Everyone in my house has a severe case of food poisoning. Barfing and diarrhea (except the one person who didn't eat True Story™ organic ham from Costco). Wife is out of commission...I thought she was dead laying on the bathroom floor when I came home and found her there. I have twin girls age 7....here is what I've learned so far tonight...To get your kids prepared:Prepare for midnight barfing and diarrhea: put a bucket (as large as you can find, as they will have bad aim) next to the child's bed (and for everyone else sick in the house).Put another bucket in each bathroom in-front of the toilet. This will come in handy when they have a diarrhea attack and barf at the same time. I neglected to do this and my daughter barfed all over the floor while sitting on the toilet (if you have a long journey to the nearest toilet consider putting a bucket halfway -- not necessary if you have dogs). If you don't have lots of buckets, use indoor garbage cans (don't bother with a bag). If you don't have that, use the Halloween baskets like I did (this may or may not have an added benefit of associating illness with halloween candy). As long as its plastic and will hold chunky liquid, it should work -- the bigger the better. If the Halloween bucket has a small opening on top, its not good. Their aim won't be that good. Use a salad bowl instead.Be sure to tell them its imperative that they don't shit or puke in the bed. I can clean up that stuff from a wood floor (my dogs love it!), but if its the bedding its going to be a lot more work. I told my kids to try to make it to the bathroom, but if they only make it to the hallway that's fine. Just avoid the bed at all costs!Who cares if its passed their bedtime, get them in their PJs, and let them snuggle up with a blanket on the couch until they fall asleep. It will be easy to put them to bed. There will be no resistance. My kids will refuse to go to sleep if they are not feeling well, so why fight it?Praise them on what a great job they did when they throw up in the hallway, they didn't puke or shit the bed, this is primary concern and if its avoided they should be rewarded.Don't encourage self pity...this will backfire eventually. I get it, being sick sucks, but encouraging them to whine and whimper all day will drive you absolutely bat shit crazy in the end.If they barf or shit, you can take the rug, clothes, etc out back and spray it down with a hose -- get the washing machine going with lots of detergent + bleach first, high-power. You gotta get those chunks off first though. It's either that or throw it away, but that's another $50-100 bucks I would rather spend on something else....like roses if my wife lives through the night.Lock the dogs up or just keep them outside or in the garage. Mine will try to eat the shit and puke if it ends up on the floor.If your daughters have long hair, be sure to put it back in a bun or pony tail otherwise they will lean over and puke into the bucket and get it all over their hair, which will then mean taking a shower. I didn't do this the first time...had to bath them again. I found a few videos on youtube on how to do this. (rubber bands are not good unless your child enjoys their hair being pulled out by the roots, string is better).....brb, someone is throwing up......bucket saved the day, no mess...rinsed the bucket in the shower, good to go!Make sure your shower has one of those extensions on the shower head, its much easier to clean, or just use a hose outside. Don't bother disinfecting as you'll be doing it again in 30 minutes.If you have multiple people sick, make sure each bathroom has an extra bucket in it and each person has one by their bed -- incase you missed it, this will save the day when they are having a diarrhea attack followed by a barfing attack. Also leave the seat up, so they can plop down easy in an emergency.Don't leave the house. You're fucked, forget stepping out for a bite to eat, order a pizza if you're hungry.Make sure they drink water once they are done puking (even better if you can get some lipton sweet lemon iced tea in the can, this makes the puke not as bad tasting down and up), it helps avoiding dry heaves. don't let them eat food but water will at least give them something to throw up.Have a damp washcloth ready to go so they can wipe their face off. When finished, go wash it off and get it ready for round 8.Do not under any circumstances let them sleep in your bed. Unless you want to change it in the middle of the night and wake up your dying/sick spouse.Open the windows and doors. It'll start to smell like puke in the house...and may eventually lead to you puking. Just get some air flow going, give 'em an extra blanket if they are cold.Leave lights on in the hall/bathroom so they can get to it easy and aren't scared of the dark.Have a change of PJs and clean towels ready to go. At the very least know where to find them, otherwise you'll have to wake up the wife because your clueless ass has no idea where these things are...you'll have to check every drawer.My kids always want to use getting sick as an excuse not to go to school the next day. I say "let's play it by ear" I won't want them at school if they are going to throw up, but if they are 100% in the morning, they damn well better be getting ready for school.Don't take it personally when little cunts down vote your well intended Pro Tip.As the dad, just stay up as late as you can. It's pretty common for me to stay up until 2-3am anyway, but it's going to be much easier to respond when someone gets an attack if you hear it immediately rather than being woken up. I already called in sick at work for tomorrow, so I can just sleep in if I stay up until 4am. My wife hopefully will be able to take over at 6am when she usually wakes up.Also, after you hose off the puke from the rugs/clothing, and set the wash to go. Be sure you actually put the clothes IN the washing machine. I ran the damn thing with only soap/water for 20 minutes before my wife asked why the dirty