Does your kid “fake” being sick? – Probably…

Last week, my oldest kid woke up coughing.  He didn’t have a fever (which is one of the two absolute reasons you are supposed to keep your kid home) and wasn’t vomiting (the other reason) but he was coughing in a barking like manner.  It truly sounded awful.  Other than that, he did not appear to be in massive discomfort – I kept him home anyway.

In the past – when the kids were younger, I often kept them home for sniffles, clothing issues, sleepiness, arguments that occurred before school, general moodiness and such – as well as fever, vomiting, diarrhea and extreme coughing.  During those times – I pretty much let them do what they wanted if they felt good enough and were behaving. 

As they have grown older – I no longer let them stay home for piddly issues – and when they do, they are required to stay on the couch or in bed, take medicine when I say and eat/drink what I tell them.

Back to the story – the oldest boy stayed home – restricted to the couch.  He was given cough medicine, cough drops and ibuprofen for the throat pain.  Later in the afternoon, he did develop a bit of chest congestion and I think he swallows the phlegm he coughs up.  This is way gross to some people but actually ok with me because the one body fluid I cannot deal with is “sputum” – also called phlegm or “lugies” (loogies?) – what a disgusting thing – makes me wretch.  Anyone who spits up something from their nasal passages or lungs at my house is required to go outside or into the bathroom, WITH the door closed before spitting it up. Phlegm is not allowed in the house (though I still have a hard time convincing my husband of this rule).

OK – back to the story again.  In the afternoon he complained of nausea – ran into the bathroom and said he was going to throw up.  He did not – but then he almost never vomits while I puke at the drop of a hat.  I looked around for some sprite or ginger ale – nada.  We did however have some regular soda (Coke) so I poured a half of a can into a cup with some ice.  The carbonation will help the stomach AND the medicine “Emectrol” for nausea in children is basically coke syrup.

I only gave him half a soda because he is a sugar hog and is massively affected by sugar – no matter what the health professionals and dumb-a$$e$ that spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on such nonsense when you can ask most any mom…in addition, the kid doesn’t need the calories, seriously.

About 2 seconds after he swigged down the half-soda he was given.  He looked around for the other half of the can.  Then he made eye contact with me, ducked his head and ran straight to the bathroom where he “fake” wretched.  He came out and said that his “stomach still hurt” and he” felt like vomiting.” (Imagine mom mimicking giant whining 10-year old boy) Upon hearing this, I replied “No. If you feel like puking, then go do it – you will actually feel much better”.

Surprisingly – he gave up easily – because he was faking.

Basically at one time or another, kids will fake being sick – I did.  Once when I had been sick, I pretended to be sick for several more days – I stayed home a week but my mom still thinks that I was faking the whole time because she busted me.  In Junior High, I used to call home for her to come and get me, this was actually because I was afraid of the highly aggressive girls at school as I lived in kind of a rough town.  My husband discovered that cold milk would make his stomach hurt – so he would put the milk in the freezer to make it really cold, drink it on an empty stomach and then vomit in order to stay home.  The best one was putting the thermometer up to the light to make it go up – problem was that it usually ended up reading something like 140 – kind of hard to believe that one.

A friend of mine told me that he and his brother played sick several times one year – the dad got sick of it.  He went to the drugstore and got some ipecac (which was used to induce vomiting in case of a poisoning – not used much anymore but still available) and gave it to both boys.  It tastes horrible and causes profuse vomiting almost immediately.  The dad said “you wanted to be sick – well now you are” and then went to work.

Even my perfect brother played sick.  It is a normal part of childhood – but you do need to find out if they are really sick or if not, why is it they want to stay home?

Sometimes it is a simple case of boredom – as it was with my perfect brother.  He found “Bill Nye the Science Guy” to be much more interesting than 5^th grade.  He is now a trauma surgeon at the age of 30 – so it didn’t hurt him too much.

Sometimes it is a case of bullying.  Sometimes it is a case of constipation or some other illness that is undetectable.  Sometimes they don’t like a teacher, the food, the building, their clothes, a subject, or a number of other things. 

Sometimes a little tough love is required – get your butt up and go to school….NOW!