Being Ill with a Two-Year-Old

Never in my life have I washed my hands so often! Twenty times a day?

I desperately don’t want Amie to get this throat-infection. It is so painful, it would just hurt me all over if now she got it too. I’m on penicillin, so it should be taken care of soon (if it’s bacterial, which we don’t know yet).  It’s been over three years since I’ve taken antibiotics… This one, however, seemed to just get worse and worse, not better, so I didn’t complain.

I remember a time when being sick was something of a luxury. I’d cut classes for a good reason, lie in bed all day with steaming tea, cookies, and books books books, and my journal of course. On certain sick days I would scribble up thirty pages in my moleskine (and I use the kind without lines because I have a small handwriting). I would read a novel cover to cover…

And sleep, oh sleep! I would sleep. You know? Sleep?

Yeah, that ain’t happenin’ anymore.

Today, on a low fever, I visited the doctor, did grocery shopping, put all that stuff away, did dishes, did (am doing) laundry, then picked up Amie from daycare, ran home with her in the pouring rain, and spent two hours getting her to nap. Something was dreadfully wrong with the blanket because she really did not want it on her Mama. And of course there is me trying not to cough, sniff, breathe in her face, making sure my hands didn’t touch her hands, etc…

Then I extracted myself from her sleeping body (sprawling, top-heavy, all breath and warmth). Then I had lunch. Now I am here, at the laptop, trying not to cough too much. This afternoon and evening it’s all me, because DH has a dinner – the kind where toddlers aren’t invited, and so neither are babysitter-reluctant Mamas…

My tea is ready. “Throat Coat,” it’s called, but despite its horrid name it’s rather yummy, with licorice.

Have a nice weekend, everyone!

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