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Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Diagnosis: Hypochondriacal Imagination

Not me. My kid.

My middle kid to be exact. (Although my husband and my mother might suggest that he takes after me. I can't help it if I earned my medical degree from Google University.)

In the past 7 days, Charlie has had:
  • A "tweaked" ankle
  • A bruised "bone that sticks out under your shoulder"
  • Nausea
  • Headache
  • A bleeding mole
  • A sore throat
  • Deafness in his right ear
Often, these complaints come at the end of a sports practice or game. Mostly, my response is "that's part of playing sports. Either deal with it or don't play." Compassion is apparently not my strong suit.

Yet, I am not totally without mercy. I don't want to dismiss every complaint as a figment of his imagination. I have, on occasion, been wrong when I've alleged that he is just fine.

After a few days of complaining about the tweaked ankle, I did buy him an ankle support to wear during practice and games.

His comment after the first game? "This ankle brace hurts my foot."

Seriously?!

Then, there are the situational afflictions -- namely nausea and headache that seemed to perfectly coincide with a class for which he had not done the homework.

Honestly, if I had a quarter for every time he complained about an ache, a pain, a twinge or a tweak, I could probably single-handedly fund national healthcare.

Am I alone in this? Do any of your kids do this? What would your take on it be? Attention-seeking? Boredom? Overactive imagination? Or maybe he's been secretly attending Google University too?

4 comments:

Ellen aka Ellie said...

I used to call my son the "little old man," because he always mentioned an ache or pain. But it makes me wonder if he learned it from me...

Unknown said...

You are so not alone! I sometimes wonder if our youngest is going to wake up with five serious inflictions all because I basically tell her, "Go to sleep; you'll feel better in the morning!" She IS having growing pains in her legs, and there are those mysterious tummy ailments that usually come during church or at bedtime. UGH! I know everyone's level of "This hurts" is different, and once you have gone through childbirth without drugs, your sympathy tends to lean on the "really?" side, but those darn kids do make me second guess myself on occasion. We just have to trust our Mommy instincts to know when they are real. It's a crazy job!

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Anonymous said...

My first thought was the poem "Sick" by Shel Silverstein.
I too am in the "you will feel better in the morning" camp. It seems there's always something. They are still alive, lol. Not sure the answer to yours, but my advice is to trust your gut. If it's serious the cry sounds different.

Sheri in CA