Saturday, January 31, 2009

the fears of motherhood

*WARNING*
*The following is not to be read by the squeamish*
So one my biggest motherhood fears came true last night.........Luke vomited in the middle of the night. (I warned you!) I think this is what all parents dread. Dealing with puke.
Luke comes into our room around 1:45am and says, "Mom, I just threw up in my room." I think I wasn't fully awake and my husband repeated it to me. At which point it sunk it and I jumped out of bed and began pushing Luke toward our bathroom. He threw up again on the floor in our bathroom....and then again in the toilet.
But what gets me is what plays in my mind as this occurs and I am cleaning up. First I thought of my mother and I soooo appreciate her! I really can't remember specific instances where she had to deal with this but I do remember her holding back my hair while I was leaning over the toilet. She was a saint!
Then I thought "How am I going to clean this up off the carpet?" That thought dominated my foggy mind for a while. I began thinking of custodians at schools who get called in on a regular basis to clean up puke - of other people's kids! I figure they have a plan for how to clean this up. I wish I knew their secrets.
Then as I am in awe of all the places this stuff has splattered, I begin wondering: When one of Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt's kids throw up in the middle of the night, who cleans it up? Do they take care of the task themselves or do they have live-in help who they wake up in the middle of the night to care for it?
So this morning Luke climbs into bed with us. He begins saying how glad he was that he didn't "barf" at school - that would be embarrassing. (although his father and I were thinking that puking at school didn't sound like such a bad idea to us!) So then he proceeds to tell us about the kids who have barfed at school - because this kind of thing is etched in the minds of all elementary school kids. He tells of of one kids who wasn't looking too good - "all sweaty and red like someone had just punched him in the stomach." He can also tell us exactly where it happened in each instance - like on the carpet in the music room or on the floor by the blackboard. He had us in stitches laughing and was so confused as to why we were finding this so funny.
But if we didn't laugh about it, we'd cry!

3 comments:

Ben McLaughlin said...

cleaning up yr kids vomit is horrible, especially if it's on clthes and sheets and evrything too. urgh.

I remember the first day of my new school when I was about 10, I walked up the front of the class, because the teacher wouldn't respond to my raised hand. He said 'sit down' and I proceeded to vomit allover him and me, in fron of the whole shocked class. A first day to remember.

lu said...

Yes - I bet that first day of school was etched in the mind of all you classmates too! eek! So sorry!

So Ben - did that teacher always call on you when you raised your hand after that?

Ben McLaughlin said...

i didn't even have to raise my hand.. I just flashed them a concerned glance and I'd get the afternoon in sickbay:)