Get Over Yourself

Okay, okay. So it happened. Sweetie wasn't feeling so well yesterday, and she was good enough to let me know.

Not so much with words. But by not wanting to eat much of her breakfast yesterday morning and by her sour mood.

Oh, and around midnight the night before. Actually coming into our room and telling us she didn't feel good. Bad belly. She was a hurtin' pup for awhile there, poor thing.

Given all that, I decided to keep her home from school yesterday. One more day of spring school vacation never hurt anyone...

(Thanks to Nana for keeping her so I could go to work!)

Not that Sweetie's ill feelings weren't entirely unexpected. After all, we've had her (and us) on a no grains/no sugars diet for a couple weeks or more by now, but then allowed her (and us) to have a "cheat day" on Sunday in celebration of her Grampy's birthday.

Pizza. Sandwiches. Cheese and crackers. Ice cream. Cake.

Ugh.

That does not do a body good!

And now we know. Hubby and I came through it alright. But poor Sweetie. She, and we, learned a good lesson.

Good news: looks like we'd been successful at ridding her body of the excess grains and sugars that had been there.

Bad news: when reintroduced, those grains and sugars make a Lyme Diseased Sweetie feel pretty rotten.

More good news: by lunchtime yesterday, she was wanting to eat again, feeling a lot better. And by mid afternoon she was really feeling like herself again. Even wishing that she could go to school now! (too bad it was edging in on the end of the school day by then, not to mention she was with my mom in another town at that point.)

All in all, by the time I picked her up to take her home, you would have never known that Sweetie was anything other than her usual great in recent hours. Great! Lesson learned, and moving on.

When Hubby got home from work - knowing Sweetie had stayed out of school for the day - she greeted him as cheerily as ever. Hmph. Had I never said anything, Hubby'd have no evidence at all to clue him in that it had been a "sick day" for her.

That made me think... really, nearly all the times that Sweetie has felt ill due to her Lyme Disease, I've been the one to witness it. Only me. Nana too, if Sweetie ends up with her for the day. But mostly - only Sweetie and I have seen it all.

From last summer's migraine and her feeling so ill that she turns pale as a ghost and shaky, feeling like she's going to vomit at any minute; to the various instances of vomiting she'd experienced throughout the Fall and Winter; to yesterday's morning of tummy aches, nausea and tiredness. I'm the one who's seen her fast downfall every time.

I told Hubby last night that that's frustrating to me that I'm the only one who's really seen her so sick. By the time he gets home, she's past it all and feeling much better.

And not that that's true for every single instance. We both witnessed her Herx reaction last summer when she first started on antibiotics. And there was one evening late last fall when she had a bad evening of it. And of course, our midnight visit last night. But by and large, I see her at her worst, get her through it, and see her perk up almost just as quickly to her regular ways.

Hubby reminded me - and he's absolutely right... that's because Sweetie does not like to be sick. She gets over her illnesses as quickly as she can. Where other kids (and adults!) can be known to "milk it" for as long as possible, Sweetie recognizes the moment she feels even just a little better than the moment before, and rides that momentum out, getting herself back to her healthy ways ASAP.

So while, yeah, it's frustrating when she won't admit to feeling bad, and it's frustrating that, when she isn't at her greatest I'm typically the one to see that through, I do have to admit it's pretty darn great to have a kid so hell bent on feeling as healthy as she can to do all the great things she wants to get done.

Huh. That's another valuable lesson we can all learn from. Thanks, Sweetie, for teaching us the way.