**This is a very disgusting story. I promise you, it’s gross. This is fair warning. If you read any further, I will not be held responsible.
Starting Monday, my precious baby girl was having some major digestive distress. Her diapers were horrible. I wasn’t sure if she was getting sick, or if maybe it was just because she was teething. Teething can do bad things to a baby.
Tuesday morning, she woke me up at seven o’clock. She had a disgusting diaper that needed immediate attention. I got up and changed her, and then took her back to bed with me. I nursed her, and she went to sleep. I felt fine. At nine o’clock, we woke up for the day, and my stomach was hurting and I felt kind of nauseous. For a few hours, I complained to Chris and Amy that I didn’t feel good. I repeatedly told Chris how bad my stomach hurt, because I felt bad for not getting started with the kids’ homeschool. He was supposed to be off of work on Tuesday, but he had to go in for some training at two. Shortly after he left, I went to bed. I just felt horrible. I left Abby Jo mostly in her sister’s care.
By late Tuesday afternoon, I had started puking, and I was losing strength fast. I’m still not fully recovered from my surgery, and the puking had drained me. I was in bed, the kids were on their own, and Kyra was bringing Abby to me every hour to nurse. This is the standby action of choice when someone in this house is watching Abby and she starts to get bored…or fussy…or lots of things in addition to being hungry. I would nurse her, and then give her back to Kyra with instructions to take her back to the living room to play.
This is the paragraph in which I sing the praises of my seven year old: I was so sick by about four o’clock that I could no longer get out of bed. If I tried to, I would get very dizzy. I was throwing up every few minutes, and I was scared of passing out. I had texted Chris at work, but he was doing a drill and didn’t have his cell with him. I was throwing up in the notorious “puke bowl”, and I was wishing for death. The throwing up was accompanied by severe back and stomach pain. My sweet Kyra was very worried about me. In between taking care of Abby, she kept checking on me. At one point, she emptied my bowl for me, and brought me a wet washcloth to clean my face with. She brought me a glass of water, and commented, “You need to put your hair in a ponytail, Mommy.” I told her I didn’t have one, so she went and got one for me. Then, she climbed up in the bed behind me, and put my hair in a ponytail for me while I was trying to clean myself off.
At this point, Abby started crying. Then, I started crying. After that, I called my mom. This was about four thirty.
I had to crawl out of bed one time between calling my mom and her arriving, because Abby had another horrible diaper that leaked all over her clothes. I managed to clean her up and put a new diaper on her before the room started spinning. I gave her back to Kyra, clad only in a diaper, and told her to take care of her. Kyra sighed a deep sigh, and said, “I am not feeling so good.” I was hoping that she was just tired of watching Abby, and was using the “I don’t feel good” excuse to get out of it.
This is the paragraph in which I sing my mother’s praises: Shortly after changing Abby, I woke from a fitful sleep to hear my kids letting my mom in the house. I heard her comment on Abby being naked, and then she came in my room to find her some clothes. I responded to her arrival by sitting up and puking in a bowl. A few minutes later, I heard someone throwing up in the living room. I felt really bad. I just needed mom to watch the kids. I felt horrible that she was now taking care of sick kids. At some point, Elijah got sick, too. I don’t really remember the next few hours. According to my mother, it was a blur of cleaning up puke, taking care of Abby, gathering puked on blankets for the laundry, getting clean clothes for the kids, and a quick run to Kroger with Abby for 7up, crackers, chicken soup, powerade, and Lysol. I don’t know what I would have done without my mom. I was way too sick and way too weak to take care of my kids. I couldn’t take care of the baby, much less care for my poor, sick children. Thank you, Thank you, Thank you, Mom, for coming to help us. I love you.
I had leftover Zofran (a strong anti-nausea drug) from when I had hyperemesis when I was pregnant with Abby. I tried taking this twice during the evening, but I was throwing up so much I couldn’t keep it down. I think I must have got enough of it in my system to help, though, because about eleven o’clock that night I was starting to feel better. My back was hurting so badly that I had to get out of bed in search of a more comfortable position. I got a heating pad and relocated to the recliner in the living room. I had my mom call Chris, because I was beginning to think he was never coming home. After she told him what awaited him when he got home, I was afraid that he might not come home. He did, though, because he is a good man. My exhausted mother gave him the run down, and went home.
As soon as my mother left, Chris went downstairs to where the boys were sleeping to get Elijah. He had wanted to go to bed down there because they sleep in the guest room a lot so they can watch movies. It was also a lot cooler down there. Christopher made it up the stairs with our poor, sick boy when he started throwing up again. Then, the diarrhea kicked in. The poor child could not make it from the bed to the bathroom. For the rest of the night, Chris cleaned up his boy and then cleaned up the carpet. Over. And over. And over. Kyra was also up throwing up during the night, but she mostly managed to get herself to and from the bathroom on her own. The worst of my sickness had passed, and I made it back to bed in the wee hours with a severe lack of energy and mild nausea. I got up once to help find underwear for a sick little boy, and change Abby’s sad, sad diaper. The laundry supply was dwindling as the night wore on.
Wednesday morning dawned bright and clear, as if the world went on without noticing the misery of the Harmon household. Everyone was feeling much better, but without a lot of energy. The children woke up and laid on the couch watching tv for the entire day. I pretty much sat on the couch, as well. We felt better, but we had zero energy. Chris slept for a few hours on the couch, since he had been up all night long taking care of sick kids. I made some soup at some point, but the kids could barely eat anything. That evening, Chris’ mom, brother, and aunt came over to pick up Owen. He was the only one who hadn’t got sick, so they took him to their house to spend the night. Chris was starting to feel not so great, but went to church alone. By that night, Chris was feeling nauseous and chilling. He never gets sick. I was worried.
