ep 2

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[00:00:00] Sick season is here, and if it feels like your entire household is a rotating Petri dish, you're not imagining it. You are juggling school calls, canceled plans, and that never ending mental math of do we go, do we stay? Do I even have the energy to decide?

It's exhausting. And not just for the kids, for you, the mom who's expected to hold it all together, even when you're running on empty.

That's why I called in Dr. Mona Amin, pediatrician, mom and founder of Peds Doc Talk to help us reframe how we care for our families without abandoning ourself. This one's one part gut check, one part permission slip, and it might just change how you move through this season my name's Krissy Bold. I'm a mom to two little boys, and this is Mom's Guide to Finding Herself.

Every year around this time, I brace myself, not just for the sniffles and fevers, but for the avalanche of decision fatigue that comes with them. Do we cancel the birthday [00:01:00] party? Do we go to story time with just a cough? Am I being too careful or not careful enough? Honestly, it's not just the logistics that wears me down.

It's the emotional load. It's being the one expected to know what to do to stay calm while everyone else is melting down, to somehow be the nurse and the planner and the emotional anchor, even when I'm running a fever myself. We all know those moments. Maybe one of the kids has an ear infection, but you're not quite sure, and then the other one is just cranky enough that maybe they do too. And then you're feeling achy and have watery eyes, and you're having that.

Please don't make me move. Kind of cold. You lay wherever you can. Maybe it's on the playroom floor, wrapped in a blanket, like a sad burrito while the kids are playing all around you building magnet tile cities on your legs.

you're Too tired to parent, but you're too needed to rest. And all you [00:02:00] can think is this can't be how every winter goes. So, if you're in there right now, if you're in the thick of sixth season or you just know that it's coming and you are dreading it and already have zero bandwidth and maybe even less patience for yourself, you're not alone.

This episode is your reset button, a moment to pause, breathe, and remind yourself you are doing a good job and you deserve care too. I brought in Dr. Mona Amin to help take some of that mental load off your plate. Dr. Mona is a name that you might recognize from Peds Doc talk or maybe the New York Times or Time Magazine or Good Morning America. She's a board certified pediatrician, IBCLC and mom of two who has built a powerful platform helping families raise confident, resilient children through mindful, practical parenting guidance.

And today she's here to tell us what red flags to actually look out for.

Krissy: Dr. Mona, thank you so much for coming back this week.

I am so excited to chat with you about how we can support [00:03:00] ourselves throughout this sick season that we are in.

Mona: Oh, I'm so happy to be here. And you said it perfectly. We take care of our kids, but we gotta take care of ourselves so that we can take care of them.

Krissy: No kidding, right? So we know that this is gonna happen. We know our kids are gonna be sick over and over and over again through the next few months, but when do we actually need to worry about it? I think since COVID, everything feels like a red flag, but what are the actual red flag symptoms that we need to stay home from the library or school or whatever we're doing in our lives?

Mona: So there's gonna be so much nuance to this answer based on the illness. But overall, and I would love to, I wanna put that disclaimer because if I don't cover something, make sure you speak to a, like a clinician. Overall, if your child is febrile, which means have a fe has a fever, you need to keep them home.

This is because their body is fighting, whether it a virus, a bacteria, whatever it is. They need to recover. And this is twofold to protect other people from whatever germs they're spreading, because they're more likely to be contagious if they're febrile, but also for them, like [00:04:00] let them rest. Like they don't need to be partying at a birthday party.

They don't need to be at a, at a gym. They need to be at home resting, hydrating. Maybe you need to give some antipyretic, which is like ibuprofen or acetaminophen. So that is number one. Number two is if there. If they're not, if, even if they don't have a fever, if you have used any fever reducing medicines in the last 24 hours.

You need to keep them home until they are fever free and anti fever medicine free for 24 hours. And this is so key because what happens, and I've seen it with my own children because I'm always doing my own little experiments, is that you, your kid, your kid could wake up at 7:00 AM with no fever and you're like, sweet.

