotics, just as I was two days after bringing Caira home when I developed an infection in the uterus.

What I didn't expect was that the abcess would test positive for MRSA, or Golden Staph. And that instead of a couple of days IV antibiotics (which I'd already had by that time) I would end up with 4 days of very strong IV antibiotics and not be allowed home as soon as I started on the oral ones.

We've waited so long to be home with our baby. And on Monday (when it's expected I'll be discharged) I will have been in hospital for a day short of half her life.

Dear Universe: I've had about as much as I can stand for a while. OK?