(Parenting.com) -- Bed has always been a place I can't get enough of: the sex; the sleep; cozy afternoons reading; lazy Saturday mornings listening to hyper neighbors mow their lawns.





"I learned that Dad really can be interchangeable with Mom, if only I'll let him."





After my husband and I had kids, bed also became the object of my dearest fantasies -- the oasis I dreamed about in my late-afternoon stupor, when I knew that many hours still lay between me and the sheets.





My covetous view of bed changed, however, midway through my third pregnancy, when some suspicious bleeding led my obstetrician to prescribe bed rest for several days, possibly longer.





"But I have two small kids!" I protested. For those of you more gestationally fortunate, "bed rest" means lying there for hour upon idle hour -- or in the worst cases, week upon idle week -- afraid that even taking a quick shower or reaching for the TV remote might make you lose your baby. Parenting.com: 71 new-mom truths





What would my 4-year-old son and 2-year-old daughter do without Mama to attend to them every second of their exhausting days? Who could I get to fill my maternal shoes? Our relatives live far away. Hiring a nanny was financially out of the question. The answer, of course, was that the children's father would have to be their mother (he runs his own company from home), although I must confess I had my doubts.





George is a wonderful, involved dad; he changes diapers, does "this little piggy," and pitches baseballs equally well -- and equally willingly. But George has always slept straight through 3 a.m. feedings and bad dreams.





I'm the chief of childhood minutiae around here; the one who pours the juice, monitors the wee-wees, and knows what "do the coyote" means (a dry-eye technique for shampooing hair).





On top of being both Mama and Daddy, George would have to play nurse to me too. But -- the biggest, overriding but -- the unborn baby's health was paramount. "Get in bed, stay in bed, and don't worry about a thing," George ordered. Parenting.com: How men change, from lover to husband to father





The first few hours went quickly enough. There was the novelty of gliding between fresh sheets in the middle of the day and the welcome release from snack doling and bottom wiping.





"Mommy's sick," my husband explained to the kids, closing my door. I read straight through one of those books that ordinarily serve as dust catchers. I napped. With the door closed and the fan whirring, you couldn't even tell there were two tots downstairs. It was so quiet. Quiet usually means trouble's afoot. Did George realize this?





"Mommy! Mommy!" I heard them cry. Or did I? My maternal engines idling nervously, I pictured the kids stoned on Cheetos and Popsicles; my daughter's unchanged Pull-Ups sagging to her knees; six straight hours of the Cartoon Network turning their little eyeballs into black-and-white checkerboards. Darn it, why was it so quiet downstairs?





"Mommy! Mommy!" It was the kids, bursting through my bedroom doorway with excited squeals. George had taken them out to dinner and bought each child a toy doctor's kit. They were palpably relieved at being able to take an active part in my scary convalescence.





Solemnly, they listened to my heartbeat, "tested" my blood pressure, and administered innumerable shots. "You must stay in bed!" admonished the 2-year-old, wagging a pudgy finger. I had to admit that, had the circumstances been reversed, with me filling in for a bedridden George, I'd never have thought of something so clever.





Then the object of my admiration appeared. "Okay, you can get up now," he said, handing me my robe. Already? I wondered. Was he throwing in
what was the medical reason What did the dad buy his children to calm their fears? What does the dad buy the kids? What caused the pregnant mother to be put on mandatory bed rest?
suspicious bleeding a toy doctor's kit. toy doctor's kit. suspicious bleeding
question: what was the medical reason, answer: suspicious bleeding | question: What did the dad buy his children to calm their fears?, answer: a toy doctor's kit. | question: What does the dad buy the kids?, answer: toy doctor's kit. | question: What caused the pregnant mother to be put on mandatory bed rest?, answer: suspicious bleeding