The DNA of Love

I’ve had the crud for more than a month now. It’s become a way of life.

Headache. Tummy torment. Vomit. A valley of frogs in my throat that gives me a hint of what I might sound like if I were to undergo sexual reassignment surgery.

Miraculously it has not affected my husband. He is Superman fighting off illness in a single bound. Son Jay who was always claiming to have some exotic disease when he was younger has grown out of that stage. Now he prefers to go into extraordinary detail about medical diseases in all of their gross glory.

Mimi has been sick maybe three or four times in eight years. I always attributed this to me. I breast-fed her for a year and a half. Unplanned. It was just easier to carry my fridge in my boobs. Upon reflection, I can see now that was the only time my daughter was not a picky eater.

My cold was finally waning when Mimi’s began waxing until it turned into a full moon of non-stop coughing, throw-up, headaches, and lethargy. It hurt to see my baby sick.

It was sweet that she only wanted her Mommy and Daddy. While Daddy was away at work, I could not do my work at home with a sick child so we spent several days together in bed, on the sofa, reading books, watching TV, and yes – shoot arrows at me if you wish – I let her play her Nintendo DS.

Limited! Limited!!! Only an hour a day. Pinky promise.

What Mimi most resembles when she is ill is a floppy fish. This is in direct contrast to her regular personality, which is vertical high energy. Poing! Bounce!

But now all the air had whooshed out of her ball of a good time. She couldn’t eat. Barely could drink. Only slept.

Mimi refused to take medicine. This I allow, as I am a total wuss. When my husband came home and took her temperature, he screamed, “It’s 103!!!!” John shot me a look that did not need words: bad mommy. “We’re going to the hospital.”

As someone who has the absolutely useless ability of never, ever getting a fever no matter how ill — I really am unfamiliar with its implications. I reminded him that she had been sleeping, which would make her warmer. Likely her temperature was closer to 101 degrees. He agreed.

John insisted that Mimi take a fever reducer. Mimi suddenly changed into Supergirl! She bounced and poinged away from her father who held in his hand before him a single, chewable, tablet of “delicious grape” melt-away medication.

I resorted to my usual parenting mode of reasoning. (I have two settings: reasoning and screaming.)

She said she was going to throw up.

“You’re not going to throw up,” my husband said disgustedly as she took her medicine.

She threw up. That was disgusting. I pointed out it that was his responsibility to clean it up since he doubted his daughter.

The next day, after the doctor told me she was fine, I took her to the DVD store and we picked up four DVDs of “Goosebumps.” Next onto Safeway for groceries while she lethargically wedged herself into a corner of the cart, but sat up brightly when I got her a treat.

At home she lay on the couch when her nose inexplicably began to bleed and she vomited crimson.

“OMG! JOHN! SHE’S BLEEDING!!!! WE HAVE TO GO TO THE HOSPITAL THIS INSTANT.”

John ran over, examined the puke, dabbed at it with a paper towel, held it just under his nose, and announced, “It smells sweet. Like strawberries. It’s a Fruit Roll-Up.” He shot me a dumb mommy look. I kissed Mimi all over.

My daughter will stay home tomorrow, too. This is a highly stressful week with the Anne Lamott Mama Monologues on Saturday evening, and Mimi’s birthday party on Sunday afternoon with at last count 35 kids and 10 adults.

This weekend it will be all people, all the time.

This week, it is primarily my daughter and me. While it may be filled with vomit, bloody noses and tummy aches, it is the kind of quality time and care that a child forever remembers. When her Mommy is completely there to take absolute care of her. No cell phones. No computers. Just pure focus and devotion. I tuck the blankie around her, the warmth of my love so enveloping.

When she grows up and is at the therapist’s office and make no mistake given my family – she will be – my hope is that she will also remember these soft, tender moments. When a mother’s love is the best medicine of all.