Lately, when someone gets sick in our household, it seems that everyone else soon gets sick as well—except, miraculously and mercifully, me. Is it thanks to all those antioxidant-filled blueberries I’ve consumed in the past year?  Or maybe God saw that playing nurse is not my husband's favorite thing to do and decided I should do that from now on…

Whatever the reason, I got to spend the last two days of my Spring Break staycation (and the entire following week) sticking thermometers under tongues, buying large amounts of Gatorade, chicken soup and Saltine crackers, washing soiled underwear and towels, driving 20 miles to the doctor’s office and back, administering antibiotics, Benadryl, acetaminophen, and sore throat lolly pops, getting out all the blankets I'd just put in storage, mixing warm salt water, and preparing cold cloths for feverish foreheads. Oh, yeah, and losing sleep on two nights since my youngest woke me up to tell me that her nose wouldn’t stop running.  Good thing I had stocked up on Kleenex and toilet paper--my husband and teenager have had some sort of stomach bug and my youngest has bad allergies.

Of course, when you’re a WAHM (I just found out that acronym—it’s Work At Home Mom, not George Michael’s former duo) who is used to being alone most days (well, other than communing with the dog), having everyone else in the family staying home can be a little unsettling— it’s like that episode on Seinfeld about “two worlds colliding”-- having to get my husband off the phone because I’ve got a conference call in one minute; yelling at my teen to turn off Spongebob (“I can’t think straight—please, your brain is going to turn into a sponge!!”) while I’m trying to write.  But at the same time, it’s good to be needed as a caretaker.  And uncool moms will take whatever bone is thrown to them…