Story of the Day 3/ 15/ 2012

I spend the better part of my life being a Jewish mother.
The worst part, too.

The worst part is when one of my children is ill.
Of course, worst being a relative term. When they were babies, and their temperatures soared, and they screamed in pain, and I had no communication with them, to be able to ask what was wrong, I was left trying to figure out if this was an ear infection or the flu or meningitis ..... and if I needed to drive to the nearest emergency room a t 110 mph.
That was the worst.
At least now, they can tell me what is wrong.

"My head hurts.", "I feel hot.", "I feel dizzy.", or "I am about to puke."
These provide wonderful bits of information, especially the last one because it usually allows me 15 seconds to get out of splatter range.

It also helps me to narrow down what I will do to manage the problem. "I am about to puke" elicits an immediate response of, "Go to the bathroom!" Not to pee, but to...
And "I feel hot" or "I feel cold," tells me to take their temperature.
And, "My head hurts" has me asking all kinds of questions like, "Do your ears feel full? Where does it hurt?" To figure out if this is related to allergies, or if it might be something else.

Today, my youngest baby, is home ill.
Not my littlest, that is Ely.
Not his fault that his baby sister is at least 5'9" or 5'10" or....and possibly still growing.
So, my youngest baby's symptoms started out as "My head hurts" And after asking several questions, yesterday, I gave her an ibuprofen.

I now need to admit a terrible truth: I am not a very good Jewish mother.

I know this because apparently I asked the wrong questions.

I neglected to ask, "Did you feel well today at school?"
It turns out that she did not.

And, it also turned out, as the evening progressed, that the headache was to rejoined by it's friend, the ones that made her say, "I feel hot," and "I feel dizzy."
This was joined by the information that she had felt that way earlier in the day, and also "spacey" during school.
Sigh.

So, today, my baby stayed home to recuperate.
Everything seemed to be going well.
She got up this morning and ate a small amount and took another pill. She lay down and slept. She woke up again for a bit, she lay down and slept...except here is where the whole ting fell apart.
When she lay down, that second time, this morning, she said to me, "My head hurts."

This was post being drugged by her mother. (Another ibuprofen.) Enough post that she should have not felt a headache.
And, as I looked into her face, in her very dark room...dark because the light was off, but also because she has painted it a very dark color and has black curtains and a black set of sheets, I thought I saw purple under her eyes..and maybe over her nose....purple that she claimed was not from congestion, and which was certainly not from a lack of sleep, by then, and that with the headache and the temperature..I did what any good Jewish mother would do...I started worrying about meningitis.
It can be very serious.

I mean, she could become deaf from it.

I decided to calm down and let her rest for 30 minutes, and then go in and make sure she is still breathing.