When Mama Goes Down

Today I'm out! Like knocked down, dragged out kind of down.
This doesn't happen very often, but when it does, it's well, MISERABLE.

About a year ago I wrote about Male Sickness, so today I decided to write about Mama Sickness.

What the heck do you do when you are to sick to do anything?
Now if you are like me, most of the time you get sick and you just keep on keepin on.  But there are those rare times where it's just to dang hard to keep at it.
So here is my advice on how to handle Mama Sickness.

  Ask for Help and ACCEPT that help!

Today my husband took off work to help me me crawl from bed to couch out with Blake (and be the most attractive nurse I've ever seen).  This is awesome until Little Miss starts to cry for "Mama" and I instantly want to jump out of bed and go to her.  See, I can't quite seem to flip off the mom mode.  Instead I have to remind myself that Daddy is just as good as Mommy and I try to tune out the cries and sleep.  After all, hubs didn't stay home to yell at me for not resting.  

So yes, jump off your high horse for just a little bit and ask for help and then accept that help!

Rest when you can

Go back to the newborn mantra of when they sleep, you sleep!  Let the laundry pile up, the house get dusty and just rest!  All that stuff will be there waiting for you when you feel better.  But sleep!!!  It's better to take one-two days of solid rest than weeks of crabby, blah feeling mom mode because your body can't heal.

Play doctor with the kiddo

Lay on the couch, let them take care of you.  You might get a plastic fork put in your ear or a plastic hamburger rubbed on your belly, but hey, you're resting and kiddo is entertained.  Who cares!!

And when all else fails.....

MICKEY MOUSE CLUBHOUSE

I'm not a huge advocate of letting the TV babysit your child, but when you are at your wits end, then Mickey Mouse will become your best friend!  I don't know what it is about this show, but any and every kid loves to boogie to the "Hot Dog Dance"- this will buy you at least an hour before your help arrives!

Well there you go, that took all of my energy, so I'm going back to sleep now.  Wish me luck!

Coping with the Phenomenon of Male Sickness

There is a mystery I'm dying to solve.

It ranks right up there with government conspiracy theories.

Male Sickness.

You know what I'm talking about.

A guy gets sick and all of the sudden the world stops, 

they need help with everything,

and these rough and tough men become big babies.

Sound familiar?

Now if women get sick, we all keep going (with the rare exception)

We still have houses to take care of, kids to raise, jobs to do, etc.

It takes a very very bad sickness to get me out of the game.

Now I would love to solve this mystery.

Do women have a higher pain tolerance?

Are men used to being babied by their mothers when they were sick?

If that's the case, does that mean all girls were not babied?

I will get to the bottom of this phenomenon.

In the mean time, here is a list for my fellow ladies.

4 ways to deal with male sickness without killing your partner.  

1.  Send them to bed

When they are sick they lose all fun privileges.

This is not a get to sit around and play video games kind of day.  

After all their body needs to rest and you need to encourage them to feel better so they WANT to come out of hiding.

2.  Keep checking on them.

After all they need to know you care.

It is okay if you must wake them every hour to check their temperature.

That is the responsible thing to do.

3.  Make them sick food

Stick to the basics, soup, juice, water, toast, etc.

No fancy cooking here, they need the bland basics to help them get better.

4. Love them

Now if you do all of the above things and they still aren't getting better than that means they are really feeling very under the weather.  They might really be suffering of something beyond Male Sickness.

At this point, continue taking great care of them.

Maybe limit the trips in to wake them up and check on them.

But help them get better and if they get to whiney.  Shut the bedroom door.  That is why we put them up there in the first place.