Send them to school, but they had a fever the night before at like 5:00 PM right? And you medicated that. So now you, at 7:00 AM you say, sweet, let's go to school. Then you get that phone call at noon. Hey, little Jimmy has, you know, spiked a fever. Oh, what [00:05:00] happened? They didn't get that full 24 hours to make sure that their body is healing and that they're fever free.

So you, your medicine could have masked that it could have made them feel better, but you have to be med free. And fever free for 24 hours to enjoy those social activities. With that same rule, we don't wanna get other people contagious, and we also wanna monitor the child. And so for example, if you wake up at 7:00 AM and your kid has no fever, awesome.

We're gonna now look at the rest of the day, right? If the child has no fever the rest of the day, you didn't give any Motrin or Tylenol for pain, and they wake up the next morning, fever free. Off to school. They go birthday parties, here we come. All of that stuff can happen. And then in terms of like keeping them home for various illnesses, I have a bunch of resources, but like.

Hand, foot and mouth diarrhea, vomiting,

Krissy: Yeah.

Mona: good to get the guidance from the clinician. But also your daycare or school may have their own protocols, right? Like

Krissy: Yeah.

Mona: who aren't, who are kids who are in diapers, they may say like the, the [00:06:00] di the poop has to be contained in the diaper. And if it's not, they can't come for things like diarrhea, right?

Or they can't have more than three loose poops. And so I give that sort of guidance for that, like diarrhea to run it by your cl like. The clinician or the preschool or the school and things like hand, foot, and mouth, which is also annoyingly common. The scabs have to be scab, like the lesions on the, the hands and the feet have to be scabbed over to be able to go back.

And then my last mommy rule, which I know is hard, is that if you. Don't wanna take care of them because they're still irritable and cranky and you're like, God, this is so headachey. Why would you think that they're ready to go back to school? Right? Like, if they're not behaving well, do not send them if they're recovering from an illness and you know your kid.

Right? In our last episode we talked about intuition, but if you're like, they just had a fever, but they are so cranky. Even without the fever,

Krissy: yeah,

Mona: wouldn't push it to send them back because maybe another fever's gonna spike. Maybe they're not hydrated, and I wouldn't wanna put that on a school teacher [00:07:00] or another, you know, like a preschool teacher to have to monitor that and work with that.

And you can use your discretion, but medical rule, fever free, med free for 24 hours and then all those nuanced illnesses run it by a clinician or the school system.

Krissy: That's so interesting. I, what I find really fascinating is you didn't say a thing about runny noses because we've all been

Mona: Oh yes. Yeah.

Krissy: at the library and there is that little kid that starts crawling towards you and they get a, they're so cute and they're like cooing. And then you see their nose and it's just like crusted over.

You're like, no,

Mona: Yeah,

Krissy: from me.

Mona: biohazard. Exactly. I mean, if we kept home every snotty kid, there would be no child in childcare and

Krissy: sure.

Mona: so that's up to a parent to say like, if your kid wakes, so if my kid wakes up with a runny nose. The first thing I'm doing is checking their temperature, and I'm also looking at their behavior.

And this is a privilege and I I, I wanna be very clear that it is a privilege to be able to keep your kid home in America, meaning as working parents without a, a village right [00:08:00] In. It's hard because even, I know a lot of work environments don't allow. PTO, and it's so stressful, and I see this in my office and I empathize with families, and I used to be that family because I used to work a full-time clinical job where I ran outta sick days because I was taking them for my son.

And so I want put that out there that I understand. It's a privilege to be able to keep your kid home, but it's not only important and it's not only important for. Them, but other people. And it's important for policies to be in place that we allow that, and that's obviously a bigger conversation. Because yeah, we can't keep a runny nose home.

It's check them if they're behaving off. Like if they're super cranky and you're like, oh man, this is not their normal crank. Like this is something weird. Or if they have a fever. It would be useful to keep them home that day. Obviously if they had the fever, but even if they're super cranky to monitor.

Right. And I use this rule for both of my children. My daughter is not in childcare yet but actually she started in August, so she kind of is. But she goes, she [00:09:00] goes two mornings a week and. That's, that's the rules we use, you know, and my son, thankfully is older, so he is not getting sick nearly as much.

