Fluids. Fluids Everywhere…

The stomach flu dropped by to say hi and to see if we’d been diligent about stocking up on Lysol.

At around 1am early Saturday morning, I heard some coughing and crying coming from the baby monitor, each interspersed with light gagging/choking sounds. So I leapt out of bed and bolted upstairs to Daph’s room where I could just barely make out in the dark that she was sitting up in her crib and crying.

I reached down, put my hands under her arms to lift her up, and was met with a squish. The unmistakable sour cheese + chocolate bubble gum smell of vomit whirled up and caused a quick retch.

The first natural reaction is to recoil.
But then you downshift into Dad, and up she came…slathered in semi-digested blueberry yogurt that squelched against my t-shirt and lovingly transferred its scent to my chest as we headed to the bathroom.

In the light, however, it quickly became apparent that this was going to be a three-player game. Her pajamas, arms, legs, face, and hair were all covered in puke. And so I called for Jen to come upstairs and help as I turned on the bath water.

We dropped her in the tub and Jen began cleaning her off as best she could while I stripped Daph’s crib and carried the soiled sheets to the washer.

We had just gotten her out of the tub, sat her on the changing table, and put some clean pajamas on her when…

*heave*

“Whoa. Daph, you okay?”

*heave* 

“Daph?”

*buuuurp*

“Wow…that was…”

*retch*

This time she threw up all over her changing table and her fresh pjs. I scooped her up and ran back into the bathroom where she deposited the rest of the vomit into the tub.

Jen headed back downstairs to clean herself up and I stayed upstairs with Daphne, wiping her down and trying to console her. We headed into the guest bedroom where I put her down on the bed next to me and held her. She almost instantly fell asleep.

Then, 10 minutes later, her eyes suddenly opened and she groaned.

“Hey…you okay?”

*heave*

“Oh no…”

*heave*

“No, no, sweetie…in the tub!” I scooped her back up and began to make my way to the bathroom.

*retch*

This time on my shoulder and into my beard.

And it went on like this most of the night.

I swapped with Jen at about 2am and went downstairs to bed. She’d pretty much thrown up everything in her stomach by that point, but was still waking up every 20 minutes to dry heave and cry.

And so went our very first night with a vomitous toddler. Yes, this was the first time this had happened. And yes, it’s remarkable that we’d gone so long…

Saturday she threw up a couple more times after her “meals” (in quotes because we were sticking to the CRAG diet, Cheerios, Rice, Applesauce, and Goldfish, along with a whole lot of apple juice.), once onto the living room rug and another onto the couch. She was never running a serious fever throughout this ordeal, though, and so I didn’t think it necessary to involve a doctor.

That theory seemed to hold up on Sunday, as she wasn’t sick at all and held down some pasta. So we thought we’d rounded a corner and she was on the mend.

Laying on Beatrice helps…

I stayed home to take care of her on Monday, however, and she quickly disproved that little hypothesis.

When I went upstairs to get her in the morning, there was another puddle of vomit in her crib as well as on her pajamas. So I cleaned her up and brought her downstairs to lay in bed and watch some Little Baby Bum. Then, about an hour later, she began gagging again and I pulled her little head over so she would throw up on me instead of on our bed.

Which worked like a Swiss watch except, now I have a puddle of vomit on my sternum…
How do I get out of bed?

I eventually slid my way off without spilling on our sheets and comforter by kangaroo pouching the puke in my t-shirt, then stripped out of my clothes and carried Daph upstairs to clean her up again.

At which point she fired hot diarrhea into her diaper.

Poor kid…

So, a massive daughter reclamation project later, I carried her back downstairs and put her on the living room floor to lie on Beatrice again and relax.

This is a good spot, I guess.

And we stayed there for most of the day.

She ate 12 goldfish and a few bites of applesauce, along with 3 Nalgene bottles full of apple juice. Fortunately her appetite came back a bit by dinnertime, and she ate a decent amount of rice which, while it clearly put up a struggle, did manage to stay down. I don’t believe she’s thrown up since.

Her mom, however? That’s a different story.

Once again I awoke last night to the sounds of retching and coughing at 1am, and I came tromping upstairs to help Jen clean up Daph again. (She was staying upstairs in case Daphne got sick.) Then…I heard the toilet flush. And Jen walked out of the bathroom, wiping her mouth.

“Oh no…”

Oh yes. it seems that Daph imparted her little stomach virus onto her mother, and Jen spent the entire night being sick. She’s home right now, hopefully napping.

Which means, more than likely, I’m next on the hurl parade. At which point we might need to hermetically seal our house in plastic like in E.T. and wait for this thing to flush its way out of all of us.

So…I’ll see you from the bubble.

j.s.

3 Comments on “Fluids. Fluids Everywhere…

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