Wednesday, April 15, 2009

The Inconvenient Truth

Having a sick kid home all day can be a real inconvenience. I know you Working Moms have to deal with this; you can't go to work if you need to stay home with your child. But the same goes for us SAHMs. I'm a Stay At Home Mom who is now realizing that I am actually very rarely home.

The 5 year old has been home from school now for two days with Scarlet Fever. Don't get too alarmed, its just strept throat with a rash. But nonetheless, he is still contagious until tomorrow when he has had a few doses of the antibiotic. Most days I do have a 2 year old tethered to me, but we still get out, run errands, hit the gym, attend various committee meetings, etc. We pack in a pretty full day. With a contagious one, I am now tethered to both kids at home.

Yesterday was our first day at home and it felt like a time warp. Without my usual schedule, my brain seemed to stop functioning. I think I got confused why I was still standing in my kitchen after 9am. The thing is, if he hadn't been complaining yesterday morning that his ear hurt so bad, I might have pushed forward with our day as usual. He was otherwise pretty much asymptomatic. An early morning trip to the doctor's office did not work with my other obligations for the day.

I now understand why it was always so hard to convince my own Stay At Home Mother that I was sick enough to miss school. I rarely exaggerated my symptoms, but she rarely believed me. My illnesses were probably not too convenient for her either. Sick days at home became pretty special. It was not often that I got the small TV moved into my room and all meals served to me on a tray in bed.

However inconvenient, the truth was, I had to cancel my day yesterday. I made my calls and emails from my cell in the doctor's office waiting room. A throat swab later, I was making up a little bed on the couch in the den for the 5 year old to spend a sick day at home. When I turned on some cartoons for him and brought him his lunch on a tray, he said to me "Wow Mom, this is like I am really sick, this is really special". History repeats itself.

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