Bless, bless him. But it's that same rule, right? I'm looking at the runny nose plus something else. And you can't, you can't keep them home for just a runny nose. And I think that that makes some parents really upset, but.

Krissy: Yeah.

Mona: up to our responsibility and integrity to be like, did I actually take a temperature?

Did I,

Krissy: Yeah.

Mona: I, did they have a fever and did I just medicate and send them? Which a lot of parents do because of the lack of help, and

Krissy: Yeah.

Mona: make it okay. But I understand if that makes sense, why a parent feels in that dilemma that they have to do that. But I wish that wasn't the case.

Krissy: No, I get it. For sure. You have to do what you have to do if you

Mona: Yeah.

Krissy: You, I mean, it's

Mona: But it's, but it's not. Right. Right. Like, and I'm not ever gonna say that. That's okay, but I, I, I,

Krissy: yeah,

Mona: when moms are in my office and they're like, I have no choice. I'm like, I have to tell you what's right. But you get to do what you wanna do with that information. And I, I'm, and it, and people might be like, gasping, but I can't be in her [00:10:00] shoes and have her lose her job because I, you know, her kid has to be at home now.

And that is such a sad reality. But of course, you asked me the question about what to look out for and that's what I'll always go. But I do wanna provide that sort of understanding and empathy as a pediatrician who works with so many different families that I respect that there are certain circumstances that you may not listen to my advice, but I hope that we all can try our best to do so.

Okay. Quick pause. If this season has you feeling like you're just surviving one snotty week after another, I wanna invite you to something gentle and grounding.

It's called the Mom Moment Memo. These are short, encouraging emails I send out during the week with stories and simple ideas to reduce mom guilt, find little joys, and remind you that you're still a whole person. You might find some reframes that help you bust through some of that mom guilt, a spark of curiosity or a grounding question,

something that you can read in three minutes or less.

Head to Mom identity project.com/memo to sign up for free. It's your little pocket of com straight from [00:11:00] me to you.

Krissy: Now let's talk about some of the optional things, because a lot of us have newborns or elderly grandparents, or even our own children are medically fragile. So what are some of the best ways that we can protect them while still allowing ourselves some normalcy?

Mona: I love that and it's a good, it's a good answer for everybody because I have some families who are very risk averse. Like they don't wanna get sick. Even if their children are healthy, they don't have newborns or grandparents. So it comes down to looking at your big picture of germ reduction strategies, right?

So rather than focusing on, I can't get sick. I can't get sick, you wanna focus on, we're gonna stay healthy, we're gonna be great if we get sick, we're a mentality thing in my mind, right? If we're gonna get sick, we're gonna ride it, right? Living in fear. What that does is that increases your cortisol, it makes you not sleep, and what does that do?

Take your immune system. Right. So illness is inevitable. It is. And I see a lot of a cyclical thing that when we're, the kids are getting sick, well the kids are getting sick, the parents are stressed. It's like this [00:12:00] vicious cycle that just continues and I'm like. What is the stressing going to do for this situation?

It's not making your kid get better faster. So we need to remember that now we have to deal with the cards that we have at this moment, right? I've been there as well. I've been that mom, right? That was dealing with the callouts. And a lot of it is external. So what we wanna do is first focus on the big things, which is vaccinating against the preventable things that we can, right?

So hopefully you're getting the required vaccinations for optional ones like. Flu. I highly recommend that. RSV for the babies, if that's, you know, something that's being offered, I would highly recommend that COVID is a personal kind of decision based on what you've seen with COVID in terms of has your kid had it, have they not?

But it is a good, important conversation to have with the pediatrician. And then what we're focusing on is the basics. Hand hygiene, like I cannot express how useful hand hygiene is. What does this mean? Mom, dad, any caregiver in the home is washing their hand before they're touching the newborn, before they're touching anybody in the house.

