The Lessons We Learned This Week

Micah got off the school van today with tears in his eyes. My boy doesn't cry very often, and when he does it's a big deal. He started crying again as soon as he saw me. Can you say Red Flag? And then my Mommy Senses (like Spidey Senses) kicked into overdrive.

As he was holding his right eye, I zeroed in on that. It wasn't red, it wasn't bloodshot, it wasn't irritated in any way. I held my hand over his left eye and asked him to watch my other hand as I waved it in front of his face. His right eye tracked well, so he wasn't going blind in that eye. (Hey, Mommy Senses don't scoff at the ridiculous.)

Instead of stripping down to his boxers, Micah snuggled with me on the couch, his face flushed, crying. And he kept holding that left eye. I was baffled. I asked him how school was, and he cried. I asked if something happened on the bus, and he cried. I checked his daily take-home folder and there was no note about anything that happened that maybe shouldn't have.

I got him a cold pack for his eye, wrapped in a towel. He gladly held it on his eye for 20 seconds, then stopped crying, tossed the cold pack onto the couch, clapped, took a bow, and went on to play. He was miraculously healed. For three minutes. Then he came back for the cold pack.

Becky and I came to the conclusion that maybe he had a migraine from being overtired. When we get that tired, the pain settles into our eyes. (If you've had this happen, you know the feeling. If you haven't, there's not much explaining it. Just trust me on it.) Micah moped around for an hour, coming back for the cold pack more often than not, and in general trying to be himself but not succeeding very well.

He eventually fell asleep watching TV, and that happens approximately once a year with him. I kinda thought last weekend that he was tired since he spent Saturday in meltdown after meltdown, but then on Sunday when I had plans to make him nap against his will, he couldn't have been better. A model child, he was. And when he's overtired, he just doesn't get over it. He gets worse. Quickly.

So we all learned something this week. I learned that Micah can now control his emotions and outbursts even when he's so overtired that it would throw even the strongest of mothers who have survived years of sleep deprivation over the edge. (I should have seen this coming. He powered his way through a combination of Overtired and Sleepy Drugs to fuss for 3 hours solid on an airplane trip. The boy has some fortitude.) And Micah learned that getting up before dawn, and staying up for hours past your bedtime, playing in the bedroom, will eventually catch up to you no matter how strong you are.

In the future, son, please just try sleeping. We'd all appreciate it. A lot.