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“One night, my 3-year-old asked me if she could sleep in my bed. I told her no. She said, “That’s not fair! Why does Daddy get to sleep in your bed?” READ MORE
Mother Knows Best
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More pain than I had ever seen him in and I was starting to get really scared. What started as a headache treated with one Motrin at 10 a.m., had intensified into a frightening, migraine-like pain that sent us to the emergency room that night. And it kept getting worse, instead of better. The prescription we got during our visit to the doctor that afternoon, the one he said would “definitely work,” did nothing to touch the pain. That night, after seeing my son writhing on the table in the ER, the doctor injected him with something he said would “work within minutes.” I didn’t care what it was, as long as it brought relief. After an hour, when nothing had changed, my mothering instinct took over. I became Shirley MacLaine in the movie “Terms of Endearment” and acted out the scene where the nurse said it wasn’t time to give MacLaine’s daughter her pain medicine. MacLaine went berserk demanding the medication be administered immediately. That was me. Yes, the ER was busy that night. Yes, there were patients in the hallways complaining of chest pains and running ferocious fevers. None of that mattered. All that mattered was that my son was now in tears begging me to do something. And there was nothing I could do. Finally, after my scene at the nurses’ station, they gave him a narcotic injection that began to take the edge off. Two brain scans later the doctor was thinking tumor at this point we were able to exhale as my son, exhausted, was finally getting some relief (it was now 1:30 a.m.) and the scans showed no threat. When your child is in pain, it is the most helpless feeling in the world. Or is it? What about Tara Blocker, whose daughter feels no pain? Five-year-old Ashlyn has a rare condition in which she feels neither hot nor cold and has no pain sensation at all. My first thought: What a gift! Until I learned more. When she got her baby teeth, Ashlyn chewed through her lips and bit the flesh off her fingers. As a toddler, her mother found her with her hand on a hot surface, watching it burn and blister. At school, they even have to put ice in the hot chili they serve at lunch, because little Ashlyn will gulp it down and scald her mouth. She could suffer a potentially fatal appendicitis attack and never know it. Her mother told CNN, “I’d give anything for her to feel pain.” Trade places with Ashyln’s mother? No thanks. My pain threshold is way too low. Senior Writer Kimberly A. Porrazzo can be reached at kimberlyporrazzo@cox.net. For Letters: ocfamily.com. |
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