Right? And but if they're, [00:13:00] if grandpa or grandma are there and they're older, right? We are washing our hands before we prepare food, basic hand hygiene. The next is protecting our respiratory germs. And I'm a big believer in masking still, like in our homes, if. Someone is sick and we're trying to protect other more vulnerable people.

So when my son was younger, was younger, and my daughter was a newborn and he was bringing home the germs, he was like three, three and a half, right? I had a mask around the family. I also mask because my nanny is very germ averse and so I mask when I'm sick. My husband mask when, so it's like, it's something that we do that adds an extra layer so we're not coughing up our germs into the air.

And that is gonna get to other people. And it's really important, you know, you can do the sanitizing of surfaces, but really it comes down to hand hygiene. Watching things like your phone, which obviously are going to have like more of the germs, you know? And then remembering how vital sleep is, right?

Like sleep is one of those things that we forget, especially when [00:14:00] we're stressed. But if someone is sick in the house, you are not going to scroll at night. You are going to go to bed early. You're going to prioritize your sleep so that you can be rested for the wake up that you can be rested for. Uh, handling that and also protect your immune system so that it doesn't come through the entire house.

And then my other big tip is when people are sick, focusing on getting outside if possible. If the weather cooperates, and I'm not saying to go to the playground and touch all the surfaces, but go for a walk. If you have an area, like a park where you can set up and be away from other people, like we do, like go and get sunlight, go and get nature, because it really.

Does help our healing system, right? And wanna be clear that I'm not telling you to go play with a friend in the park and spread the germs, but like, you can set up a pic, like a little blanket if it's good weather and not freezing, or not, you know like amenable to, you know, not having rain or anything.

And just enjoy, get outside. You don't have to coop up because that also can just help your mental health to go for a stroll, go for a drive, like get out of your [00:15:00] house. And I think what happens is that we think we gotta stay home. I get it. You can't go to like play dates and all that, but you do not have to be suffocated in your home, breathing the germy air.

Like go for a walk, enjoy. Let your kid who's sick go for a stroll. You know, like it's okay for them to be outside and it's actually better for their immune system. Of course the nuances, if they have any respiratory difficulty, asthma, and it's a cold day, watch those symptoms. But if they're okay being outside in cold temps, let them enjoy it.

Krissy: Yeah. I love that tip so much. So I am very germ reversed because I have an immunocompromised family

Mona: Yes,

Krissy: you know, through COVID we kinda trained ourselves to be extra careful if we wanna see this person and that was what we wanted to do. So we've kind of figured, it's been so tricky for us, but to think back to the things that we did during the winter and COVID, I live in New Hampshire, so it gets real cold, but we still saw our friends.

All bundled up out on the deck for a few minutes at a time, and it truly did make a big difference. [00:16:00] So if, if we're in a situation where we're making those kinds of choices, where maybe something's going around real, maybe the flu's at its peak, we can still see our friends. Maybe it is just a walk around the block though, and

Mona: Yeah.

Krissy: okay.

And that can be fulfilling.

Mona: And I think it's so important to, 'cause we have to remember how important connection and community are, especially when we're stressed and illness is gonna bring stress, right? So it's also about talking to the family. Like I give this example like. I have a great group of friends and we are so transparent about illness, right?

So like, Hey, Ryan was sick earlier. How do you feel about, you know, he doesn't have a fever, but he has a runny nose. Like, are you good? Like, and that's gonna look different for every family. So like, your family may say, I'm not good with that. Like, you know, and, and I love that openness and transparency in friendships because.

I don't mind a snotty kid near my kid because we are not immunocompromised. Right. And my kid is exposed to germs at daycare anyways. Or preschool and school. Right. If they're febrile though, if I know that they have flu, [00:17:00] if I know that there's a diagnosis, of course they should be staying home. But like

Krissy: runny

Mona: nose isn't gonna send me like, panicking.

Because they're exposed to that. Right. And I know that and COVID taught me about that, you know, like that you can't. Avoid everything, but everyone's gonna have a different threshold. And I think it's so important to remember the reasons and understand that we may not ever fully know why a family may make the choices that they do.

