Over anxious mother

[Gemg]

Is there anyone out there who feels that they are an over anxious mother when their child is ill? I know we all get worried but each time my ds gets a temperature (he's 22 months) I have to stop myself bursting into tears all the time and last night I was awake all night listening for him and going in and out of his room cHecking his temparature about 15 times. I feel like when he gets ill, I develop this totally irrational fear that he is going to deteriorate and get seriously ill and just feel really upset. He has not been a particularly ill child and has had his fair share of viruses and sick bugs. Does anyone relate to this? I feel like such an idiot and I think my dh thinks I'm mad.

When my ds's are ill I still worry about them as much as I did when they were little babies. Ds2 hasn't really had any health problems (touchwood!) but ds1 has stopped breathing twice after immunisations and is also asthmatic so I still chek to see that he is breathing - even though he is nearly 4! Dh probably checks on the boys even more than I do!

I hate it when DD (24 months) gets poorly. Luckily it isn't often but each time I worry about everything and anything. She is prone to rashes and gets one every time she has a temperature, hwever slight. Everytime I panik on first sight.

I think it is just called being a mummy

I think every or almost every parent has some weak/irrational points, where you lose all sense of perspective about your kids' situation.... Gemg's is illness, mine would be bullying, it's always something.

I always panic when my kids have a temperature - I;m convinced it's meningitis (without the symptoms) and cannot relax until they start being cheeky again.

Hula's right - part and parcel of being a mummy.

I find talking to NHS Direct reassuring ... not because they help in any straightforward way but because they protocol they use is so stultifying it just bores me to death. I know they have to ask the same series of questions, because they aren't doctors and the patient isn't in front of them, but I do feel like yelling 'no-one said it was meningitis in the first place you dorks'! By the end I'm just so bloody grateful to get off the phone I've got to the 'you can't stay off school unless you are actually dying' side of motherhood (even though ds is only a baby, its that kind of robust approach). Not sure that's quite what they intended though... if it is they are cleverer than I thought

I used to think I was an over anxious mother and used to talk myself into not bothering dr's too much although I probably did. At the end of last year my daughter had a temperature and found it painful to go to the loo. The out of hours dr diagnosed bladder problems over the phone and told me to take her to our GP in the morning. She said it couldn't possibly be her appendix. Moaning and vomiting through the evening prompted my husband and I to phone them and NHS direct several times and after 4 hours we carried her to the car and phoned the dr's to say that we were comming down to see them. The doctor then told me I was over anxious and I was phoning them too much. We took her to causalty as the switchboard lady at NHS direct had suggested if we were really worried. She was admitted for signs of appendcitus although she didn't have all the syptoms. Two days later when they decided it was probably her apendix they operated and found out it was just peritonitus. Quite rare but very life threatening. I'm very glad that I didn't cave in to the dr trying to convince me I was over anxious and wasting her time but I did feel that I was wasting everybody's time until the nurses at the hospital convinced me otherwise.

I really wanted to say that being over anxious is part of the job description of being a parent and it does have a purpose. I'm now on going to be a real pain with the doctors if I don't think they have examined my children properly and I wont feel guilty at all. I don't think any parent should.

Sorry for the spelling mistakes etc I am feeling quite emotional about this now although its almost 6 months ago.

ds used to have bad asthma attacks so now i do tend to be a bit paranoid about both of them. Its impossible to get a night doctor here aswell so its a trip to a & e. (probably not poorly enough to go there but need to see a doctor and have no choice IYSWIM) i had a right rollocking from a doctor there once who said there were patients in pain that needed their attention more. I did feel guilty but ds used to deteriorate so fast that i didnt feel i could risk it. im terrible, ive sat up all night sometimes watching him.

Gemg, I totally sympathise. I'm an awful worrier. Is your ds your only one? My dd's 19 months and is my only child and I just can't bear the thought of something happening to her. I too lie awake, sweating and panicky every time she's ill. Part of it with me is that my mother was the opposite, usually she didn't believe me when I said I was ill. One time quite drastically when it turned out I had glandular fever and another when I had pleurisy. So I have this inbuilt fear about not 'noticing' or 'listening' for important signs.

On the positive side it means we're being very good diligent mums! The negative is that we probably make ourselves suffer when we might not need to.

Oh Furniture - thank you. Yes my ds is the only one and I was the only one. When I was a child my mum was very ill twice and on both occasions she nearly died. Thankfully she is still around but I grew up with a terrible fear of losing her and I think this may have transferred to my ds now and I hate being quite so bad. I am now 2 nights down on sleep and thank god he is on the mend as I don't think I'll be functioning soon. Thank you for making me realise that someone feels like me for different reasons.

Oh, thankgod there are others that worry when there child is ill. I am absolutely terrible. I get sweaty, panicky and completely paranoid, i can't even bear to look after ds alone when he's ill in case i judge the situation wrongly and he has meningitus or something. Found out last year that ds has a low immune system and some of his vaccinations haven't worked which has made me even worse, i check for a raised temperature everynight and he's 5 now. You thought you were bad

Linzoid, you have just described me to a T! Either we're all suffering from severe anxiety disorders or I'm just that bit more normal than I thought! Must go and tell dh that I am normal I AM HONEST!!

Linzoid
I am the worst worrier when it comes to my dd and the slightest sniffle. But it's counteracted by an innate fear regarding "making a fuss", so I feel kind of like I have a massive internal struggle going on between "oh my god she's ill - better get to the doctor" and "I don't want to bother my (wonderful) doctor when I know she's so busy and it's probably nothing". I tend to come to the conclusion that if it were serious, I'd KNOW. At least I hope I would. BUt then as a mum who has always worried about how instinctive her parenting really is - and who has thrown away the books because I was turning into a wreck - there's always the deep-down fear that my natural mummy instincts would fail me when really needed. Oh dear.
And dd is only 10 months, so lots more worrying to come, although I suppose my confidence will grow with time.
And I've found NHS direct very helpful, if only as a means of letting my common sense take over.