Stephen went away for three days to a retreat/team building thing for work. When he arrived home Tuesday night, he was sick. He was in bed when we arrived home from Jax's appointment and it is now 3:30pm Thursday and he is still there. He has a fever, head ache, back ache, sore throat, nasal congestion and today we added dizziness to that litany of symptoms.

Now, I am the first to admit that I am a horrible nurse. I hate it when people are sick because I feel so useless when I cannot make them better. I have been giving him Theraflu every 4 hours and fresh glasses of water every few hours. I have heated up chicken soup for him and kept the kids away so he can sleep (and so they will not get sick too). I do not have a lot of patience though and when he tried to get up out of bed on Wednesday afternoon, I told him that he was useless to me if he remained sick so he must stay in bed and get better. He said "Thanks for the sympathy".

I did feel a little guilty and I apologized to him. I fluffed his pillows and made some oooh and aaah sympathy sounds. When this morning came around and he was still sick I made sure I did not give the impression that I was sick of him being sick.

Then, at lunch time we had this exchange:

Me: Here is your soup. Do you want some crackers?
Him: No thanks, this is good.
Me: Ok, let me know if you want anything else.
Him: Thanks for taking care of me.
Me: No problem. I know you would do the same for me.
Him: Sure, if you were sick on a weekend.

Aaargh! Isn't that the truth! When I am sick, I would not be afforded the luxury of lying in bed until it is over. Ok, so if I were as sick as he is, I would probably not make dinner and would order in a pizza or have Stephen bring something home. He would probably make lunches for the kids and get Jax and Dex to the bus, but I would still have to drive Cars to/from preschool or swimming lessons, or soccer or whatever. After school, I would still have to ensure that they got their homework done and if I had to be lying down in bed, they would be in the room a gazillion times asking me a million questions!

Oh, and now he is using the intercom on our telephone to page me. Off to check what the patient needs.

Serenity now.