tired and sick

I liken being pregnant and sick to swimming while wearing a trench coat. The entire body is engaged in a very difficult and strenuous process and then the coat adds to the already exhausting situation.

My daughter caught a cold a week and a half ago. For her, this quickly turns into an upper respiratory issue. Antibiotics are called in, a nebulizer is hooked up; we're like a mini-hospital and its only October. Her doctor says, "She has narrow passage ways that we hope will widen as she grows" that lead to this upper-respiratory cough. If left untreated the cold, turned ugly chest issue, would swiftly move into croup and I say, no thank you Senor Croup. I don't wish to meet him again.

A winter ago, non-prego, her cold/cough combo packed little punch for me. But this year, no such luck. The body, busy forming another person's pancreas and sense of sight, was too busy to fight off the infection and here I am, laid up with sickness. I've never felt so nearly what life as an asthmatic must be like; effort, both mentally and physically, is often required to breathe.

And yet, my peanut shines. In the morning my little germ-spreader awakes she calls to me. "Missin' my mommy!" I enter her room she quickly hides, only to giggle with delight when I swoop her out of bed. Sitting on the rocking chair she looks at me with a concerned head tilt and furrowed brow, puts her hand on my throat and says, "How are you feeling today mama?"

Cynicism is out the window.