But what we can do is be transparent, ask questions, and give honest responses of like, I don't feel comfortable, or, Hey, thank you so much. And that I think is the, the bottom line here, right? Is how do we respect others so that we can still see them? And be transparent and respect the fact that everyone may have different situation or an immunocompromised child or a family member that we may not know about.

That is why they don't wanna hang out. And it's not personal, it's just the fact that they're trying to protect their family the best way they can.

Krissy: Definitely, and we don't have to have it be black and white of

Mona: right.

Krissy: how we always operate. If you have a big family gathering coming up and you can avoid going to the library [00:18:00] or going to a PlayPlace, then maybe for a few days just don't go out and do those

Mona: Exactly. It's, it's about stacked risk reduction, right? So like I give the example that if we're traveling. I don't love, like I, I have a very, I'm a little stressed sending my kid, my kids to school the week before we travel because I'm like, Hmm, what if they pick up something? But I still do it and it's fine.

But like for my younger, like when Ryan, when he was getting sick a lot, I would pull him out and I was like, listen, sweetie went to my husband. I'm like, we gotta figure this out because we're about to travel. And he keeps picking up these germs that I don't wanna ruin our trip and. It's not always like that, right?

It's not always a perfect science like that, but it's stacked risk reduction, right? If the more exposures you have, so you're going to a play date, you're going to the, the museum, you're going to an indoor play gym, you're going to XY. Like all these places, you are adding up germ exposure, right? So exactly that.

You can reduce your risk by saying. This one event is really important to me. Yes, I get it that it's going to have germ exposure, but to lower my risk, let's [00:19:00] remove all the other things that may not be needed. Let's send them to school, do this event, but everything else, miscellaneous, like the part dates and all that.

For now, we say no.

Krissy: Yeah. Yep. And it doesn't have to be the whole winter. It

Mona: Exactly,

Krissy: the

Mona: let's, and you make it, you get to make those decisions. And that's the thing, right? Like, and it's, but it's all about sustainability. And I talked about that a lot in the pandemic for anyone who followed me then, is that

Krissy: Mm.

Mona: people were like, should I pull my kid outta daycare? Like, everyone's getting sick.

Should I pull my kid out? I'm like, what is sustainable for your family? Like speaking about if a second sibling was being born, right? I'm like. I, that's not, that was impossible for me. Like, I couldn't pull out my son because he would drive us nuts in if he was home at three and a half years old with a newborn.

So we kept him in. Right. Did he bring home germs? Yeah. My, my daughter got COVID at four months from him, and

Krissy: Yep.

Mona: but it's life, right? I mean, I couldn't control that, but we, we kept her, you know, virus free for four months, but for a second sibling, I was like, Hey, at least we made it four months. Like that's pretty good.[00:20:00]

Yeah, but it's just such a reality that you gotta decide what is the sustainable plan for your family for the winter to get through, to still have the socialization that you feel like you need for your mental health, but not have that socialization give you anxiety. Like it's a balance of deciding what is enough, what is too much, is the social gathering giving more me more anxiety because I'm germ, I'm germ averse?

Then obviously then you have to make a decision on what makes the most sense for you.

Krissy: I love that advice so much. Now, there's another side to this coin here where our children are perfectly healthy and we are not. Now,

Mona: Yeah.

Krissy: talked about masking yourself around the house, but that is just the tip of the iceberg for when mom is sick, because mom is not allowed to

Mona: Yeah, and I, I've always thought, I'm like, is it worse? Obviously the worst situation is everyone's sick at the same time. Like, that's obviously the worst. But I, I actually agree that it is harder to be the sick adult taking care of healthy children than the reverse. And I agree with that because you are just so tired, and I've been there.

What I, and I've been [00:21:00] there in two situations. I've been there when I don't have any community and village and I've been there with my village, so I've seen both sides. It is harder if you have no help, right? I mean, we didn't, A lot of us did that in the pandemic where our kid got sick or we got sick.

