The value of sickness

Spending the better part of 48 hours in bed can do a lot to change your attitude. Just when you think you can’t stand cooking another meal, picking up after another kid, or spending another hot day in the sun…that’s when it hits you. The pain. The agony. The 36-hour, double dose of the most miserable summer sickness you’ve ever been unlucky enough to contract.

Suddenly, the simple things in life…like a hot shower, a toothbrush, a leisurely stroll to the toilet…they all seem so far from your grasp. If only you could make the room stop spinning. If only you could keep your insides from spinning…such has been life at the Smith house as of late.

I really shouldn’t complain too much. It’s the first time I’ve been sick in bed for a whole day in 15 years. Not a terrible track record, I guess. And it seems all a mother really needs to make her appreciate her own daily grind, which really isn’t so bad, is a glimpse at something worse.

So here’s what I’ve learned to appreciate, in the last 16 hours, about my life, my health, and my family.

I love it that my boys are still young enough not to care one bit when a buddy comes over for a surprise visit and finds them covered in flour and wearing aprons.

I love that my four year old niece has no reservations telling our boys how she and her two brothers were cut out of her mommy’s tummy when they were babies. “Then it just grows right back together!”

I love that I can predict Brisco’s response to this revelation before it ever happens, “Uh-uh. Mom! You know what Harlie said?”

Cleaning a dirty kitchen sink doesn’t seem so bad after two days of looking at the bottom of the toilet.

In the midst of booking a last minute family vacation I came across Devil’s Den State Park. Oh yeah, I can handle that.

I’m not worrying a bit that our 5 year old would rather eat an entire cup of flour “in the raw” than the delicious homemade pizza he just created.

I’m having no trouble teaching the same 5 year old to mop the floor “Cinderella Style” as he tracks his piles of dropped flour all over the kitchen tile.

I’m actually excited to feel well enough to wash my own bed sheets and scrub the germs out of my bathroom.

I’m relishing in the few peaceful hours that I probably have before we start all over again with Dad.

Multi-tasking things like chopping onions, swatting flies, rescuing a drowning aloe vera plant and being a big scary monster to three little kids doesn’t seem to bother me one bit.

It’s possible that maybe my husband said it best, “Not a bad time to start a diet, eh?”

And finally, it’s true: No matter how old you get or how sick you are, no one takes better care of you than your Momma.

And that’s All in a day’s work!