Kate's no good, very bad day

So anyone following the blog may notice that I have been constantly writing about things that have happened in the past, like a few weeks ago, instead of writing about, you know, timely and current matters. This is because I'm behind on my blogging, and frankly, nothing interesting has happened today, so you can either read about how I did two COUNT EM -- TWO -- loads of laundry this morning, or you can suck it up and read about something that happened a month ago. Your choice.

Okay? Those of you still with me now get to hear about projectile vomit. And while I can almost HEAR you sighing and saying "jeez, AGAIN?" I say to you -- yes, AGAIN, because GOD HELP ME, if I keep getting puked on, I'm going to keep writing about it. But at least I let you know up front where this was heading. That has to be worth something...

So anyways, poor Kate. The day after her birthday, she had to go for her annual appointment to get three shots and blood drawn. She also picked up something else while she was there.

A stomach flu.

The next day while she was at Mothers Day Out, she sat up in one of her caregivers laps, made a tiny little noise of distress and then proceeded to projectile all over the floor. I went to pick her up, and on the way out to the car, she then puked all over me. This was NOT shaping up to be a good day. Ben was traveling, so while I would have liked to call for reinforcements, I was all alone on this one.

We went home and she snuggled into me for a little "I'm sick" comfort. I was worried about dehydration, so I gave her a bottle of milk which she promptly sucked down and then immediately went all exorcist on me. I mean, I had regurgitated milk IN MY BRA. At this point, I'm starting to lose my cool. Like seriously, lose my ever loving shit. Not because she was throwing up on me, but because she couldn't STOP throwing up on me. After a few more episodes, I was really worried because there wasn't anything left in her poor little tummy, and all she could do was whimper at me in between gagging and spitting up stomach acid.

I went into SUPER PANIC mommy mode. I scooped her up, jumped in the car and called Ben from the road, telling him to give me directions to the closest children's hospital. She was getting dehydrated (I know, because while I don't have a medical degree, I DO have GOOGLE, which told me all the signs to watch for) and I was taking action damn it. Ben talked me down and insisted I take her to the pediatrician instead. I called the doctor on the way to the office and a nurse called me back with instructions to go home and give her a teaspoon of Pedialyte every 10 minutes. If she couldn't keep that down, to call back.

I drove BACK to the house, with Kate continuing to retch and whimper in the back seat. We did the whole damn Pedialyte test and when she couldn't keep even a teaspoon down I called back and basically said "I TOLD YOU SHE WAS SICK, NOW SCHEDULE ME AN F-ING APPOINTMENT!"

So they did, and we headed BACK (BACK!!) to the doctor's office. And, what did I think was going to happen? Well, I guess I thought I'd go in, they would see she was sick and would administer some drug and maybe give her some fluids with an IV. Yes, I'm that stupid, I thought the pediatrician would actually TREAT my daughter.

Silly, foolish woman. Instead, I waited for 45 minutes in the "sick room" with Kate who continued to vomit on me to see a doctor, who looked at her, said "Yeah, she is a little dehydrated, I'm going to send you to the EMERGENCY ROOM" for some fluids and then sent me on my way.

You've got to be friggin' kidding me.

I was covered in puke, tired after four hours of stressful worrying and frankly, more than a little pissed. So I promptly called up my husband as I drove to the hospital and berated him for making me go to the pediatrician instead of the emergency room in the first place. Lets just say that didn't go over well. And while he snapped back at me because his flight home was all delayed and he was all mad he had to hang out in an airport somewhere, I was all, "I'M COVERED IN VOMIT AND I HATE YOU." Because, I mean, yeah -- a delayed flight is a bitch, but seriously? YOU SUCK.

But by the time he got home and to the ER, we had pulled our collective shit together and refocused on what was important. Getting our poor, sick, puke-tastic toddler well. The crew at Medical City Children's Hospital were fantastic (HOLLA!) and took great care of Kate. And yes, while I was, like, uber concerned, I still had piece of mind to take a before and after picture. Because... yeah. I knew I would blog about it later. I'm THAT kind of mom.

Kate is normally a ball of energy that is pinging around the room in a restless search for entertainment. This baby? The one who passively LET PEOPLE STICK NEEDLES IN HER HAND? I didn't know this baby. This is dehydrated, sick and miserable Kate. But, 30 minutes and an IV of saline later...

Ta-DA! Kate was ready to get a move on. Just the fact that she was sitting up on her own was a relief, and once she started slapping the crap out of that toy and pointing at my Dr. Pepper frantically, I knew she was on her way to recovery. Once we got the okay, she chugged a glass of water and half an apple juice and then continued her pursuit of play while we nervously waited to see if it would all come back up in a waterfall of "kill me we have to stay in the ER for a FEW MORE HOURS."

Luckily, my champ kept it all down and we hauled butt home where I could burn every single item of clothing I was wearing and Kate could sleep off her no good, very bad day.

Next evening, I had the pleasure of throwing up all the contents of my stomach and then some. Guess that is what wearing baby puke for an entire eight hours will do to you. Thanks Katie, mommy loves you!