Let's use the example of us getting sick and it, you couldn't ship the kid off to grandma's or you couldn't have anyone come into the home because everyone was worried. Right? And that becomes survival mode. And that is, what do you need to survive? So does that mean you are leaning on screen time more than you normally would?

Go for it. Does that mean that you are doing more takeout delivery frozen foods for your child than you normally would? Because cooking is not in your on your radar because you're not feeling well? Do it. Does that mean that you're laying on your couch and letting your kid run amok? And don't worry about cleaning.

Do it. You gotta think about survival mode and that's for you. And then using that example is that when your kid finally goes to bed, you are knocking out, you are going to bed, you are getting the rest, you are not getting on your phone. You got to get [00:22:00] the sleep and rest your body needs. And when you do have access to help, maybe your partner is home, maybe you do have a babysitter, you are going to use that time.

To heal your body and rest, you are not gonna use that to catch up on work. You need to heal so that you can come back to it. And then the flip side, if you have help. You are going to make clear that, hey, I'm not feeling good and I do this with my nanny. I'm like, Hey, I, I'm coming down with something. I'm gonna mask up and just stay in my room.

I'll come down and wash your hands, do all the things that I mentioned earlier to protect the people who are helping you. Right? And I'm very respectful of our nanny. Like, she doesn't have any underlying medical issue, but she just does not like germs and. While that she takes care of children. But I'm like, I respect it.

Like I respect it. I also don't like germs being a pediatrician,

Krissy: Yeah.

Mona: I respect her and her, her desire to come and help my family by masking. And do we mask when it's US four, our immediate family? No, but I mask when she's in my house because out of [00:23:00] respect to the fact that she would like that, I ask her what she would want, you know, and she Clorox wipes like everything in the house and like does all that and wears the gloves and she's like.

Can you just get me more wipes and get me more gloves? I'm like, hands down, I'll do whatever you need to do for helping clean, but that's what she needs. I love it. I'm, I'm fine, but that's not what I normally do. But if she wants that, I am so appreciative of the fact that now I have a nanny who can be there while I nap for four hours.

Amazing. Right? And I've seen both sides of the coin, and I know how hard it is, but use your community if you have it. And then if you don't have that community survival mode. Use your fake tech community, which is like your, you know, your screen time or takeout, all of that, whatever it is that takes up your time.

Outsource it in an easy way so that you can rest and survive through this process.

Krissy: Definitely, I know that every parent does it. I don't

Mona: Oh yeah.

Krissy: you saw the, the Miss Rachel, uh, that she put out with her first sickness with her newborn where she [00:24:00] put on the mama with her baby. And it, it was such a cute moment for me of being like, okay, if Miss Rachel can do it, I can do it. It's okay.

Mona: So funny. I didn't see that. And that's exactly the point, right? Everybody's doing it. Not everybody talks about it. And the people who are saying they don't do it, they may not be your cup of tea. And that's, that's normal. Like this is, I can say this as a pediatrician who sees so many patients and has this online platform, everybody, mostly everybody.

And if they're not, they're lying to you.

Krissy: Yes, yes. Uh, think everybody's lying about something.

Mona: Yes.

Krissy: I'll say that. I love also how you circled back to the reiterating how important sleep is and putting away your phone and just going to sleep

Mona: Yeah.

Krissy: I think that is something that even in the moment, it sounds like you maybe have said this to yourself a few times the way you said it, because I have to say it to myself all the time, but the, the sleep, hearing you say it twice is so powerful for me.

How important sleep is.

Mona: There is one thing that I, I want parents to put on their computer or on their phone, [00:25:00] like a post-it note. So what I started doing is I call things wasted energy, and what that means is if I'm doing something that's wasting my energy, that's not adding value to my life. I have a reminder on my calendar and as a type A person, I'm always looking at my to-do list, right?

There's a big banner on my to-do list that says Wasted energy. So it's a prompt in my brain that if I'm doing something that's not useful for my time or resting my brain, it's wasted energy, right? Like, so scrolling is an example. I wanna be very clear that I, I would love people looking at my platform, but if you're late at night when you could be doing maybe.

