Puking Kids
Yesterday was tough. My teenaged daughter was on her third day of vomiting every 10 minutes. I checked her blood work (Since I'm a doctor, all I have to do is fill out a requistion slip and take her to the neighborhood lab.) It indicated she was extremely dry. Her hemoglobin went up 20% from a few weeks ago when we did the annual lab checkup thing. Now that's pretty concentrated blood. Even her kidney function was worsening. So I fed her Pedialyte every 15 minutes for a few hours (with a chicken broth chaser,) then every thirty minutes for a few hours, then every hour for a couple of hours. She perked up just like my wilted Bouganvillas do when I water them. All this on top of a tough homeschooling day for my son Erik and his friend Sean. Then there's bills to pay, groceries to get, and well, you know the routine. Illness doesn't give a hoot about our schedules, does it? All this and I was still surrounded by gripes from my sick daughter and complaints from the students. A mother's day is rough sometimes. WHat we do we must out of love, not out of any expectations of gratitude. (Although that would be nice.)