The Perfect Storm

So, it has been awhile since my last post. Plenty has happened, I just have not been posting... The last 12 hours is too good to pass up though.

Of course it begins with Rachel being away on a trip. I brag to everyone how I can easily handle it all, and so am just begging the fates to throw me a curveball.

Midnight, last night, it arrives. I hear Lucas crying and so I get up to comfort him and put him back to bed. I meet him in the front room, where he is vomiting all over our carpet. Sweet. A nice dark brown against our nearly white carpet with nice chunks of fruit snacks littered about. Awesome. So, I direct him to the bathroom to finish his wreching and proceed to cleanup mode. It is not faring well for me. At that point, Lucas informs me that he also threw up in his bed. So we walk downstairs looking for a trail of vomit and much to my relief there seems to be no other spots... until... I reach his bed. I would have snapped a photo except for the fact that it would have I am certain made you vomit right on your keyboard. There was a huge pool of vomit on his bed. Another huge pool of vomit on the floor on one side of his bed, and a modest pool of vomit on the other side. Lovely. I am relieved that I can at least just grab all the bedding and scoop it up, I then try to meet the challenge of sopping up the floor. I proudly did not vomit myself- but given that cleaning is not one of my gifts, there is still the mark of the beast all over that room. After sopping up most of the wet mess, it actually required me to vacuum up the bits of chips and fruit snacks the were all over. After about an hour of cleaning, I finally gave up and went to bed. Lucas was in my bed, and I was hoping beyond hope that he wouldn't throw up in the bed. And... he didn't!

Cue next morning, the normal hustle and bustle but being a man down was not helping matters. Lucas says he has to go to the bathroom and bam Montazuma's revenge. So, normally a parent would use these signs as a cue to not send your child to school. I have to lecture today though, and have no backup for childcare. I clearly cannot send him to day care because he is sick, but he'll be fine at school- right? Once I do the enviable task of wiping him, I let him know the great secret of loose stool- "Lucas, if you feel like you have to fart... don't!" 15 minutes later, I am dressed and ready as is Lucas... Ben not so much. Lucas doesn't look right. I ask him "Lucas, are you ok?" "I don't want to tell you" is his reply. Apparently, he did not heed my advice, and crapped his pants. So, I take him to the bathroom and carefully pull off his poo soaked tightie whities when he freaks out and flails a leg. That sprays poop soup all over the floor and his socks and legs. I throw his underwear in the toilet to wash off the slop and then proceed to wipe him again. I wipe and wipe and wipe and then decide I had better flush the toilet before it gets clogged with TP. The second I pull the handle I remember that his underwear are in the pot! Too late... plugged up. So with crap all over everywhere, I am forced to reach into the bowl of fun and feel the underwear with the tips of my fingers way up the pipe. After a couple minutes of slight tugging I finally manage to free the courageous pair of underwear and then commence the quick cleaning. We are scheduled to leave in 5 minutes.

In a mad rush, I get things manageably clean while then demanding Ben to get dressed (this was the fifth time I told him). He said no for the last time, and I totally lost it on him for his oppositional behavior. I undressed him and dressed him without a fight, I think because he didn't want to chance being physically harmed. Checking the clock, and seeing we were only a few minutes behind, I thought we just might make it after all. Barring one incident where Ben slammed Lucas' hand in the door, we made it to the truck and were on our way. I glanced back in the rear view mirror and saw a completely exhausted and sickly child and realized that there was no way I could leave him at school. If he crapped his pants at school, it would just be a total nightmare for everyone. So, I dropped Ben off and headed back home. After a quick nap on the couch Lucas was feeling better and I took him to class with me. Aptly, it was disease ecology so I got to use him as a prop for how sickness can alter an individual's normal behavior. He played with my iPad the entire lecture- so he actually fit right in with the other students...

We are home now and he is sacked out on the couch. I am still trying to figure out how to remove vomit stains and hoping that another crapping spell does not rear its ugly... well rear.

Lucas finally out...




- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad