Diary of an omniturnal mom

A full act in every ring

It's been a while since Mommy pulled an all nighter. And all nighters with kids are drastically less fun than a college all nighter. Even all nighters that involved studying in the library were more fun than, say, changing sheets filled with vomit four times in two hours, midnight baths and wiping diarrhea off the floor. 

It seems mommy could get only a one week respite from bodily fluid crises or BFC for short, which is what mommy is now calling all poop and vomit related incidents. Three weeks straight of BFC and mommy is about to check herself into an asylum.

11:00 p.m. Mommy is just about to wrap things up for the night and hit the sack when she hears Danny screaming in his bed. Another nightmare. She sits with him for a few minutes while he settles down and then heads to bed.

Midnight


Mommy hears a sputter and a cough from Fiona's room. She lifts her head, freezes and waits. Then she hears the baby crying. It's a two alarm wake up. Mommy's feet hit the floor.

Fiona's face, pillow, sheets and pajamas are covered in puke. She is staring up at mommy in a stunned and horrified silence, unable to utter a single sound. 

Meanwhile, on the other side of the room, Owen, the 2 year old, is curled up and crying in a puddle of his own pee. He had managed to take off his diaper in order to, um, access his favorite toy. Faced with two BFCs, she calls for re-enforcements.

Her husband comes lumbering down the hall. He strips the bed, puts Owens' diaper back on, makes the bed back up and tells the boy to be quiet. Naturally, boy face starts crying even more.

Well, that was helpful. So now, mommy has a crying baby in the crib and a puke-covered girl standing in the bathroom.

Mommy changes the sheets and cleans the girl up. She even leaves a puke bucket and a cup of water next to her bed.

With Fiona cleaned up and in her freshly made bed, mommy turns to Owen who is still not settled down. She gives him a new diaper, fastened extra tight, and puts footed pajamas on backwards to keep him from finding his favorite toy. (This child has actually maneuvered through zip-up pajamas put on backward to find his penis. And, of course, this is why he wakes up soaking wet almost every night.) She nurses him and moves him to the pack and play in the closet. Separating the kids is usually the best way to minimize the chaos.

She starts to head for bed, but finds Fiona in the bathroom again. This time, she got some of the puke in the toilet. There's also some on the floor, the wall, the cabinets, the curtains, the floor and in the girl's hair.

Puke in the hair is an automatic bath no matter what time it is. Mommy has now lost count of how many times she's cleaned the bathroom. She wonders if this is her punishment for bathroom cleaning neglect.

She wraps Fiona in a towel and hears her mutter something which turns out to be "Carry me." So she carries the girl back to her clean bed, tucks her in and says good night, hoping the worst is over. How much more food can a child who hardly ate that day have in her belly?

12:45 a.m. Mommy's head hits the pillow. Five minutes later, Fiona pukes again. Mommy has now changed the sheets three times in less than an hour. She shoves yet another pile of soiled clothes, towels and pajamas in the washing machine and figures, what the hell, let's just start the washing machine at midnight. Might as well get a head start, right?

1:00 a.m. The washing machine is gearing up for launch. Mommy gets out of bed and tries unsuccessfully to balance the load. Ultimately, she just gives up, shuts the machine off and goes back to bed.

2:00 a.m. She hears Fiona in the bathroom yet again. This time, it's not puke, it's poop. On the floor, on the wall, on the toilet, in her bed, on the curtains.

8:00 a.m. Mommy discovers that the overloaded washing machine didn't quite clean all the vomit or the poop. She runs the wash again.

9:00 a.m. Mommy optimistically returns to the washing machine to finds chunks clinging to the sides of  the washing machine, chunks clingy to the sheets and towels and now chunks littering the carpet in front of the machine.

She's now cleaning bits of vomit out of the machine and off the floor. No, it is no consolation that this vomit has been cleaned. Twice, actually.

1:00 p.m. Mommy scrubs every surface in the bathroom with bleach and, for good measure, sprays everything with Lysol. She's washed everything in hot water and wiped down the bed with bleach and Lysol. She dares any germs to survive.

Twelve hours and counting post-puke-a-palooza and all bodily fluid is under control. For now.