poor little baby

When sickness hits Ada's daycare it hits the whole family, so our family has been a little under the weather for about a week now. When Elliot dropped off Ada last Friday one of Ada's classmates was getting sick all over the room. She was sent home and we all thought, well that was taken care of quickly so hopefully we missed the part where Ada pukes her brains out all over the house. And, while we were sick all weekend, all of us managed to hold down what little food we managed to eat. Until 1 am this morning. I was actually up fighting my own cough when I heard Ada coughing away in her room, and started thinking, "Poor thing, she gets sick like I get sick and that means long drawn out illnesses, with incessant coughing that keeps you up all night long." And then I heard it, a different cough. A more chunky cough. Followed by some crying and I had a gut feeling that we had NOT missed the puking phase of this illness. So we whipped into cleanup mode, got Ada cleaned up and just as we thought she was starting to settle down, she got sick again. She ended up feeling better shortly after that and we thought she was Ok this morning, until she got sick while we were getting her ready for daycare. All this time, in between her bouts of illness, Ada was very clingy. I have written before about how snuggly Ada gets when she is sick, but this time she really played up the 'I need my mommy' act. And of course I have fallen for it hook line and sinker. I always knew that kiddos needed their parents love and compassion and cuddles when they were sick, but I had NO idea that the way God got around the whole parents being grossed out by gallons of baby puke, was that he built in the 'poor little baby' reflex. You know the one, where even though your baby has puke in their hair and on their hands and their breath stinks like a heavy coat of spoiled milk; when they reach out for you - instead of retching and gagging from the utter stench of it all, you hold them close and put their head on your shoulder and rock them back and forth. Whispering assurances in their ear and thinking to yourself, 'Poor little baby, I wish I could go through this for her'.