House of Horrors

Having children is a beautiful thing.  The love you feel for them is indescribable.  The pride, immeasurable.   The need to protect them, immense.  And the happiness they give you, unimaginable.

But there are things that come with parenthood that people don’t necessarily warn you about.  And that don’t cross your mind as you blissfully gaze at ultrasound photos and dream about first dance recitals or little league games.

Like the flu.

“The flu?”, you say.  “I’ve had the flu.  It’s not so bad.”

Yeah, it’s not so bad…before you have kids.

Being sick used to mean lying in bed, taking medicine and maybe, if you were really lucky, having someone take care of you.  Yes, you still feel like crap, but everything will be alright and hey, you get a few days off from school or work.

Well, there is no silver lining once you have kids, because there is no time off when you’re sick.  I have already learned this lesson many times in the past 3 years, but, like they say, you learn something new every day.  Here is something new I learned yesterday:  Being sick at the SAME TIME as your kids is infinitely worse than only one unit being sick at a time.

Which makes sense now that I think about it.

So, yesterday my husband, Carlitos and I all were pretty sick. (Thankfully, Xavi somehow managed to escape this one…but did manage to get some good crying in due to tooth #2 pushing through.)  I am not sure what exactly we had.  Some version of the I Will Rip Your Body Apart And Sell The Parts To The Devil flu combined with a stomach virus, perhaps?  Or maybe I am just not used to the flu consisting of SO MUCH FRIGGIN’ VOMIT.

Our house was like some scary medical version of Nightmare on Elm Street, where the blood being poured and splattered everywhere was replaced with vomit and the spewing guts replaced with…well, you really don’t want to know.

It was gory.  So, so gory.  And it just would.  not.  stop.

Mommy, my tummy hu- splash, {pause} splaaaaaashhhh, splash, {pause} {groan} splaaaassssshhhhhh

Annie, can you take him?  I’m going to be si-

You get the idea.

(Sidenote:  He wasn’t calling me to come get Carlitos because I was busy touching up my pedicure downstairs or anything.  I was probably busy trying to stand up long enough to change Xavi’s diaper.  Or was lying in the bathroom with my sweaty forehead on the cool, cool shower tile.)

You see, the thing with having kids is that not only is there nobody to take care of you when you are sick, but you, in your Just Let Me Lie Here and Die state also have to take care of your kids.  And if they are sick too, you really have to take care of them.  Like, hold them while they get sick.   And then shower the vomit off of them.  And then get on your hands and knees and Lysol wipe the heck out of the floor…and the couch…and the walls…

Thankfully, things started to take a slight turn for the better when my (amazing) best friend walked fifteen blocks to our house to bring us Pedialyte, bananas, applesauce and gingerale.  She took one look at me as I stood at the door with cash in my hand and said, “Oh my God.”  Then she said, “Um, I’m not going to come in, okay?”

Yeah, I would suggest you don’t.  Unless you feel like catching whatever this psychotic illness is that is going to make you feel like that movie scene where the alien comes out of his stomach.

Also, I am pretty sure that our house smells like vomit with a thin veil of Lysol covering it.  Kind of like when someone sprays room freshener in a bathroom.  i.e. Worse than the original smell itself.

Definitely don’t come in.

I am going to make this a short post, since I still have one more set of sheets to change.  Plus, just describing the horror show that was our home yesterday is making my stomach crampy and the back of my neck sweat.

Sooooo, there is your daily dose of birth control.

You’re welcome.