09 May 2011
by Tamsinin Bedraggled Mum Tags: Child, Husband, Mommy, Poo, Sneeze, Squidge, Vomit, Wee
Hmmm, I think I'm hungry...
I love my child, I do. But there are times when I can only stare at her and wonder where on Earth she came from.
From the day she was born she had this uncanny ability to sense just when we were about to sit down for dinner. Happily snoozing or burbling would change to crying, screaming or an enormous nappy changing emergency JUST when we were about to eat.
The more delicious the food, the more likely it would take a while to sort things out. I got used to cold food.
She got older. She ate with us. She was at the table. Did this change?
No
To this day (and my GOD she is going to hate me for this when she hits 18) she will require the toilet just as supper is placed gently upon the table.
However, while this no longer presents (include disclaimer about poo disasters here) a barrier to our enjoyment of a tasty repast, the other spectacular knack she has inherited (from only WHO knows where) is The Sneeze.
My daughter, for no particular reason that I can fathom, will let out a hearty, Earth shattering sneeze while in the middle of a mouthful of food.
This results in sneezed out masticated food particles landing on ME including my hair, my food, my clothes, and my phone. Not The Husband. No. Like vomiting, she shares this joyful experience only with me. When I prayed for membership to an exclusive club THIS was NOT what I meant.
The Sneeze is violent, disgusting and omnipresent – it goes everywhere.
Into the salad at the picnic we attended last week (never seen a woman move that fast as I removed salad from table as innocent human reached towards it)
Onto my yummy Mars Bar last night.
I am honestly amazed that I’m not stick thin, seriously, because I do not have the stomach to cope with The Sneeze. Vomit, poo, wee – fine (sort of) but sneeze? URGH
21 Oct 2010
by Tamsinin Bedraggled Mum Tags: Child, Cleaning, Mommy, Mother, Vomit
When vomit comes a-knocking it’s never during the day, it comes at night when on your bed you lay.
It comes when you’re snoring and ever so asleep, when they cry out at night and start to weep.
It goes over the bedclothes and into their hair, frankly that shit goes everywhere.
It drips and congeals and stinks and cloys, while you stagger in the dark and trip over toys.
You get it on you, there’s nothing to do,
You just have to deal with it because, honey, there’s only YOU.
You hold your poor child in the warmth of your arms, ripping off clothes and bringing them calm.
They cry and they choke and then they say the fateful words, “Mommy, it’s coming, erug” all over your clothes.
You wait for it all to come to an end. You clean and you tidy and you change the bed.
You set a spare bowl beside her and snuggle up close, you’ve washed, you’ve tidied, you’ve rinsed with a hose.
Three times in the night you wrestle with vom, until you wake in the morning and feel like Death’s bum.
For 24 hours you wait and you pace, for in 24 hours you’ll know if your next.
We are on hour 18. Fingers crossed we escaped this one unscathed….
27 Sep 2010
by Tamsinin Bedraggled Mum, Slightly Insane Tags: Child, Cleaning, Mommy, Squidge, Vomit
It seems almost fitting that, after Heidi’s briliant post, I would once again come into contact with vomit.
I am not a fan.
Vomit would be ok if it didn’t smell, wasn’t chunky, didn’t look like what I just ALSO ate and didn’t turn cold the moment it hit my hair, neck and skin.
Last night, after a weekend of ill child, ill me and increasing familial crankiness my daughter rounded off the weekend with a scene that would have made the special effects genius of The Exorcist pack up his bags, go home and take up square dancing.
Not only did she manage to cover the entire bathroom floor but she also got my shoes, my hair, my ears, my neck, and down the front of my chest. Which was, considering she was facing AWAY from me, an impressive feat to say the least. I am starting to believe that the whole head turning thing is like the whole touching your toes thing – something all kids can do until their muscles lock up at 22.
So, there I was in the bathroom, covered in sick and holding a dripping child. There was an undigested leek on my toe. I don’t like leeks.
Fortunately there was also an already run bath. Wahey! So I plonked her into the bath, clothes and all, only for her to start screaming even louder, “Is HOT Mommy! HOT!”.
The Husband, now alerted to the fact that things weren’t necessarily all well in the house, appeared. Like a Man Genie. Poof.
“I haven’t put all the cold water in there yet!” he said.
I instantly whipped her out, checked her legs, and panicked about boiling her alive while sick slid happily down my chest.
The Husband continued to sign his death warrant, “You should always check the temperature of the water before you put a child in it,” he said.
The expression on my face would have stopped a lesser man but he calmly ambled off to fetch a bucket and mop while I opened the cold tap with somewhat more violence that it deserved.
It got worse.
You see, because I had dumped my poor child into the water, most of the undigested lentils, leeks and other items from the chicken soup we’d just eaten, had slipped gaily into the water. There they were, frolicking with gay abandon in the water and, wait for it, BRUSHING MY HAND as I washed the water along.
And here came the question that all parents are faced with at some point or another. Do I empty the tub and start again while my child shivers in sick or do I throw her in the sort of clean water, scrub her off fast and get her clean?
Pop quiz, hotshot. WHAT DO YOU DO?
What you said