Rest or reading something for yourself or something for you. And if scrolling is for you, awesome. But then you need to have a buffer between scrolling time and bedtime. You cannot be scrolling in bed, so you need to put a reminder that says, wasted energy, even if it's an alarm that comes up at 10 30, that reminds you.

Wasted energy alarm. Like are you wasting your energy right now? Because then that's gonna impact your sleep. And I'm very big on sleep [00:26:00] quality. Not just hours, but like anxiety. The thoughts in our head that I've been there. I was recently there earlier this year that I was like, in this summer phase of like my business, like what are we doing with our life and moving and my kids and all this.

And I was like not sleeping well. And I had to really stop the doom scrolling the dopamine hits from checking all X, Y, and Z and say. Clear your brain. Use your energy resources. We only have a finite amount of mental, mental resources, and we can't be wasting it on wasted energy.

Krissy: That's so powerful. I love that takeaway. Now, the last thing I wanna talk about here is, I shouldn't say it's the last thing I wanna talk about so many other things, but the last thing we will talk about here is the spiral we get into. When our kids are sick back to back to back, and you feel like there is no reprieve and you must be doing something wrong, can you tell us things that we can say to ourselves in those moments of like, we're not doing anything wrong.

This is just a bout of bad luck, or whatever it might be.[00:27:00]

Mona: I love that. And to backtrack just a tad, I do have a great blog that talks about when to be concerned. Maybe I'll add that to you and send it to as a link for your listeners. Just because to know when to be worried about back-to-back illness, because the advice I'm about to give is, is not including if it's a serious issue, right?

Like is there a bacterial process? Is there something? But because sometimes back to back illnesses are an issue but most of the time. 95% of the time, I would say it is the, the normal nature of a child. And I've been there, my son, when he started preschool at 14 months around 19 months when everything opened up with COVID, he was sick every seven to 10 days.

And I thought I was going to lose my damn mind. And what I want to tell you, and these are mantras that you'll tell yourself. Healing happens. That's one of my favorite mantras that I wanna get put on a t-shirt. That if they're gonna get better, and I want you to put that in your brain, that they're gonna get better.

And if I'm worried about my kid, I can go to the pediatrician and get some advice, right? That you are [00:28:00] not alone in the illness That. It. They're gonna heal. Most kids heal from illnesses, and if there is a red flag or a concern, I'm going to reach out. I'm going to advocate for my kid. I'm going to talk to someone who knows more than I do about illnesses, like a pediatrician, and I'm gonna get the help I need.

You're never alone because it can feel so isolating and that healing will happen. It does. And that also remember that it's not your fault. I think we put so much guilt on ourselves when our kids are sick. So that narrative of. I didn't give them the right foods. I, I let them have too much sugar. I let them go to that party.

I, you know, I gave, I gave them takeout when I didn't home cook a meal. We are going to shame ourselves and guilt ourselves with every decision we make when our kids are sick back to back. But I can tell you it's gonna get better and you could still do those same things and they could never be sick for like nine months.

And it's not those factors all the time, right? Sure. Sleep matters. Sure. The foods we eat matter, but giving them a chicken nugget or a goldfish cracker [00:29:00] did not lead them down the road of getting a viral illness. Okay? It's, it's a big picture of immune health and I think we shame ourselves so much and that has no place in healing.

Right? Going back to the healing happens, we got to focus on the kid in front of us. So when you're feeling like you're spiraling. You have to ground yourself and part of grounding is looking at the kid in front of you and saying. I can't control what happened and how this illness happened. I cannot control what's going to happen with this illness.

All I can control right now is that my kid is sick and I can deal with the fevers that come. I can deal with the vomiting that comes, and I'm going to take care of this child in front of me and give them what they need in this moment, and that is what I would want in return when I'm sick. If I'm sick, I do not want someone who's caring for me that's anxious, that's worried, that's like panicking, that's spiraling.

I want a. Calm presence that's going to lead me through this illness. And that is how they also learn to heal, right? Like I don't baby my kids when they're sick. What I mean is I [00:30:00] don't like, oh baby, you're sick. But I don't say Suck it up, right? There's this balance of like, with my son, especially, 'cause he is older, I'm like, I know you don't feel good.

