And The Worst Mom Award Goes To...

....uh....that would be ME!

My poor little Zander was up coughing all night, and didn't get much sleep. So I wanted to make sure he got a good long nap.

Around 3:30pm he started talking to himself, which he normally does when he wakes up. He sometimes makes me wonder if there's someone, unseen to me, in the room with him. Anyway, he was coughing quite hard and saying "I wanna go", but he didn't sound upset.

At the same time, I was trying to get Logan to drink a bottle without suffocating him...his nose is still completely clogged. So I figured I would get Logan fed before I went to get Zander. By the time Logan was done eating, Zander wasn't talking anymore, so I thought that he had gone back to sleep.

He started talking again around 4pm. So I put Logan down to play, made a sippy cup of milk for Zander, and went upstairs to get him. When I first entered the room, I smelled something....was it poop? It doesn't really smell like poop. I turned on the light. There was Zander, standing with arms in the air signalling for me to pick him up. He had something brown all over one side of his face, and in his hair. I could also spy through the crib slats a large brown spot on his sheet. I thought "Oh gawd...he's had a diaper blow-out!". But no.....it was vomit. He had thrown up in his crib and all over himself. I believe it was brought on....or out...by one of his coughing attacks.

What made it worse was the fact that it was starting to dry on his shirt, and was completely stiff on his face and in his hair. I have no idea how long he was sitting in it.

I told him to hold on, and ran to get some wet cloths and receiving blankets. I had to take his shirt off before I lifted him out of the crib, otherwise we both would have been covered in it. I got him onto the change table, and stripped him off his pants and socks. I then proceeded to try to scrape the caked-on puke off of his face, out of his ear and nostrils, and comb it out of his hair. It took a while.

I was crying while I was trying to clean him up, I felt so guilty. And do you know what my sweet sweet boy did? He started making cute, goofy faces and flashing smiles at me to try to cheer me up. Of course, it made me cry harder!

Carlos will be home any minute, and both boys will then go into the bath. We normally give them their bath after supper, before bed. But this calls for a change of routine!

I've been a mother for just shy of 2 years now, but I will never get used to the amazing level of guilt a mother can feel. I mean, he wasn't screaming or anything that would signify an emergency. And I had my hands full trying to feed a screaming Logan. But he never says "I wanna go" when he's just woken up in his crib...I should have checked on him.

So, I guess I will spend the night wallowing in self-pity, self-doubt, and guilt. At least Zander has recovered better than I have!