Roller Coaster Day

After the repeated episodes of vomiting last night Daughter Dear had a very hard time getting up this morning. She had a ticket on a 1:30 p.m. flight out of Orlando for a weekend in Southern California. She had not even started packing, and I could not get her out of bed this morning. She was no longer vomiting but she was running a low-grade fever. She had had virtually nothing to eat in 24 hours. After all that vomiting with so little fluid intake, she was probably dehydrated. What should I have done in that situation?


I found myself standing in the hall at 8:30 a.m. wondering what a Good Mom would do. What I wanted to do was to pull the plug on the whirlwind weekend trip to Disneyland. My baby was sick. She was not ready for the trip. Forget it. She would just have to reschedule the whole thing. Good moms probably would keep their kid at home and stay home from work to care for the Sick One.


DD is as stubborn as me; she was determined to go on her trip which was a graduation gift from her WBF's family. She was going by hook or by crook. By the time WBF arrived, she was clearly no longer nauseous or feverish, but she was weak and tired. She stayed in bed and issued orders to him regarding packing her suitcase. I decided the better part of valor would be to beat a hasty retreat, so I left for work. They seemed glad to have me leave, but it made me feel as though I really suck as a Mom. Part of me wonders what is the point of staying home with a sick kid if she is (a) no longer sick and (b) determined to go on a cross-country weekend trip regardless of sickness. I left them to their packing. I escaped to the world of work. (Another part of me says I suck as a Mom for not being here in case she needed me.)


For good or for ill, I decided to go to work. I received various text messages throughout the day: "We are in Houston;" "We are on the plane for LA;" "We just landed at LAX." I hate text messaging most of the time but I really love it when DD is traveling. She won't call but she will send me a series of text messages informing me of her whereabouts. Thank goodness for small favors.


After receiving the "Eagle has landed" message, I replied requesting a real honest-to-god phone call. I actually got one. She is feeling better. Tired, but better. Flights were swell. Her luggage (packed this morning by her boyfriend) arrived safely. His luggage is .... somewhere. The airline is supposed to deliver it whenever they find it. Poor kid. He may have to spend the entire weekend in the same outfit. I guess if it had to happen to one of them, better him than her. God help Southwest Airlines if they lost HER bag.


I was okay until I made the mistake of calling my mother tonight. She launched into a spiel about how she admired me for releasing the apron strings to the point I could let her go like that. I did not need to hear that from my mother. I was doing fine until she brought it up. Damn!


Now I have something else to put on my Worry Pile.