Guilt and Worry...Worry and Guilt

I stayed home from work today.  This has been a rough week in my house, and I missed work the past two days as well.  Let me try and explain how physically and emotionally exhausting it is to care for an infant while you yourself feel like you are going to die.  Imagine the hardest thing you have ever had to do.  Maybe it was participating in a triathlon, or something similar.  Now imagine doing it while you are exhausted, and then repeating it for 10 days straight.  Ok now imagine doing it again, but this time while you are sick.  The sick that normally leaves you laid up in bed with no contact with the outside world for at least 48 hours.  I will tell you, no matter how physically sick you are, it doesn't compare to the sickness you feel in your stomach thinking your little one could end up feeling this way.  I thought my biggest worry of the week had come true last night, I thought my son was getting this awful stomach bug.
Normally he is up at 8:00 am like clockwork, but we had a pretty long night.  There was a bit of crying, a terrible diaper before bed time, and I swear if my neighbors didn't hear his gas, they had to have smelled it.  So this morning around 8:20 am, while he was sleeping on my chest better than he had slept all night, I finally decided to let my boss know I was going to stay home again today.  I wanted to be home with him if he was going to go through this, but I also wasn't feeling too hot after being up all night.  He woke up around 8:50 am and we came into the living room for our morning "bites".  After I fed him he played for a little while.  I watched him as he played, and I thought to myself, maybe it was just something he ate and he will be fine.  Maybe I should go on into work.  After all, I'm pretty sure this will use my last sick day, and if I get ready now I'll be less than two hours late.  As for me?  I have a slight headache and I've only gone to the bathroom three times this morning.  I doubt I'm even contagious anymore.  But what does any of this have to do with me?

This is where it gets hard.
The guilt...he already knows we're in routine for him to be spending the day with mommy.  What if I break his heart by leaving him now.  I know it will break mine.  How do I give up a day with him that I have already been given permission to have?  Voluntarily...by deciding to go into work.
The worry...It is my fault that this may be my last sick day.  I could have gone to work when my three month old had his first cold (1 day).  I could have gone to work, and waited on a phone call while my dad was in the hospital (2 days).  The rash my son had a couple weeks ago turned out to just be eczema, it could have waited rather than taking time off work to take him to the doctor (1/2 day).  I only get 6 days a year.  One of the last two days I asked for in advance, so it didn't count as a sick day.  The other day and today will.  That is 5 1/2 days.   It is May.  I don't worry about me getting sick, I worry about him.
The worry...What if something happens or he gets sick?  We have to go through a whole half of winter season!  What if I start to leave for work one day when he's not feeling well as a small toddler, so he clings to me?  I know I won't be able to leave him.  I know I won't.  So I know I will get in trouble at work, because I have used all 6 of my sick days.
The guilt...I shouldn't have to worry about anything but him.  He should be my only priority, and if I want to be able to comfortably stay home with him today just in case he needs extra snuggles, I should be able to do that.

Then I pick him up and he curls his little legs up to me and sinks his head into my chest...yea, mommy is not going anywhere today.  

This is not the only time I have felt an extreme amount of guilt or worry over something that may have otherwise seemed manageable.  For example, the first day I was sick, as hard as it was on me I kept him with me.  I didn't even ask anyone to come and help because I knew that would be my only day off with him for another week.  Plus I had just given up a day with him to clean the house less than a week ago.  So I sucked it up, and I took care of him myself (at this point I thought I had ate something, never would have thought I could be contagious). As hard as it was on me, it was easier than handling the guilt of not spending the day with him.

I can't handle seeing or hearing anything about a child who is sick.  Not sick like get better sick, sick like big time sick.  I do not know how mothers handle that, and my heart aches for them.  When I look into the eyes of those children, I see the innocence of my son looking back at me.  I worry constantly.  What is this bump?  Has he peed enough? Is he peeing too much?  Should his poop look like that?  Is this normal?  My husband would tell me not to.  He would tell me, "The tongue has the power of life and death, and those who love it will eat its fruit" (Proverbs 18:21).  And I completely agree, so I am ever so careful not to think or speak the worst.  But then I worry what if my faith leads me to denial.  Maybe I worry because the enemy is trying to make me think my faith will lead me to denial.  Or maybe, just maybe I worry,

because motherhood.