A terrible thing happened the other day. My
husband was struck down by tuberculosis, small pox and the
bubonic plague all at once. Actually, it was a mild case
of food poisoning (NO, I did not do it!), but you would
have thought that the Grim Reaper was lying in wait
outside our door by the way he was acting. Covers pulled
up to his eyeballs, four layers of clothing and unable to
answer with much more than a grunt, some would have called
a priest for The Last Rites. Being his wife, however, my
thoughts were anything but blessed...
In a recent study conducted by The
Center for Wives Who Think Husbands Are Wusses, (located
in my computer), the results were unanimous.... Wives
think husbands are wusses. While he was hovering near
death, I entered a moms’ chartroom I frequent and threw
out the question, "If given the choice, would you rather
play nursemaid to an ill husband or get poked in the eye
with a sharp stick?". <continued below>
The response was fast and furious, and
had I been being literal, I would have run out of sharp
sticks. Dialogue scrolled by so quickly, it was hard to
keep up...."My husband is worse than any baby when he gets
sick..." "I would rather have all three kids get sick at
once than have him to take care of....", "My husband loses
all ability to function if he even gets the sniffles..." ,
"Where is my sharp stick..?".
Now I was not surprised at the results
of my poll, rather, I expected them. Regardless of race,
color, or creed the same scenario is played out all over
the world. Husband gets sick, world stops turning. For the
duration of the malady, a man will shut out all outside
influences and convalesce behind drawn shades. This
comatose state will be interrupted only to seek out
attention from his wife, "Honnnnnnnnnnneyyyyyyyyyy, am I
warm?"..."Helllllloooooooooo? Can you get me some 7UP?
Cough, Cough, Hack Hack."..."Whhhheeeeeerrrrree’s the
remote?" Most of us women will cater for the first day.
It’s just that inherent "mothering instinct". Plus,
despite what most men believe, we do not actually want
them to suffer.
Day two? The tide begins to change.
Requests for Jell-O take longer to be filled. Stirring the
bubbles out of his 7UP almost bends the spoon. And as for
the remote control’s whereabouts...WE HOPE YOU NEVER FIND
IT UNDER THAT TANGLE OF SWEATY SHEETS YOU HAVE CREATED
THAT HAVE THE WHOLE ROOM SMELLING LIKE A...(deep
breath)...sorry about that.
Why the hostility, you of the Y
chromosome ask? I’ll explain. You see, as a wife and
mother, we are not allowed to get sick. Oh sure, we might
get the sniffles, the flu, the runs, the plague...BUT IT
DOES NOT MATTER! When WE get sick, the world does not stop
turning, children do not stop being hungry or going to
soccer practice, babies do not stop pooping!
The last time I got the flu, I had an
audience outside the bathroom door for every performance
of "It Came From the Deep"! My need to lie down was
constantly challenged by their need to have me stand
up----try making a peanut butter sandwich from bed! Can’t
happen! Due to my ghastly pallor, they cast me in their
rendition of The Little Mermaid as Ursula...and I WAS
GOOD! My husband’s only concession to my illness was that
he made dinner (he MADE the phone call to Pizza Hut).
Face it, women just aren’t afforded the
opportunity to be wusses. Perhaps, therein lies the lesson
for all of us, X’s and Y’s alike. If wives did not allow
their husbands to disappear from the face of the earth
when sick, and husbands actually picked up the slack when
their wives were ill, then maybe, just maybe...yeah
right...anyone seen my sharp stick?
Linda Sharp is an internationally published humorist,
appearing regularly in publications from Canada to New
Zealand, as well as many parenting websites. She is also
co-creator of the totally irreverent and hilarious Sanity
Central—A Time Out From Parenting. As a mother of three
children (4 if you count her husband ), she firmly
believes that laughter IS the best medicine.
Email the author.
Visit her site.
