It's 7:43 p.m. and I'm lying in bed, watching Thursday night football and talking to you while Amira PRESUMABLY finishes her homework upstairs.
This was one of the longest weeks I've had since you've been gone.
In preparation for my first day of work, I put Amira to bed early on Sunday night. I signed off on her agenda, packed her homework folder, and made both her breakfast and lunch ahead of time. I set my alarm for 5:45 a.m. so I'd have time to workout before getting myself showered and dressed by 7:30 a.m. I went to bed that night, certain that I was completely ready for my first day on the job.
But at 4:30 a.m., Amira awoke from a bad dream and couldn't fall back asleep. And at 5:30 a.m. she began to cough.
Having been her mother for the past 9 1/2 years, I know the difference between the beginning of an asthma attack and the beginning of a cold. I know when Amira cannot possibly go to school without coughing herself sick, and I know when a few sessions with a nebulizer is all she needs. From the sounds of Monday's cough I knew she probably shouldn't go to school but that her cough wasn't bad enough for me to miss my first day of work. She was still eating, laughing and watching TV and these are all good signs. So with both Amira and your mom's encouragement, I left my, only-just-starting-to-get-sick daughter home with grandma.
I was gone for exactly five hours including travel time, and for exactly five hours I worried non-stop. I worried while being trained on a new-to-me computer program. I worried when I texted your mom to check in and she didn't text back. I worried until 12:00 p.m. when I left the office, called the house phone and Amira picked up and let me know she was okay.
And when I got home and gave her nebulizer treatments every 4 hours on the dot, when I put her in a steamy shower and let her breathe in the heavy, moist air, when I put her to bed that night with her head propped up on damn near every single pillow in this house, I worried about my baby then too.
Being a single mom is hard. Being a single mom to a child with a chronic illness is fucking brutal. I absolutely know this could be so much worse. The support I get from both of our families is something I will NEVER be able to repay. The fact that our daughter "only" has cough variant asthma and never has problems breathing is a gift compared to what others have to endure. We have health insurance, a roof over our heads, enough food to eat and clothes on our backs but...when I hear her cough, I worry incessantly anyway.
If you'd been here this week, you would have SUCKED ASS at being supportive.
You would have gotten on my damn nerves with all of your ineffective, all-natural home remedies. You would have called me overanxious and neurotic. I would have called you callous and insensitive. We would have driven each other crazy until Amira's cough had subsided, and then we would have grinned at each other sheepishly, grateful that this episode had ended at last.
There is not another soul on this planet who could work my last good nerve that way that you did but sometimes, when our daughter's sick and I'm all alone with my worry, Lorenzo, I miss you anyway.
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