When my body shut down

When Maisie turned five I took her to Disney for a few days, and left Liam with my parents; he was two, and too small for the rides Maisie would want to go on, and single parents have to accommodate circumstances.

One afternoon while we were there Liam got sick. My father was home with him alone, and Liam was napping on his chest. Dad thought Liam felt a little warm, and suddenly Liam's eyes rolled back in his head, his body went stiff, and he started frothing at the mouth. Dad--not the most confident baby caretaker in the best of circumstances--thought Liam was dying. Called the ambulance, rushed him to the hospital. The docs explained to Dad (and the seven other family members who'd beat the ambulance to the emergency room) all about febrile seizures. Later that night the fever spiked again, and they had him back in the ER. Nobody slept that night, or the next.

Nobody called me in Florida, because "you never get away" and "there was nothing you could have done."

I get it. But you mothers: are there any circumstances in which you wouldn't want to know immediately if your child was put in an ambulance??

Anyway, Liam recalls that time as "the day when my body shut down." Every little fever, from then on, became a big deal, because kids who get the seizure once are prone to get it again, up to age 3 (or 5, depending on who's talking). I stocked up on kids motrin and never let him ride out a fever, though I almost always let Maisie's go unless they're really high. 99 and I'm drugging him.

Not anymore, though. Tonight he's sleeping on the couch with his first fever in two years. (Molars are coming in, and he picked up a bug at school.) I get up and look at him every five minutes, and he's rosy and hot, but not burning. It's just a fever. Kids get fevers. It's a good thing, even.

I'm terrified. Feel like a new parent--the kind who jumps when their kid sneezes. Oy oy oy.