I hate feeling sick, but you know what's really gonna help you. It's gonna help when you rest. It's gonna help when you drink water. It's gonna help eating your dinner. And I know that, right? Like that is what's gonna help you. And he has now embodied that sort of understanding that now when he gets better, he says to himself, mommy, I'm feeling better because I slept Mommy.

I'm feeling better because I drink my water. And these are not lies. These are real realities that helps our immune system and helps us heal. And so embody that. But we can only do that if we believe it. We can only do that if we ground ourselves and we tell ourselves that this is a moment, they're not gonna be sick forever.

Do not think. Worst case scenario all the time. I can tell you as a, as a pediatrician for 10 years, most kids make very good recoveries when they're sick. Do I see a lot of rarities? Absolutely. But when you are dealing with a kid, if the first thing you hear is that video on social of [00:31:00] that child who ended up in the ICU, that's not gonna serve you well.

You are going to think. My kid is going to be okay, and I'm going to do whatever I can to support them now, and if they're not okay, we'll get the help we need. That is how I want you to approach every illness, whether it's back to back, whether it's spaced out, so that you do not get into that anxiety spiral that you're failing or that you're failing them because that has no, no space and no place in healing.

Krissy: I love this conversation so much. Your approach to all of this is like the perfect mix of like nurturing, but also tough love.

Mona: Yes. Yes.

Krissy: you

Mona: That's.

Krissy: be okay.

Mona: Yeah. And that's how I parent. That's literally how I parent my kids. And that's how I approach my advice for, for peers like my parents, right? Like, you can't, you, I'm not saying that we have to, you, you, it's hard. Like we're never gonna deny the fact that all of this is hard. But what are our options here?

We can sulk and be upset. We, we can say, here's what my cards are right now, and how am I gonna deal with them? Right? And that's how we deal with life. And it's a good reminder for our [00:32:00] children, right? Like when I'm sick too, I, I used to be very, like, I don't feel good. Because I got that sympathy from my parents, right.

And I learned as a grownup. That's kind of annoying shit. Like, come on. Like, so with my son, he's like, mommy, you're not feeling good. I'm like, yeah, sweetie, but you know what I'm gonna do? I'm gonna go to bed early, yet when I put you to bed, or I'm going, it's okay. You know, Maggie's here and she helped me today.

That's my nanny's name. Like I, you, I remind him of the things that help us heal so that there's a embodiment of that. And it's a reminder to ourselves that that's what we need when we're not feeling good.

Krissy: I love this. I love this so much. Now tell us where we can learn more about you and more

Mona: Yeah, so like I said, I have so many resources. You can go to my website and search like what, you know, illness and I have a whole database. I actually have a free guide with all of my illness content that like, you know, gives you all of that sort of what to do with different illnesses. Peds doc talk is my handle on Instagram.

P-E-D-S-D-O-C-T-A-L-K. My website is the same. Peds doc do peds doc talk.com, tongue [00:33:00] twister. And then the podcast is the same Peds doc talk podcast and then the YouTube. So the Instagram and the website are your hub. There's so much guidance there. I have all my stuff online that you can search. You can Google peds doc talk and a key word now because everything comes up thanks to SEO, like search engine optimization.

So I have. Everything that you can imagine, and I continue to create content for what my community needs. So keep coming in. Follow and I'll maybe make something that you need if I don't have it already.

Krissy: Uh, well, we're so grateful for the work that you do,

Mona: Thank you.

Krissy: patients, for your children, and then for the broader community. We

Mona: Thank you.

Krissy: to have you.

Mona: Thank you. It's such an honor. Thank you for having me.

If you learn something from Dr. Mona today, let me know in the reviews. And while you're there, leave me a five star rating. Make sure you share this with a friend who might also be feeling the six season fatigue and isn't really sure what to do next. You can also send me a message over on Instagram or TikTok at Mom Identity Project to let me know what you took away from this episode.

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