16. Mother of the Year

I am sure you will be shocked by this news, but I am not going to be voted Oklahoma State’s Mother of the Year. At least, I won’t be if the school nurse at Stillwater High School has anything to say about it. Yesterday I committed the unspeakable, the most egregious offense possible. 

I sent my son to school with a 101-degree fever.

I know, I know. I hear you, the sharp intake of breath from all of you concerned about public health. I get it. It was not my finest moment. But let any one of you parents out there that has not sent your kid to daycare with a hefty dose of Tylenol—because they had an ear infection but you couldn’t miss that big meeting at work—be the one to cast the first stone. In my defense, the kid seemed fine after a shower and some breakfast. And he protested strongly that he didn’t want to miss school (being his fourth day in a brand new one), especially since he had his first anatomy exam first hour. I told him to call me to come get him after his test if he still felt bad. The phone stayed silent until 2:30; it was the school nurse, giving me an earful—and not gently—about the school policy of not letting your child come to school with a fever. How I’d endangered the lives of other students if his illness is serious.

I remember such a policy from daycare, but frankly my son is almost never sick (and when he does get sick, it seems to always fall on school breaks for some reason), so I wasn’t aware if Champaign schools had a similar policy. I only was aware that the handful of times I’d had to call him in sick, it had been particularly hard to get teachers to help him with make-up work afterwards. We quickly learned it was just easier to go to class, even if you feel shitty. And I’m sure teachers and administrators in a school system with a high truancy rate probably become skeptical of students who are always “sick.” Which, unfortunately, impacts the ones who are legitimately ill.

Which led me to wonder, why do we live in a culture where showing up for your “duties” has become more important than taking care of yourself?

When I was in the workplace, I saw folks coming to work who were hacking and coughing, or obviously feeling under the weather; women who were in their early months of pregnancy running to the restroom, looking slightly green. But bosses expect you to be there. Colleagues are counting on you. Gotta get everything done, and right away. If you show up for work sick, you’re not showing poor judgment, you’re tough, you’re stoic, both admirable qualities. How wrong is that?

And the same holds for taking care of your mental health as well. Our culture doesn’t value self-care for physical or mental health. And in the long run it’s making us all sicker.

Today my son is home, wrapped up in a blanket on the couch, binge-watching videos. I want to call the school, explain my actions to the nurse who barked at me angrily yesterday for sending my child to school sick. I want to tell her I’ve been programmed to put duty before health, for myself, and now for my son. And I want to tell her I was wrong. I want to tell her I’m not a bad mom, and I do care about the other kids at school. But instead, I’ll just take care of him. And I’ll try to let him know that although I’ll probably never be Mother of the Year, I do care about his well-being, and more importantly, he should too.