Puke Patrol

I don't care how cute kids are: puke is puke and puke is always gross. ALWAYS. I've had my fair share of taking care of drunk, puking sick girlfriends in my day- pulling hair out of their faces, fetching water and pep talking them out of their head in a toilet, crying, sick stupor ("He's an asshole- you're too good for him anyways! To hell with him!") - but all of that experience still didn't prepare me to be a mother taking care of a puking, sick child... which is way worse, much more sad and definitely grosser. Sick puke is much harder to handle than drunk puke, because with drunk puke, you have usually had enough to drink yourself to not notice the grossness, and there's much more alcohol than food to deal with.

That, and you aren't responsible for cleaning it.... or touching it. 

 ~shudder~

That being said, you can love your kid to the moon and back and still be grossed out by their puke.

Since the day I walked up to Jude's new school a couple weeks ago and first saw the notice posted on the front doors about a tummy bug going around, I have been mentally trying to prepare myself for puke.

That's one of the things that I've always been relieved about, having kept Jude at home with me his whole life- he hasn't been exposed to many of the gross sicknesses that go around preschools and day cares. My son has avoided Gross City for the most part. I can count on my hand the number of times he's been sick. Now he is out in the real world all week, where snot and slime and butt and nose picking and little pee pee hands are touching everything. With this, puke and diarrhea most certainly come hand in hand sometimes.

It's not their fault- kids are just kids. And I've come to learn that little kids have gross habits that they can't help. It's our job as grown ups to break these gross habits.

Despite the best efforts of taking precaution that I know his teachers (and hopefully other parents) take to prevent yucky sick outcomes, it's inevitable... kids get sick. And they throw up. 

Jude threw up last night. He was running through the house being his crazy self- then he stopped in mid fun time, looked at me, turned green, and leaned over and puked all over the floor. Just like that. No warning, no indication whatsoever prior to the second before it happened that he was going to puke. Then bleugghghghgh. 

He cried for a minute ("Ewww gross! I puke!"), then got over it and went about his way. We got him cleaned up and tucked into bed like normal. Taylor and I were both on edge when we went to bed later, just waiting for the moment when we would hear him wake up crying and sick in the middle of the night so we could run upstairs and tend to him, but it never happened. Then this morning I went to get him up for school, and as soon as I walked into his room I smelled it. Stale puke. He had thrown up on his bed at some point in the night and rolled over to the other side of the bed to sleep on a clean patch of sheet.

"Omigosh Jude, are you okay?" 

He popped up with his messy bird's nest bed head and sleepy eyes, gave me the upside down fish guppy mouth look that he does when he's sad, pointed to the dried up puddle of vomit and said, "Ewwwww gross. I puke!" Then started to cry. He hadn't made a peep all night, and the moment he sees me, he has a meltdown. I get it though. It's a mommy thing. I still turn into a gigantic baby myself when I don't feel well and my mom comes to save the day. 

So he stayed home today. Sick days with Jude leave me torn: 90% of me feeling all nurturing and mother Earthy and mama lioness'y, making a special trip to the store to fetch my no-fail sick day remedy of crackers, a colorful selection of Gatorades, soup and Eddy's fruit popsicles, enduring hours of the same DVD du jour, handing out infinite hugs and fluffing couch commando campsites to ensure comfort ("My poor little sick buddy boy- it's no fun being sick!")... 

...then there's that 10% of me who gets frazzled and exhausted and exasperated, battling my patience and reminding myself that this high-maintenance, impossible to please little person is only whining and arguing and objecting to everything I offer and do because he's only 2 and a half years old and is not feeling well. This 10% is fleeting- only coming in momentary spurts, when he, let's say, sporadically throws a fit because he's decided that he's over watching the only DVD he was adamant about watching exclusively all morning or suddenly only wants to eat M&Ms and cheese. 

I'm supposing that there are a lot of June Cleaver moms out there who don't battle with this 10% within themselves... the woman and individual within a mom who wants to lock herself in her closet, light up a cigarette and zone out to some really loud, really obnoxious rock and roll (or techno or country or R&B, whatever), ignoring for just 20 minutes the tiny fists pounding on the door demanding her immediate attention. 

Congratulations to them for being perfect. F'ing liars!

By late afternoon, he was back to his old Pookie self- happily farting around in our office, listening to his music and getting into stuff he's not supposed to. Hadn't puked all day. Then just a bit ago, after settling him down for bed, we hear him freaking out in his room and come to find him crying in his bed- one half of his face and head all but glued to his pillow in regurgitated Bagel Bite puke. 

WTF?

This picture of Baby Mochi has nothing to do with anything mentioned in tonight's blog. I post it because she looks like a yummy cupcake in this little tutu and I'm trying to ease myself out of Puke Cleaning Candy Striper mode and think of sweet smelling, ungross things.