I know, I’ve been writing a lot lately about being sick, which is probably not any more fun to read about than it is to live through.  (Sorry, I’m still writing about it.)

Today, I was really empathizing with little Liam.  He’s sick, just like me, and our symptoms have caught up to each other (we seemed to each get them in a different order) so now we’re really going through the same thing.  It is so hard to watch my kids be sick.  They are so miserable, and so incapable of helping themselves.  They don’t want to have their noses wiped, and they don’t know how to blow them, even if they had the inclination.  Their throats are sore, so they don’t want to drink the fluids that would help them feel better.  It hurts to have their diaper changed, so they hide, fight and avoid it when it’s really the fastest route to feeling better.

My poor little guy.  It was so hard to watch him suffer through his runny nose, choking cough and weepy eyes today.  He was not a happy camper.

When I’m sick, though, I know I’m going to get better.  As miserable as I might be, trudging through the day’s unending tasks and wishing for a moment of respite, I do know that this is temporary.  One day, very soon, I will wake up and I will feel like myself again.  I will have energy.  I will be able to breathe through my nose.  All will be well.

He doesn’t know that.  He doesn’t have the years of experience of getting sick and getting better again.  He doesn’t have a memory of the last time he felt so miserable, nor of the days, so recently, when he didn’t.  Right now, this is his whole world.  His whole existence is suffering through this cold (or flu, or whatever charming viral infection this is).

So, that’s what I focused on today.  All day, when I held him (which was a lot) I whispered to him that he will feel better soon.  That this is temporary, and it will pass.  Things will be so much better.  I don’t know if he believes me.