Mother's column – a mother's diagnose is the best

Thus, as soon as Sifra sneezes for the first time, I almost jump to the roof. "There we go again", I say to Jan. At night, I quietly count the number of breaths per minute Sifra takes.

After a few days, Jan notices it too: Sifra uses her auxiliary respiratory muscles. Does that mean that she is a bit stuffy? At night, she snorts and squeaks terribly, but we see a happy baby who develops very well by day.

The family doctor will sigh when he sees me coming, I think. Surely, he sees enough overprotective mothers in his clinic.

Neline is married and the mother of five: Martha (8), Abel (7), Jolijn (5), Reinout (3) and Sifra (1).

Yet, I am not reassured. When Sifra breathes so loudly, I question whether it does not take her too much effort. And when she sleeps quietly for a while, I check whether she is still alive.

Overprotective or not, tomorrow I will phone the doctor. He sees the same as we do: a child who breathes a bit strange but who drinks good and is alert. "When you remain concerned, I will refer you", he says when we leave again. And thus, the initiative is ours again.

"Does she have hidden reflux?" my friend asks when she looks at Sifra. I google the symptoms and read that reflux can cause some stomach content to end up in the respiratory tract. It is called atypical reflux, and it can result in breathing problems. Would that be it? Oof, now I am, in addition to an overprotective mother, also someone who finds her own rare diagnoses on Google.

After a few days, I call the family doctor again. Great, I can come to his clinic the same morning. He does not respond much to my Google discoveries. Still, the bags under my eyes tell him enough to refer me to the children's doctor. A bit later, I am on my way to the hospital. The children's doctor takes her time for research and refers me to another doctor to rule out several rare diseases.

A week later, I return to the children's doctor. The preliminary diagnosis? Atypical reflux. A concerned, googling mother is actually not so bad.