Well, has it been a night, or hasn’t it! Let’s chat. But I’m going to warn you: the following story is not for the faint of heart (or at least someone who is prone to feeling sick). Flu season hit us pretty hard this year.
            One day, we decided that my husband could have a game night at his brother’s apartment. You see, a new game came out, and the place where we are staying doesn’t have the best internet connection. So, he does all his gaming at his brother’s place. I began the hour drive back to our place. It was…relatively uneventful.
            My daughter and I got home, and all seemed normal. She was peacefully sitting in her car seat for a few minutes while I got settled in at home. But when I went to get her out, she was wet! Everywhere! I could smell a strange stomachy smell. And I knew—she had thrown up.
            Well, enlisting some help from my mother-in-law, I washed off her car seat, gave her a bath, and changed her clothes. She was perfectly calm about the whole thing, but I couldn’t help but wonder how the night was going to go. Noah and I had just experienced this bug less than a week ago, and it was absolutely awful—diarrhea, vomiting, fevers, shivers, achy pains, and the worst part of it all was the stomach pain. I hoped the best for my daughter, and I prayed for her to be well throughout the night. Of course this would happen the one night my husband was gone, I thought.
            We sat watching TV after her bath, and then suddenly she threw up again. Sigh. It WAS going to be a long night. You’ve got to keep babies upright when they vomit, so that nothing can go back into their throats. Why? To keep them safe from accidentally breathing in the throw up. If it gets into their lungs, it can be severe. They can suffocate. In any case, I started to realize that I wouldn’t be getting a lot of sleep that night.
            After a few more hurls and a lot of cleaning and changing of pajamas, my little one fell asleep. And I tried to sleep as well. However, whenever I would fall asleep, she would wake up and cry. Not her regular cry though–she was screaming in pain. It was then that I knew she was definitely experiencing the intense stomach pains that had led me to tears when I had been sick with it.
            So there I was, sitting on the couch holding my little girl, vomit all over my shirt and stomach, and absolutely exhausted. I stayed awake for most of the night, but around midnight, her fever was getting higher than I was comfortable with. I went back outside for the diaper bag, in search of the infant Tylenol. After a dose, she was back asleep on and off for the next four hours.
            My mother-in-law came out at 4 AM to see how we were doing (Vera was crying again). She took Vera from my arms, sat on the rocking chair, and told me that I should sleep if I could. She didn’t have to tell me twice. The next thing I knew, I woke up around 7.
            This morning has been another sort of difficult, since my daughter was hungry. Every time today that she has had something to eat, she has almost inevitably heaved it back up. It’s been so conflicting. Do I feed her? Is it worth it? It does comfort her, even if it means that she will probably throw up again. I don’t want to starve her.
            She has been such a trooper. I’ve never seen another six-month-old deal with the stomach bug, but I can definitely say she has handled herself admirably. She’s been very good to me today, even though she’s not feeling well (crying, vomiting, diarrhea, and all else aside, right? ;D )

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