Sick Day

Sorry for the late posting today, but my little patient has kept me on my toes.  Read all about it...)

It's official.  Cael no longer has perfect attendance.  Last night when he staggered upstairs to the bathroom while Joel and I were watching TV in bed, I noticed the telltale flush on his face that, coupled with the coughing I heard on the monitor and the sore throat I, myself, had started to feel, I knew he was getting sick.

But a sniffly nose is no reason to miss school, especially in a class full of ankle-biters that have undoubtedly covered every surface of the room with one bodily fluid or another.  So I got up as usual and headed to the boys' room with a laundry basket full of clean clothes to get them dressed for school.

Surprisingly, Cael was still in bed.  He was awake, but from his perch on the bed he was dictating to Graham where to place all of the toys Graham had unearthed and scattered across the floor of their room.

"Come on, Cael.  We need to get dressed."

"I'm not going to school."

"I don't think that's up to you to decide."

"I have a headache."

A headache?  With my caffeine addiction, a headache is no more shocking than a booger in Graham's nose.  They happen, but are no reason to miss school.

"But Mommy, my head feels like a rock."

"Like a rock?"

"Yeah, it's ouchy and hard and really heavy."

Okay, so maybe he wasn't faking.  I took his temp and he clocked in at 101.6 degrees, so I quickly called the school and reported his absence and then fed him a mouthful of children's ibuprofen.

"Does your throat hurt?"

"No.  My throat is like carpet."

"What does that mean?"

"It's scratchy and dry."

I asked him about his cough and whether or not he felt sneezy, so that I could try to assess whether his problem was caused by allergies or bacteria, but all I got from him were more cryptic, child-speak responses about the "gum in his throat" and his "sink nose".

Later, cuddled up in my bed and kept company by Woody, Buzz and the Toy Story gang, his innocence and frustration with being sick made my heart ache. 

"Mommy?  Remember how when I got those shots you said that the medicine was like little soldiers that would fight off the sicknesses?"

"Yeah, I remember that."

"Where did the soldiers go?  Why aren't they fighting to keep me healthy?"

"I don't know, honey.  Soldiers can't always fight off a cold.  But those same soldiers are doing a good job of keeping you from catching other sicknesses that are much worse than a cold.  So even though you feel yucky now, you know that you won't have to worry about those really bad things later." 

"But still, Mommy... good soldiers are supposed to fight the bad guys.  And this cold is a really, really, bad guy."

I'm sorry that he's sick, but I'm still very grateful that both of my boys are generally quite healthy and that I am able to do what I can to protect them from any "viral terrorism" the "bad guys" throw at us.  But if this cold threatens our Halloween, don't doubt for one second that I won't be on the phone with Homeland Security...