COLUMNISTS

Mullis: The partial deactivation of Nurse Mommy

Nicole L.V. Mullis
For the Enquirer

My son wasn’t looking too hot. He felt hot, however. I asked what was wrong and he mumbled, “Nothing.”

Later, I found him sitting on the deck, eyes glassy. He had to be running a fever. I suggested he take his temperature.

He gave me the thermometer and waited for me to place it under his tongue.

Exasperated, I handed it back to him.

For crying out loud, you’re an adult. You know how to do this.

He gave me ghostly grin and took his temperature – 102 degrees.

After two days of 102, I suggested he see a doctor. He got his shoes and waited for me by the front door. I told him to take his wallet.

“Why?”

You’re 18. I can’t sign for you anymore.

He brought his wallet, but every time the triage nurse asked him a question, he instinctively turned his head to me. Granted, he had a fever and I knew the answers, but there was a delicate dance going on – a baby-adult handling his first illness.

The nurse gave him a set of HIPAA forms and asked if he understood the privacy agreement. He looked at me. I nodded my head. He nodded his head.

She told him to wait, as she needed to “deactivate” me as the grantor on file. Her choice of verbs made me laugh and she blushed.

“I didn’t mean it like that.”

But it’s the truth. I am being deactivated. I’ve taught him how to cook, drive, do laundry, and fill out a W-2, all of which he picked up fairly easily. But this part – the sick part – doesn’t seem to take on the first try. It didn’t with my oldest daughter.

She got sick her first week of college. Given her sporadic texts and phone calls, it sounded like allergies. When she came home for a visit three weeks later, it looked like the plague. I took her to the urgent care, where she was diagnosed with bronchitis, pink eye and active asthma.

I wanted to criticize, but that would make me a hypocrite. I didn’t fare much better on my first attempt at self-care, and I was raised by a nurse.

I was 19 years old at Michigan State University, carrying 19 credit hours and working 20 hours a week. I barely slept, I ate sporadically and, at some point in March, I started feeling bad. I kept going to class and work, sleeping instead of eating. The last week of April, my boss told me I wasn’t allowed back at work until I had a note proving I had gone to the doctor.

I rode my bike to the clinic, where they told me I had “the worst case of strep” they had ever seen, as well as an enlarged pancreas from mononucleosis. They wanted me to go to the emergency room.

I explained I couldn’t go to the ER because I had finals and a job, which is why I needed a note and antibiotics. Since I was an adult, they gave me both. They did talk me out of riding my bike home in case I fell and hit my stupid pancreas.

After my last final, my mother came to take me home for the summer. One look at me and she started chastising – my face was so swollen, my eyes so red, my weight loss so evident. What was I thinking?

I wasn’t. I was a baby-adult.

I thought about my mother as I sat next to my son in the urgent care. I wondered how long he would have let the fever go.

The doctor said it was a viral fever, which should break in 5-7 days. As my son convalesced on the couch for 5-7 days, I had to remind him to drink, take his medication, and monitor his fever.

One day he’ll to do all the above without prompting, but for now, I’m only partially deactivated.

Nicole L.V. Mullis is the author of “A Teacher Named Faith.” You can reach her at nlvm.columns@gmail.com or www.NicoleLVMullis.com.