Running From the Devil

Tuesday was the best day of motherhood so far:

The Cheeks and I had a very productive day, meaning

I had time and energy to blog and she slept, played 

on her play mat and napped on schedule. Woo hoo!

Tuesday night into Wednesday morning, however, 

was the worst night of motherhood and it had nothing

to do with The Cheeks: at 2:30 am, Matt came down 

with a horrific stomach virus and I developed an even

worse case of the "what ifs" that made me just as sick.

What if I catch it? Who will take care of the baby?

What if the baby catches it?  Is that possible?

What if it's not a stomach virus but the Ebolavirus?

What if I'm suddenly widowed with a newborn?

What if that call from AllState that went unanswered

was to inform us that our life insurance payment 

wasn't properly processed and thus, I'm not only 

a single parent, but a poor one as well?

These are the thoughts that consumed me as I tore

through the cleaning products aisle at Target the 

next morning, throwing anything into the cart labeled

"kills 99.9% of all bacteria and viruses" and thus 

solidifying the end of my commitment to green products.

I bought industrial size containers of bleach and Lysol

(the latter which, by the way, was only available in two 

scents: Disgusting and Putrid - , come on! Who wants their 

home to smell like baby powder or vanilla covered puke?).

I spent the morning disinfecting the bathroom and wiping

down all surfaces, in addition to washing my hands until

they were red raw.  The Cheeks seemed not to notice the

chaos swirling about as her mom moved quickly from

bathroom to laundry room in an attempt to outrun the devil.

Once I had done all that I could do, I stuffed The Cheeks 

with formula before stuffing her into her snowsuit and

car seat.  I lugged her and the oversized diaper bag that

I swore I would NEVER carry outside and somehow

managed to get the City Mini out of the trunk of the car,

snapped the car seat onto it, and pushed her through

the snow and ice to 1st and Garden, where I met up

with Tina, one of the moms from the support group.

Together, the two of us made our way single file across 

town to The Turtle Club, where we were joined by Marni

and Brenda (Bjorn girl!).  It's restaurant week here in 

Hudson County, so we decided to take advantage of the $13 

pre-fixe menu (and an additional $16 worth of wine).  It 

was great - we had the entire front room to ourselves and

our four babies (Eliza was a hit as the only girl amongst

three very adorable boys) and thus had plenty of room 

to spread out and take care of all of their needs while

we laughed and commiserated in an effort to fulfill ours.

Upon return home, Beezlebub met me at the door and so

I began the disinfecting process once again.  Taking care

of a newborn and a sick husband is exhausting but the

fear of becoming the sick one is much, much worse.

After put down, I ran to the laundry room and threw 

the final load of the day into the dryer, then ran back

upstairs and threw myself into the shower.  By 9 pm, 

it was lights out and I was asleep on the couch.  When 

I awoke at 4am to the sound of The Cheeks crying for

her bottles, I was amazed that I still felt normal and hadn't

succumbed to the Devil's curse. Six hours later, I'm 

still feeling good and only have 2 more loads of laundry.

As for how The Cheeks is coping, well, see for yourself: