A Mom at Midnight

He is sick. The doctor says it is a light case of the flu, but I think the phrase "light case" was thrown in to make me feel better about the fact that Colin got the mist vaccine instead of the shot. Apparently kids who had the mist this year are still catching the flu...at least more than the kids who got the shot. I will remember this next year. Hopefully.

He has had three very long days and two sleepless nights and overall just a horrible no good very bad week. We are both so tired, my boy and I. I slept in his bed during the first night and he ended up in our bed last night, during a disaster of a midnight fever spike. The poor baby was in hysterics and literally burning up with fever. I finally got him moved to my bed, but he passed out right where I laid him, which left me just about 6 inches of mattress space. I should have climbed up into the bed and tucked myself in the very center. At the time, Enzo was splayed out down the middle of the bed with his head on the pillow right next to my husband. A rational woman would have kicked her dog to the curb and settled into slumber. I, however, did not even think about the huge open softness of the middle of the bed, or of my snoring slumbering fat dog or even of my 6 tiny inches of mattress. Instead, I precariously positioned myself on the sliver of remaining bed by my nightstand and laid my head down so close to Colin's that I could feel his coughs on my cheeks. I tucked the edge of the covers around my calves and proceeded to think "my baby. fever. too high. emergency room? don't be insane. 1am. breathing too hard? cough too deep? emergency room? don't be that mom. go to sleep. sleep. do it. no school tomorrow. call teachers. not now. 1am. he is too hot. emergency room? crazy person." I finally fall asleep, but wake up seemingly every few minutes to the sounds of coughing and the feel of hot baby skin pressed up to me somewhere. I shifted around on my tiny island of space and waited impatiently for the sun to finally put an end to the night. The morning will make it better. We can watch cartoons and make coffee. We can turn all the lights on and I can tuck him into the middle of my bed with a box of Kleenex and apple juice and pop tarts. Mornings are better for moms. Coughs and fevers are much worse at 2am.