Having a sick baby is the 10th circle of hell. That's why I haven't posted in a couple of weeks. While parenting is already a 24/7 operation, a baby with a cold will KYTFO. You'll dream of being woken up every 2 hours, because you can only daydream - never sleep.
My poor booger has boogers in places they should never be. His normally rhythmic breathing is punctuated by chokes, gasps and tears. His .001 second patience is now .0001 seconds. Yes, one thousandth of a second. If he wants something he cannot have, he goes into a full on, terrible meltdown where he throws himself wildly around on the floor. He then wretches his head back and showers snot onto anything in a 10 foot radius. Oh, baby jellyfish.
Fortunately he has developed a love of saline nasal spray. When I pull it out he follows me around with his nose pointed upward, ready for a shot of the juice. My husband was quick to offer concern over the addiction - a few years ago we saw a television special on a woman who couldn't get off afrin, and he was concerned about him starting down a treacherous path, carrying a bottle around in his lunchbox before he's even in daycare. I assured him that this one is just for tots, and contains only salt water.
Yes, we've had some tribulations throughout this illness. I loved a good humidifier in my room as a child - it helps! I snuffed some of the bellows of mist myself to prove the point. So I put one in our son's room and cranked that baby up to the max, much to my darling spouse's chagrin. He slept! But when we opened the door in the morning, his room was like a tropical rainforest after monsoon season, and the paint was starting to peel off the walls. I submitted to his wisdom after that one - but evaded the damage I had done with the reasonable statement that we will have to paint his room again when he gets bigger, anyway. Through flared nostrils and a tempered voice, my dearest husband (see how I'm groveling, even now) agreed.
Nothing breaks a mother's heart more than her sick baby not eating. I was so distressed by his lack of appetite, I've been willing to let him munch on just about anything he is willing to consume. Would you like some cat fur with you baba, little man? It's good for you. No, not really cat fur, but just about anything else. I've offered him candy, donuts, french fries, pizza - none of it would enter his precious pout. Not wanting to be wasteful, I ate them instead, and have probably gained about 10 lbs compulsively eating his leftovers (read: entire meals) to stave off my anxiety. Until yesterday, when he gleefully consumed hotcakes from McDonald's that his father got him. How would I have known?
Now that he's getting better, we are now sick - and so enter the 11th circle of hell, being sick with a healthy baby.
