My 4 year old is sick again. She lays her little blond head on my lap, and looks listlessly up at me with big watery eyes and flushed cheeks. My heart constricts as I notice her lips are chapped from the shallow mouth breathing she’s been doing and I see the pulse jumping in her neck. Just two days ago, she was violently sick and I thought she was getting better yesterday. But now, her temperature is between 101 and 103, even with Tylenol. I thought she already had H1N1. She’s been sick so much this fall.

I almost superstitiously avoid thinking about anything happening to any one of my kids. That’s because if I started to think about those “what if’s” it could become a bad habit that would drive me insane. I love them so much. I have had the luxury of healthy children, and a teenager who was not a risk taker. So, I’ve been able to protect this bubble of denial that anything truly bad can happen to my kids for all these years. But today I find myself holding my little girl and thinking “Could I lose her?” and regretting every time I’ve lost patience with her recently–and every missed opportunity for a hug or silly conversation about bugs.

The Mama Bear in me wants to call the clinic and raise holy hell until they agree to give her Tamiflu and apologize for the delay in getting vaccinations of both flus out (because of course they had a hand in that problem). Poor medical professionals who must deal with parents feeling powerless.

Edited to Add:  MamaBear didn’t have to raise holy hell.  The doctor sent my little girl to the hospital.  She was very dehydratrated.  One night of IV hydration and medications and she was sent home.  We’ve been trying to keep her fever down as much as possible with Tylenol and Motrin.  It’s Day 6 of this sickness, and her fever will spike again tonight (though probably not the 104 it was at the clinic).  The Tamiflu doesn’t seem to be helping, probably because it was begun too late.  My advice: don’t wait until high fever has been around two days to take them in, as all the websites recommend.

This entry was posted on Friday, October 23rd, 2009 at 1:58 pm and is filed under Motherhood. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.