The only kid-free moments I’ve had this week have involved either meetings or sleep, and there hasn’t been a whole lot of the latter. Flu, respiratory bugs, colds, coughs, holidays from school, escalating outside responsibilities—you name it, we’ve had it in the past few days. Even the cat contributed by suddenly becoming ill and requiring an urgent visit to the vet.

The week has offered a few positive notes, however. Four-and-a-half year old “Emmie” has been glued to my side all week due to her cold-flu-whatever-the-heck-it-is, and she’s made it clear that despite feeling icky, she’s loved spending this much time with me. I’ve been rewarded with an abundance of hugs, kisses and her eyelash-batting, “Mommy, I love you,” multiple times each day. While inarguably dramatic, Emmie’s affections are warm and genuine and work the same magic as the sudden appearance of a double rainbow on a misty, gloomy day. This is what Emmie is like in her sweet moments, and it’s what gets me through the tougher preschooler times.

If Emmie’s expressions of affection are a rainbow, a similar gesture by seven-and-a-half year old “Jack” is like the pot of gold at the rainbow’s end. Emmie wraps her arms around me and kisses me and tells me how much she loves me, but you can look up and down, high and low for a similar expression from Jack and in all likelihood, you’ll never see one.

But I’ve learned that I can find that pot of gold if I know where to look. Jack simply has his own way of telling me how much I mean to him. Yesterday, for example, he tackled me.

We’d played a few games of Mastermind together (remember Mastermind?) and then a few raucous rounds of table-sized air hockey while Emmie napped. We goofed around and sent the tiny plastic puck flying into the air to perform loop-de-loops and other feats that make a seven-year-old boy giggle so hard he can’t sit up straight, and he emerged from our hard-fought mini-tournament the victor. He put away the game and before I had a chance to prepare myself, fifty-six pounds of boy flew at me and landed on my back.

Jack wanted to play, and I obliged. I joined him in the tickle/wrestle/boy stuff antics because I wanted him to have fun and because I realized that this rough physicality was the equivalent of Emmie’s hugs. Jack was full of smiles and laughter, he’d had a good time with his mom and he thanked me by goofing around with me in a way that was all at once silly and sweet, focused and casual, an expression of emotion that was masculine and cool. I appreciated this subconscious gesture of affection so much that I ignored the little voice in my head warning me, “He’s seven. You’re not. Keep this up and you’ll be in traction by the end of the hour.” After all, isn’t a son’s love worth a little thing like a wrenched back or a sprained neck?

Of course it is. And now I’m going to conclude this post, wrap a warm compress around my neck and go to bed (I’m writing this at night) with a smile on my face, because I know my kids love me. They told me so.

The words are there; you just have to know how to hear them.