clothes were on the garage floor.More down voting? you people have no sense of humorReport food poisoning on your state's health web site (if you can find the damn form). warning: all government sites were built in the late 90s. Do not attempt to find it on your mobile phone...unless you enjoy squinting and pinch-zooming to read.Sit in their room with them while they fall back asleep. I turn on classical music (amazon prime has some free mp3s) or put on the Vin Scully (i hate the dodgers but this man is a legend...my kids fall right asleep as soon as they hear his voice). If the dodgers are not at home or the game is over, find Vin Scully broadcasts on youtube. Has the added benefit of being part of history. Also Jon Miller is good too if you can't bring yourself to watch the dodgers.Unless you want an angry sick, half dead wife yelling at you, its important that you are on your A-game when it comes to running interference. The last thing I want them to do is to go in and wake up their mother. Everyone will suffer if they get passed you, especially you.Don't let the dog sleep on your child's bed. If it decides to go take another shit outside, you may wind up with a crying kid who needs to be comforted back to sleep again when it jumps off the bed and wakes her up.Keep telling your kids that they will feel better in the morning, as soon as its out of their system -- this is how your body fights food borne ISIS. Puking is good for them...It also makes them feel better, because one of mine thought this might actually be the end for her.Don't bother with porn tonight...you'll get interrupted (guaranteed). Install Kodi/Exodus and watch whatever the hell you want for free.Be sure to check the puke for blood. If you see blood call 9-1-1. BONUS: DO NOT ACCEPT AN AMBULANCE (unless you've got $2500 to burn).If you hear coughing coming from the back bedroom, bolt in there immediately. Remember: A-game.Its important to comfort your wife while simultaneously avoiding making her talk (and trying not to plan a memorial in your head and how you'll raise the kids alone just in case)...I find asking questions like "What's for dinner?" just makes her angry.Realize you overlooked one important detail. The elderly sickly woman whom you do not recognize just yelled from the back of the house that she will definitely not be up at 6am and you'll have to take the kid who isn't sick to school in 2 hours. 2 hour power nap baby!I've decided to forego sleeping at all tonight. Going to bed now would be like leaving in the bottom of the 9th of a tie game. It simply no longer makes any sense.4:17am I AM AMPED UP FOR SOME REASON!!! IS THIS WHAT IT FEELS LIKE TO BE AN OLYMPIAN? I FEEL LIKE I COULD PAINT THE HOUSE TOMORROW IN UNDER 2 MINUTES!! 2 MORE HOURS UNTIL FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL...I'M GOING TO GET THE PREMIER PARKING SPOT!!!i'm starting to come down off that weird high that I experienced a little bit ago. 1 more hour until dawn....must....stay....awake...I'm starting to get hungry, i haven't eaten a thing in 14 hours. Wondering if diner-on-wheels delivers McDonald's sausage mcmuffins this early in the morning (I'm avoiding any organic ham until further notice due to its packaging stating there are no preservatives used). Still can't leave house for nourishment as someone might still die.After scanning government web sites for the past 2 hours and 45 minutes I found the form (I had to use greasemonkey to automatically inject any .gov site I visited with bootstrap so I don't suffer any brain trauma looking at hundreds of poorly designed government web sites).The high powered special ops precision flashlights I bought on amazon (4-pack for $20) came in handy when I had to go look at the ham that i threw in the garbage to find out what brand it was in order to report food poisoning. If it weren't for the million candle power beam I may have accidentally touched some of the dogshit that was covering it. It's important that I report this to the health dept. I may be at ground zero for some kind of food borne ISIS super virus that the CDC isn't telling anyone about yet.Its 5:09am now. Still no sounds of birds chirping. I hope they didn't catch the food borne ISIS super virus. Nothing. No sign of life. Except I hear someone's cat getting raped...so that's a good sign. Cats are immune.I'm starting to understand the benefit of owning the front-loading washer and dryer that don't require you to bend over. Also freezers on top? what idiot came up with that? Was there an explosion of midget household appliance inventors in the 50s I wasn't aware of? I never use the freezer which is easy to access but I bend over to look in the fridge all the damn time. I think I know what I'm buying the wife for something other than her birthday or Christmas....or valentines day....or our anniversary....or mother's day. Next 4th of July we are going to MAKE OUR REFRIGERATOR GREAT AGAIN!. Its a year away, but I'm not allowed to buy her something like this for the normal gift-giving holidays.5:48am -- my cat just came in from the cold...he seems ok, so it wasn't him that got raped. Although there's no conclusive evidence that he isn't the rapist.No puking for the past 2 hours. Starting to get a little loopie though. I am trying to recall how to get to the kid's school. I have no idea where the new classroom is....and my stomach is starting to gurgle. Don't know if I've been infected with the super virus or just hungry.9:29am I'm back from dropping the kid off at her first day of school She was so happy. Kids really are fun to watch. When I introduced myself to the teacher I forgot my own name. I didn't think to mention that my other kid was not there. I completely forgot I had twins. This must be how parents of singletons feel everyday. Weird.I received what I can only assume were signs from God on my way home from school. Either that or I'm going slightly insane. via /r/Parenting http://ift.tt/2bh9i9x
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