NYR 5-25-11 - I've misplaced my Mother of the Year crown

For about three weeks, Mac has been complaining of a stomachache. When I hear such complaints, I expect evidence of said ache in the form of vomit, diarrhea or irregular bowel movements. Barring this evidence, I assume the stomachache is a figment of the imagination.

After three weeks, all I got was a note home from the nurse on one occasion to say that Mac had come in complaining of a stomachache that was more on his skin than in his stomach so she applied a topical ointment to make it feel better.

Weak evidence. Very weak.

On Monday, when Mac got off the bus, he appeared very distraught and said his stomach was killing him. So I called the health unit and got an appointment for the next day (yesterday) so we could lay this stomachache issue to bed, once and for all. (And if it was something serious, I would know that I only let it go for 3 weeks and not months or years.)

Yesterday morning I had my killer tennis class and came home to the phone ringing from Mac's speech therapist who we also know socially. She said that Mac hadn't been himself in speech therapy, that he'd said he was sick and had been to the nurse for a bad stomach, etc. He also told her that his mother was coming to pick him up early to go to the doctor. She just wanted me to know that he didn't seem right.

I quickly showered and went right to school to get Mac. We went straight to the health unit and were seen almost immediately. The stomachache was determined to be a result of maybe heavy phlegm intake from the cough and yucky nose Mac has sported for a few weeks that hasn't responded to medicine or maybe reflux which Mac has suffered from before. He was sent home with a prescription for Zantac for that ailment.

They also noted that one of his tonsils was very swollen. We all decided that there was no need for a strep test because he didn't present with any of the symptoms from the last time he had strep. No fever, no sore throat, no white pustules in his throat.

So we went home and he was fine for awhile until he started complaining about his throat hurting.

Behold the power of suggestion. He heard that his tonsil was swollen and that it was weird that he didn't have a sore throat because of it. He he made his throat sore.

Mac went to bed as normal and woke up this morning complaining of a terrible sore throat. He just could not go to school because his throat hurt so badly.

I checked with a flashlight and saw absolutely nothing. Nada. Zilch.

So I told him if it hurt that bad, he could stay home but we were going back to the doctor's office.

Then I started thinking that perhaps there was a psychological issue behind his not wanting to go to school. Maybe it wasn't a physical issue but an emotional issue. So I asked all these great therapist questions about whether anybody was being mean on the playground, was he enjoying school, did he have any enemies, etc. He answered that nobody was mean, he loved school and he didn't have any enemies.

So we got to the health unit, and I went into great detail with the nurse why I thought he was sick from the power of suggestion. She gave him a big song and dance lecture about how he had a sore throat but that wasn't the end of the world and that he really didn't need to be missing school at the end of the year, etc, etc. It was a great tag-team effort of guilt and tough love.

Then the doctor came in and noticed that he had this little cut under his nose. That cut has been there for weeks and I chalked it up to his blowing his nose too much. My medical diagnosis was off because the doctor said it looked like classic impetigo.

Impe - what?

I asked what that was and was told that it was caused by strep or staph.

Double What?

The doctor suggested we do a strep test just to rule that out for his throat pain.

And guess what?

Sans fever, sans white pustules, the kid has strep throat.

Turns out there was no emotional reason he wanted to miss school. He just didn't feel good. Way to go, Loser Mom.

So now we're on antibiotics - again - which will clear up the strep throat and the impetigo. I feel like such a heel and had to suck up all afternoon to make up for my heel-ness.

Here's to great antibiotics and apparently catching the strep throat early before it got out of hand. For that and Mac's forgiveness, I'm truly thankful.