Parents Talk: A Child In Pain

Two things happened in our house over the last 24 hours. My 6-month-old spent a few hours screaming in pain while visiting Nana and PapPap tried to comfort her. And I developed a nasty ear ache—something I don't think I've had since the fifth grade.

When it came to me, I took some sinus medicine and spent a few hours resting my head on an ice pack. And this morning I'm feeling much better.

My daughter, who's had tummy issues the last few months, is doing better, too, thought I'm not sure why. Yesterday we tried just about everything we could think of to make her feel better more comfortable: we gave her a warm bath, we rubbed her tummy, we gave her cold teething rings, we held her and walked around with her, and finally we called the nurse—who didn't have anything new to add to our efforts.

The problem is that we really didn't know what was wrong with our child. She hasn't even said her first word. We can tell by the way she cries whether she's hungry, tired or uncomfortable, but uncomfortable is a big category.

I never knew how hard it would be to watch my daughter sob tears while she held me tightly, as if begging me to fix whatever was wrong. It's so hard to stay in control and soothe her when I just want to say, "What's wrong? What can I do?"

The nurse told us she could be constipated, teething, having a growth spurt, all of those, or none of those. And as my ear throbbed, I wondered how I'd know if she had something like an ear ache.

My husband and I agreed—not knowing how to comfort my child is one of the most difficult apects of parenting we've faced in our six months at the job.

So here are a few question to other parents or caregivers out there. What do you do when your child is in pain and you don't know how to comfort him/her? Can you relate to the helplessness you feel holding her when she's clearly miserable? What advice would you give to people like me—a new parent going through this for the first time?

About this column: Local moms and dads give their take on current issues affecting their family and yours. We encourage you to take part in the discussion.