Frances Friday: Pain is Relative

Illness-wise, this winter has been the easiest since Frances was born (so I suppose in that regard the separation was fortuitously scheduled). I have had only two bad colds this winter; one of them was last week. I'm now in that lovely post-cold phlegm-production stage where I'm much less sick, but also much louder. You didn't want to know this. Sorry.

This has meant a whole whack of sick days, however; since of course Frances got sick and then I got sick and then the colds kept us up all night and we decided to hide out and stay in our pajamas all day. (Why not? Isn't that what sick days are for?)

The first day, when Frances was sick and I was just getting-sick, was fine. The second, when we were both sick, was not. This particular cold started with a strep-like sore throat that made swallowing and speaking torment--it felt like someone had tried to decapitate me and then patched me back together with staples and sticky tape; but Frances, bless her, has the energy of a neutron bomb moulded roughly into the shape of a soccer player on speed, and she slows down a little bit when she's sick, but it would take a mighty strong microscope to see the change. Frances was jumping, bouncing, running, spinning in circles, and demanding endless reads of her favourite storybooks. All I could do was lay down on the couch nursing infinite cups of lukewarm tea and say, "Frances, I'm sick! I am too sick to play. No, I can't read a book, my throat is killing me."

It was a catchy phrase, I guess.

Ever since, whenever I ask how she's feeling, "My throat is KILLING me," she says.

There's only one way to respond: she must be scooped into a lap and tickled with kisses just behind her ear. Her giggles sound suspiciously like those of a perfectly healthy child.

~~~~~

It is, at times, painfully apparent that she would like nothing so much as to have Mummy and Daddy and Frances all living in the same place again. At the same time, it is painfully apparent sometimes that she really doesn't know yet that it's unusual to have us all living in different places.

Every morning she asks me if she's going to see Daddy that day. Most days I say no, and tell her how many days or sleeps until Thursday, when he picks her up. She tells me that she really misses him and wishes that she could see him that day, and I tell her I know, and give her a hug.

Thursdays are the exception. "Am I going to see Daddy today?" she asks. "Yep," I tell her. "Today he is going to pick you up after school."

"Yay!" she says, waving her arms in the air.

Her whole day is then built on this anticipation. When we walk into her classroom, she runs to the first friend she sees and says, "I'm going to see my Daddy today!" She tells her teachers, too. When I pick her up in the afternoon, she bounces around the room, "Am I going to see Daddy today? Yay! I'm going to see Daddy today!"

I hate that this undercurrent of loss runs through her childhood.

I hate that I had to do this to her.

I hate that when she tells her friends that she is going to see her Daddy today, with the tone of voice of someone who won front-row tickets to see their favourite band, that they smile and look confused and say nothing because, don't people see their Daddies every day?

~~~~~

When I took Frances to the daycare on Wednesday, she was swarmed. "Frances is here!" said M. "Hi Frances!" "Frances is here!" said E. Said A, "It's Frances!" And these three girls, all much bigger, surrounded her; one hugged her from the front, and another from the back, as the third stood anxiously to the side waiting for her turn to hug Frances. Frances hugged whoever was in front of her, at first happily and then with increasing patience, until the patience ran out. She pushed the next hugger off and angrily said, "I have to go hang up my stuff!"

It's tough being popular.

Posted by Andrea at February 29, 2008 9:35 AM under Frances Friday

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