Lessons Learned

The past several days have afforded me some valuable life lessons.  Ten, to be exact.  I am going to share them in hopes that you will not have to repeat my experiences in order to gain the accompanying lessons. 

1.  If a child awakens you in the middle of the night to announce she has thrown up, ignore any subsequent claims that she may make about doing it in the toilet.  No matter how warm and cozy your bed is or how many horrible nights of sleep you have had in a row, no matter how much you WANT to believe the whole mess has been flushed away, you need to go down to investigate for yourself. 

2.  If you choose to NOT investigate, have a hazmat suit on hand.  And a spare mattress.  At the very least, have a pair of rubber gloves.  You don't want to discover you are missing these important items after the mess has been sitting around for 6-8 hours.

3.  Rubber mattress guards don't do any good if you leave them in the box from Amazon.com next to the bed.  You have to actually put them ON for them to do their jobs protecting your mattress.

4.  If you choose to leave said rubber mattress guard in its original packaging, at least have some enzymatic cleaner on hand because that is what all your Google searches about saving mattresses from vomit will recommend.  You will NOT be able to drag four kids (one of whom is quite sick) to the store in the event of this particular emergency.  Also, make sure you have plenty of baking soda and antibacterial Febreze on hand as well.

5.  Don't yell at your kid for vomiting in bed and then fibbing about it.  It will just make you both feel worse than you already do.

6.  Almost-one-year-olds actually do HAVE to take every bite of food that you give them out of their mouth to inspect it/rub it in their hair/rub it on their clothes/add it to the collection of food on the kitchen floor.  It is a biological need stronger than actual hunger.

7.  Even the most perfect baby food eater will come to a phase where she has to spit every spoonful back in your face.  Don't think you've avoided it because you went six months and it never happened.

8.  Breastfeeding certain almost-one-year-olds often resembles that scene in Crocodile Dundee where he wrestles the crocodile.  Except more ferocious and with more teeth sinking into flesh.

9.  Even if you leave the almost-one-year-old three rooms away from a draining bathtub to go answer the doorbell,  she will be able to fall into the tub before you've retrieved the package off the stoop.  She IS that fast, even with her gimp crawl.  (Thankfully the water will be so low that she is not in danger of anything more than destroying the 20 minute diapering/lotioning/haircombing/clothing routine you just put her through).

10.  Motherhood is a disgusting job but somebody has to do it.  Preferably in that hazmat suit.