Sick

The saddest thing in the world may just be a sick child, especially a sick baby, especially your own sick baby. This morning, day four of croup, cold, fevers, conjunctivitis, lethargy, humidifiers, late-night walks in the crisp, dry air, menthol rubs, showers to breathe, diluted juice, raw noses, etc. he couldn't even muster a smile at his sisters or keep his eyes open long enough to see who was holding him. He, who is usually so happy and forever smiling and on the move.

It's amazing though, what a mother (and a father) is capable of in the face of a child's suffering. All the going without: going without sleep or rest or ease, actual clothing, contact with the outside, make-up, a decent hair-washing. A super-hero quality seems to take possession of an otherwise very ordinary person, and somehow, you're able to love in a way that wasn't possible before, patience is stretched, the challenge is met. There's something not quite unpleasant about letting normal life slip away either, letting the phone go unanswered, the to-do lists left undone, the routine ignored. And despite the heart-breaking reason why he's doing it, there's something luxurious about the way a sick child melts into you, their hot against your cool, their broken against your whole. It's a gift to a mother's usually nonexistent ego to feel like no one else in the world, no matter their qualifications or title could stand in for exactly you, and that you and you alone as their mother can bring them more comfort and relief than anything in a bottle or syringe.

I appreciate for now, though, the infancy of his needs, realizing even as I feel his fevered breath in the hollow of my neck, that very soon, his needs will become more complex, more desperate as baby becomes boy becomes man, and I won't always know the fix or be able to soothe the discomfort. But for now, I can, so off I go.