The Sick Day Dilemma

Our regular columnist, Jessica McFadden, is off for a few weeks after the birth of her third child. Mom of a Million Mistakes will have several guest columnists in the upcoming weeks.

Jean Winegardner, aka "Stimey", is the mom of three children who writes a personal blog at Stimeyland; an autism-events website for Montgomery County, Maryland, at AutMont; and a column called Autism Unexpected in the Washington Times Communities. You can find her on Twitter as @Stimey.

I have three children, the oldest of whom is nine, which means that I have had at least one kid in school for each of the past seven years. During those seven years, I have had to make countless decisions about whether to keep my munchkins home from school because they are sick. Somehow I have chosen wrong, every single time.

You would think the law of averages would favor me so that maybe once when I kept a kid home, he would actually be sick—or that when one of my sons claims to be sick and I send him to school anyway, that he wouldn't throw up all over his classroom. You would think wrong.

Okay, maybe I've occasionally kept a genuinely sick kid home or successfully called the bluff of one who's faking it, but those occasions are rare.

My oldest son, Sam, claimed to be sick one morning a couple of weeks ago. I told him that he was fine and sent him to school. He made it to just after noon before the school nurse made me come get him. Strike one.

I decided to play it safe the next day and kept him home so I could take him to the pediatrician. "He's fine," the doctor said. "Send him to school." Strike two.

The next day few days are sort of murky in my memory, but I do remember that the days I kept Sam home, he bounced around the house, happily taking advantage of his time off. The days I sent him to school, he ended up in the nurse's office. By the third time I had to pick him up early, I couldn't even look the school nurse in the eye anymore.

I took Sam to the pediatrician three times in a week and a half. The doctors' official diagnosis was that his ear was filled with fluid but not infected. They believed he should go to school, but Sam regularly lapsed into pain every time his Advil wore off, and I wasn't willing to face the stink eye from the school nurse one more time, so I kept him home until I was sure he was well.

I felt like my poor son was ping ponging from the pediatrician's office ("He's fine. Send him to school.") to the nurse's office ("He looks miserable, poor boy!") to my couch ("Mom! Mom! Can I watch a movie?") back to the pediatrician's office ("Really, he's fine. Send him to school.") and then back to the nurse's office ("I've never seen him look so sick. He should be at home. Did you take his temperature this morning?").

Eventually I just ignored everyone, kept him home and made him clean his room.

I don't think you want to hear about the problems I have making this kind of decision for my younger kids, a.k.a. the Pukesome Twosome. I'm going to tell you anyway.

You know that rule about not sending your child to school if he's thrown up in the past 24 hours? Does that count for kids who get carsick? Or kids with gastrointestinal issues that lend themselves to regurgitation? Because every time I believe these two have thrown up from the flu, it turns out to have been for non-contagious reasons.

It looks bad, however, if you send a kid in to school midday after having already confessed to the teacher that he threw up that morning. It's just not done.

Those days that I think they really did just barf from a bumpy car ride and send them to school anyway? Well, that's the day they will throw up all over the classroom—and my car on the way home.

Tell me you don't remember the day some classmate of yours threw up in class in elementary school. I do. It was in third grade. Both of my younger two have been that kid. You don't want to have to do that walk of shame to pick up your son from the school nurse. Especially if he's already ratted you out and told her that he didn't feel good that morning, but mommy made him go to school.

Strike three.

Some days it doesn't pay to try. I think it might be time to just accept that my kids will have spotty attendance records and semi-regular (mental) health days at home.