Theories And Experiments Around Illness

[Dutch Lock Down Day Three Hundred Sixteen]

Photo by NASA on Unsplash

In the midst of COVID and such, is Not Exactly The Time for figuring things out, but I think I figured out Girl Twin’s mysterious illness – and based on my one day experiment, I was right.

Maybe.

And, also, I think I figured out why my temp keeps going up randomly.

Maybe.

But first the news:

The behavior I observed yesterday was two fold – one, Girl Twin got in trouble for not sharing her toys and had to go to time out. Unlike her brothers, if she doesn’t want to do something, not even time out is a motivation to do it. She sat in time out for ten minutes and it was only after everyone was gone from the room, downstairs, and she was cuddling in my lap did she reluctantly agree to share her toys and apologised for her behavior.

In the tiniest voice you can imagine.

Second, she said she was sick in the car, but only after we had driven to First Minion’s school to drop him off and were headed towards the daycare. She was fine before that. And she was fine once we picked her up and brought her home yesterday.

#ThingsThatMakeYouGoHmm

Photo by NASA on Unsplash

This morning I thought, “…what if she’s just getting motion sick?”

Motion sickness feels the same as the stomach bug we all had last week and if she’s feeling super stubborn about it, she can hold onto a feeling and insist upon it for as long as she likes.

IF it’s just motion sickness, then she’ll feel better once she’s out of the car, breathing the fresh air, and distracted for a few minutes.

This morning when she said, “I feel sick.”

I replied with, “No, you’re okay. You feel a bit motion sick. You’ll feel better once we get out of the car at daycare, okay?”

She replies, “Okay, Mama.”

Then we get out of the car at daycare and I joyously gush, “See? Don’t you feel so much better? Let’s go PLAY!! !”

And she skips along with me into daycare and is fine.

The theory with ME is not quite as easy to prove / disprove.

See, I THINK that I’m overextending myself when I’m in the role of primary caregiver and keep going until my body has to give myself a temperature and exhaustion so that I slow down.

Which means that the next time the entire family gets sick, I need to remember to take care of myself, too.

Which, hopefully never happens again, eh?

Do you have similar experiences?

I’d love to hear how you tackled them or if you’re still struggling.

Now hopefully the Universe doesn’t laugh again, but if they do, that’s okay, too.

I’ll be over here taking careful care of my family AND myself.


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