Paging Dr. Mom

It was the usual Sunday night gang, gathered this time at our house. Seven of eight parents; nine of nine kids. There were pizza boxes strewn all over my kitchen; there were children running everywhere, interrupting the grown-up conversations, vying for attention.

N cam ambling up, munching on potato chips. He began to choke on one, coughing until I had him sip some water.

“You have to give me medicine now, right Mommy?” he said, when the coughing had subsided.

“No. Why would you need medicine?” I replied, already rolling my eyes. (Have I mentioned that there is absolutely no question that he is my child, this boy who will undoubtedly one day insist that he ‘has things’?)

“Because I’m coughing,” he said, throwing in a few couldn’t-be-faker, please-don’t-quit-your-day-job-kid coughs for good measure.

“You’re not sick,” Baroy said from the other end of the couch, while various other parents laughed at N’s pathetic bid to get a dose of his beloved Children’s Tylenol.

“I am!” N insisted. “Feel my head.”

Sighing, Baroy did so, while I returned to my conversation. But N was not to be denied.

“You too, Mommy,” he said. “Feel my head. It’s burning hot.”

“It’s not...” I began, even before my hand hit his forehead. Which was, as I’m sure you’ve guessed by now, hot. Not burning. But definitely hot.

I sought Baroy’s eyes over my girlfriend’s head. “Did you...?”

He was nodding before I even finished. “Yeah,” he said with an abashed smile. “I thought he felt a little warm.”

The upshot? 100.4 axillary (i.e., under the armpit), which translates to somewhere between 100.9 and 101.4 actual temperature.

Whoops. I guess in my house, you’re a hypochondriac until proven diseased.

In my defense, however, he really doesn’t have a cough. A fever, sure. But no cough.

That’s my story, and I’m stickin’ to it.