First Posted: 5/13/2012
When you’re feeling ill, you don’t call out for your accountant. You don’t ask for your pastor or your lawyer either. You want your mom.Every Mother’s Day, we hear so many tributes to the wonderful qualities of moms. And while they’re all true, we seldom hear about her role as chief wellness officer in most households.I’ve seen it firsthand in our household. Between having one daughter with Type 1 diabetes and another with respiratory problems, the doctors at the pediatric office know us well. And they know how well my wife manages all these ailments.We have some nasty ailments going through our house now, with the youngest’s asthma inflamed to bad levels and the eldest with a strangely infected finger to complement her diabetes. It doesn’t help that I’m fighting my third or fourth ear infection of 2012. (Sometimes it’s hard to tell when one ends and the next one starts.)Somehow this nurse in a mom’s outfit can remember to give breathing treatments every four hours, talk a stubborn 10-year-old into taking her pill, all while remembering to change out the diabetes pump insulin every couple of days.Quite frankly, I don’t always remember to take my own medications, much less someone else’s. I try to help, but the medical side of things is certainly her strong point, not mine. My best skills involve the grill and the garbage.It comes at a cost. She missed nearly a day’s worth of work this week as she ran people to various doctors appointments. But I know she wouldn’t have it any other way. She wants to hear a doctor confirm what she already knows is wrong with our children.She does this while pushing an equally stubborn hubby into seeing the doctor before he loses his hearing altogether.My wife works in health care, but I don’t think that fact alone helps her keep track of our family’s health. I see the same attributes in my own mother.On Friday, I visited the doctor in my hometown to look at my ears. I’ve had the same doctor since childhood, which either means he’s a great doctor or I’m too lazy to search out one that isn’t 45 minutes away. I prefer to believe he’s just that good of a doctor.Afterward, I stopped off at my boyhood home to say hi to my parents. I wasn’t in their home for two minutes before my mom started diagnosing me. She used her mommy senses to check my temperature and how inflamed my throat was. She wouldn’t let me leave without sending me with a clear, cold liquid.After all these years, she still worries about my health. After all these years, that still comforts me.That’s why we want our moms when times get tough. They never stop caring. They never stop worrying. That’s why we celebrate Mother’s Day each year, because they celebrate Children’s Day for the other 364 of them. We’re so grateful they do.
David Trinko: Give from the heart this Christmas
