MySDMoms Staff Sunday afternoon as we drove home from seeing “How The Grinch Stole Christmas” in Balboa Park, F suddenly leaned over in her car seat and said her belly was really hurting. I hoped it would pass quickly, and aside from a few more complaints here and there throughout the evening, she seemed just fine. Monday morning she complained a little about a belly ache again, but was otherwise fine, so she went to school. But the nurse called at 10:30 and J had to go pick her up and work from home for the rest of the afternoon (cue the “dance of two working parents with a sick kid” here).
She was feverish off and on Monday night, so Tuesday morning I brought her to work with me. She likes coming to work with me; she gets cookies from the vending machine, she says hi to my coworkers, she watches a DVD with her headphones on, we record her voice in the the Vox Pro and i play it back for her backwards – it’s a good time, and since we’ve done it a handful of times now, we have it down to a science. Plus, her doctor is near the station, so I can pop over there after my shift if we need to take her in. What I learned this time, however, was that maybe going to work with Mom has become a little TOO much fun.
By Wednesday morning at 3am she was cool as a cucumber, and she woke up that morning feeling great and seemingly back to her old self. She hemmed and hawed about going to school, but when I made it clear that she’d be staying home with Dad and there would be no playdates and Dad was going to have to work so she’d have to watch movies and take it easy and play by herself for a while, she had a change of heart and decided she wanted to go to school. She did, and she had a good day. But when she came home yesterday she asked me, “Mom, if I have a tummy ache in the morning, do I have to go to school again?”
Uh-oh, I thought. I could see it coming.
This morning, she crawled into bed with us around 5:45 and immediately began complaining of a bad belly ache. She went to the bathroom, but said that didn’t help. She drank some sparkling water but said that didn’t help either. She made it clear that she wasn’t feeling well enough to go to school. And then I remembered: kefir. We have strawberry kefir in the refrigerator, so I told her that since her belly had been bothering her so much, it was time for her to have some kefir – there are so many probiotics in it! We have to try something! We can’t just let your belly keep bothering you, and this might help! It’s time to try SOMETHING.
“But Mom, I don’t like kefir!”
I insisted. “Babe, we can’t just let your belly keep hurting you, we have to try something, and kefir has stuff in it that’s good for bellies, so you’ll need to have some with your breakfast. If your belly hurts that much, it’s worth a try.”
“Mom? Guess what? My tummy stopped hurting!”
And that, there, is what J and I dubbed “The Kefir Effect.”
She went to school today, no problem. Didn’t complain about her belly once. And knock on wood, so far, I haven’t gotten a call from the school nurse. Kefir. Who woulda thunk?
