one of those two parent moments

This last week and half is not going to make my "greatest moments of 2012" list. In fact it goes down on my "Just another reason I hate the fucking military but love my fucking husband and this shit sucks royal ass" list.
Big Bird isn't feeling well. At first we thought it was just pneumonia. Which I know is not exactly no big deal, but it's also not a bring my husband home type of deal either. It's somewhere in the middle and I can handle that, but a closer look at her chest x-rays revealed that she has Pleurisy(a pocket of fluid on the outside of her lung between the inflamed pleural layers)....again this is treatable but it's a little more than just a bad cold. It can go in lots of different directions and we are taking it day by day while we work out a plan of action, but here's where you need a partner.
because the actions go in this order:

Try this very intense, rarely used antibiotic for five days.
limit her activities.
watch her breathing.
make sure she is drinking fluids.
breathing exercise every hour.
Go to doctor get more x-rays.
if x-rays confirm that removal of fluid is needed than hospitalization.


It sounds bad as you get down the list and admittedly it does get worse, but it's all doable.....just not easily. When it's just you and you have another kid at home who can't even reach the back of the counter in the kitchen much less take care of himself while you're at the hospital with the other kid who's only ten and you can't just leave her alone in a hospital....how scary would that be for her?
It's doable...just not easily.

But this is where I fail as a parent and The Sgt. truly shines.
Sickness is my kryptonite. Not the puking, or the taking care of them, or the staying up at night. I don't mean that, I can totally do that. I'm sitting here typing this in the middle of the night because I'm doing that. No, I fail because I don't know how to talk about sickness. I don't know how to express my feeling about sickness because instead of thinking about how I feel I worry how everyone is going to think I feel.
Sickness in my childhood household was a bag of mixed feelings. One parent was always dying. Every word out of their mouth was something about how sick they were, but "oh you know that just my life." and the other parent used sickness as a means to display their love for us to others. Every cough, every fever was serious and we were on deaths door until they pulled us back, thank the good lord for that. The point is that being sick was never just being sick. There were always strings attached and I hated it, sometimes I would try to hide it because I didn't want to deal with the freak show that might follow. This ridiculous insecurity slowly turned into some neurotic psychosis that I carry within. So every time something happens that involves a sickness I don't know how to talk to anyone about it because what if I am making a mountain out of a mole hill, but then at the same time I am dying to talk to someone about it because I want someone to hug me and make it all better. The Sgt. would say "fuck it, make into Mt. Everest if that how you feel about it." but that strength to not worry about how others might see it doesn't grow inside of him like it does inside of me.
These are the moments where being the single parent isn't okay. The moments where you need to tag the other guy in because you aren't made this way. Moments where there is some one there to hold you. Someone there to say I'll take the night shift. Somewhere there so that you aren't left worrying which kid has to be left with strangers. Someone else who is there, because it's doable...just not easily.

Comments

[KT]

Looking into what it would take to get B and I there to help if she has to be hospitalized....