Thursday morning, the kids and I were feeling fine…albeit a little tired…and Chris woke up feeling much better. The day was pretty uneventful. Even though I didn’t feel bad, I didn’t really feel like doing anything. The kids seemed to feel a lot better. They ate a little bit, drank Powerade, made “crafts”, and even went outside for a little bit. Chris spent the day playing video games, and then went to work Thursday evening. Owen was returned late in the day, with a report of him having a bit of diarrhea the night before, and of him lying on his mamaw’s couch, rubbing his tummy, and saying, “I don’t want to throw up.” Kyra, Elijah, and Owen played for a while until I heard Kyra call me from the bathroom, “Mommy, I threw up.” I went to check on her, and found her looking pale in the bathroom. I was hoping against hope that it was a fluke and her sensitive stomach had merely been upset by all the running around and playing. She complained of a headache right before they went to bed. Right before they went to bed downstairs. Through a baby gate, down to sets of stairs, down a hallway, and into a bedroom. (Hint: That’s what you call foreshadowing.)
I went to bed about twelve thirty with a headache and feeling slightly nauseous. “Hoping this virus doesn’t have a Round Two”, I sent out to the Facebook world, and then I went to sleep.
At two thirty, I heard a pitiful little voice calling, “Mama? Mama?” I got up to find Elijah in my doorway, dressed in a shirt and his underwear. He looked rather sad and pale, and he said, “I had a little accident.”
“What happened?” asked I.
“I couldn’t get the baby gate open. I didn’t make it in time.” He sounded so sad. So pitiful. My stomach churned. I did not feel good.
I tried to wake up and assess the situation. There was a trail of diarrhea from the top of the stairs by the baby gate, down the hall, into the bathroom, and around the corner. “I tried to clean it up.” His voice was sad and weak. “I used a lot of baby wipes.” (Hint: What do we call it again, children? That’s right…foreshadowing.)
I gathered a roll of paper towels, a walmart bag, and the carpet cleaner. I began cleaning up the mess, bleary-eyed, nauseous, and sleepy. Elijah stood in the hall in his underwear, sad and skinny, trying to help explain how it all happened. I was concentrating on not crying when something in me picked up on a different sound to Elijah’s voice. I looked up. His chin was trembling. I grabbed the walmart bag and lunged toward him. I held it under his chin to try to catch the apparent gallons of purple Powerade he had consumed prior to bedtime. Walmart bags are good for lots of things. Containing vomit is not one of them. Apparently, it had holes.
I got Elijah cleaned up, being careful of where I stepped, put him to bed with a puke bowl and a sippy cup of powerade, and walked back to the…now ever larger…mess in the hallway. On cue, Abby started crying. I had left her in my bed, so I could not let her cry. I had to go see to her, so that she didn’t fall out of the bed. I laid down with her to nurse her back to sleep, and called Chris at work to tell of my misery. He sympathized and said he was sorry. He told me that it was a sucky night, and I hung up. Moments later, I heard sounds at the baby gate. I began disengaging myself from Abby, and got out of the bed about the time a messy-haired little girl carrying a blanket said, “I don’t feel very good, Mommy.” I walked over to her, and she handed me the blanket. I asked if she felt like she was going to throw up, to which she replied by bending over and puking on my bedroom carpet. I threw the blanket down, and she threw up on it. I rushed her to my bathroom just in time for her to finish throwing up in the toilet. Being the loving mother that I am, I reached out to pull her hair away from her face. Guess what I learned? Yeah. She puked in her hair. After she was through throwing up, I helped her into the shower, and washed her hair for her.
Of course, if you turn on the shower in the bathroom adjacent to the room your nine month old is sleeping in, she will proceed to wake up and wail at you. My brain began to scream at me that my stomach was not feeling well. I told my brain to shut it’s trap, and trudged to the bed to get the baby. I got Kyra out of the shower, dried her off, got her dressed, brushed her hair, and put it in a bun, and then I put Abby in her bedroom floor and shut the door. Abby of course cried, but I needed her confined long enough to clean up the mess in the hallway, the bathroom, and, now, also my bedroom. This was the point that I ran out of carpet cleaner.
I got the hallway cleaned up the best I could, and sprayed it all down with Lysol. Then, I actually ventured into the bathroom. Remember when Elijah said he “used a lot of baby wipes”. Yeah. He did. A lot of them. Then, he put them in the toilet. I began to cry, as I rolled up my sleeve. I cursed in my head as I reached into the toilet and pulled out three handfuls of baby wipes and put them in a trash bag. I washed my hands in scalding water, and then cleaned the floor and the toilet and sprayed them down with Lysol. I threw everything away, washed my hands again, used some hand sanitizer, and put a load of disgusting towels, blankets, pajamas, and rugs in the washer. I retrieved my baby from her sister’s room. Kyra was in bed at this point, and white as a sheet. She told me that her stomach hurt, and weakly asked for some Powerade. I got her some Powerade and a puke bowl, and bid her goodnight.
Relieved to have the mess cleaned up, I carried Abby into the living room, where I was ever so surprised to step in some poop. At this point, I said a Very Bad Word.
What the heck was he even DOING in the living room?
I washed my foot, cleaned the floor, and took Abby to the couch. I thought that I would nurse her back to sleep, and then rejoin the land of slumber. Oh, what a stupid, stupid woman I am. Because if your son is going to leave a trail of poop all over your house, then puke at your feet, then be joined in the puking by his sister, and all of this happen at two thirty in the morning, well, of course your baby will have insomnia.
And that, Children, is a late night tale of the virus from hell.
