by Lucinda Witherspoon Joyner

Created on: January 30, 2009

You can barely hear it, the faint whisper of a throat clearing and stuffy sniffling. Suddenly, your child erupts with the horrendous sounds of coughing, sneezing, and unbearable nose blowing. Oh Lord, you think, here we go. Your child is showing the first signs of being unwell. As you race through your house, bucket in hand that he/she will inevitably need, you wonder which one of your child's nasty little friends gave your precious baby this terrible disease. You just want to barge into their classroom with bleach and deodorizer in hand and eradicate all the nasty little critters (the viruses and bacteria not the children) that dare infect your child.

As your child retches for what seems like the millionth time in your mop bucket, you try your best to keep from scolding him/her about not using the proper hygiene techniques you tried to instill since birth. "Haven't I told you to sneeze into your sleeve or hankie instead of your hand or into the air?" "Haven't I told you to wash your hands thoroughly after everything?" "Haven't I told you not to touch all surfaces unless they have been sprayed with at least ten layers of Lysol?" "Didn't I tell you not to play with that nasty boy Billy who loves to eat his boogers or that unhealthy looking girl Jenny who takes pleasure in picking her own butt?" These questions stampede through your mind but you don't ask them because you are too busy cleaning the vomit off the floor and wiping crusty stuff and tears from your child's face.

No matter how unhappy you feel about your child getting sick, all your feelings give way to love and you automatically go into super doctor mode to insure your child gets better. As your child's fever rises, you start praying to everyone you know to help your child get better as you rush around trying to fulfill the child's every whim. You believe if you just get this toy or have this favorite food item, you child will magically get better and you can escape from this heck his/her sickness has manifested. You call the doctors or the nurse practitioners every hour on the hour until they have to start checking their caller ID so they know not to pick up if it is you, again. They have already assured you that it is just a little bug or the common cold but, as any good parent should do, you question their ability to practice medicine and firmly set in your mind that they have no idea what they are talking about. Don't they realize your child's case is special and should garner special attention?

Then there comes the day (two days later to be almost exact) that your child starts feeling better. The coughs and sneezes come less frequently and the fever that only reached 101 degrees has returned to normal. Your child will then milk the sickness for all it's worth because they want just one more day to stay home to watch TV, play video games, and, especially, not do homework. You still comply to his/her whims, deathly afraid of relapse but, after another day of being your child's gopher, you suddenly realize you're being played. So, with stern lectures to your child on how they should have proper hygiene (which invariably fall on deaf ears), you send your precious baby back to school, hoping to not have to endure this horror again any time soon. It is just as you are starting to relax that your husband comes in coughing and sneezing. The vicious cycle begins again, only with a slightly larger child.

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