Best Week Ever

The following is a brief recap of the Best Week Ever and by best week ever I mean worst week of my life.

Samuel got things off with a bang by getting an ear infection and keeping me up all night every night.

The afternoon I was about to make our reservations for three family days on the beach in New Smyrna, my love calls to tell me that Uncle Sam cut those three days off. I sob my way to the salon chair where Jillian fixes my hair beautifully and provides me with alcohol to drown my sorrows. So, I decided to shut up, suck it up, and move forward.

Hubby came home. We spent as much time together as possible considering all the things he had to do in preparation for the big "D". We were both stressed out (vast understatement) and seemed unable to connect, which is common for us when times get really hard. This however, left me longing and kind of grouchy because I guess I was expecting a whole bunch of romance seeing as how we'll have at least 9 months apart.

We went to the science center and had a great time :)

Then. it happened. Puke at midnight. Nicholas toddled into the guest room (where I had been sleeping so that my hubby could at least enjoy full nights' rests in his own bed before leaving) postively covered in puked up pizza. Hubby helped me clean him up and took him to the master bedroom for the rest of the night. I cleaned most the house by 1:45 am. Pickle was up all night long vomitting. The next day, he felt better for a few hours in the morning before becoming strange. He got sick again and refused to eat or drink anything. He was clearly dehydrated, and after he vomitted on me during dinner, I asked his daddy to take him to the ER. My hero took him, and they gave him IV fluids and some zofram and did a bunch of scans and blood tests and analyses, etc. Apparently, he just had "the bug" and would be fine, but you can imagine how I felt knowing my baby was sick, and in pain, and that my husband's last night at home was spent in a chair in an ER waiting room instead of in my arms on my couch. So I did what any sane woman in my situation would do! I cleaned the whole house again and began eating the chocolate chip cookies I baked for the soliders...

Nick was recovered enough the next day to ride with us to drop my Hero off at the appointed place so that he may go for the big "d". so. we went there as a family, and I left the place as a geographically single mom/ raving lunatic/ basket case. Mom drove me home in her car while Daddy kept Nick in the truck so that Nick wouldn't see me like that. I felt it best that he not understand the gravity of the situation. (The rest of my feelings about this situation can not be expressed by simple syllables and punctuation. There are no words to make you understand, and trying here would only make me hurt more. Perhaps in time I will find the strength and the adjectives to express some piece of it. In the mean time, this watershed in my life is reduced to this single paragraph, but certainly you understand that there is a great raging waterfall of pain and loss hiding behind this tiny group of words.) We made it to my parents' house. I talked to hubby a few more times and crawled, emotionally exhausted, onto my couch there.

Hubby called that next morning and told me he had been up all night vomitting, etc because he had contracted "the bug!" I felt awful, blamed myself for not cleaning enough, and worried about him being ill and traveling the many hours to where he's going. The funny thing was that although I had been quite vigilant about washing my hands, taking my vitamins, cleaning, and taking the proper precautions with Nicholas, I felt yuck. In fact, I had felt slightly "yuck" for a couple of days but had convinced myself it was all the stress. Ladies and Gentleman, it was decidedly not stress. It was "the bug". And if we want to compare it to a bug, I think we could say it was about a 40 foot cockroach with a scorpion's tail. Huge. Disgusting. and Painful with the potential to be lethal. I took ill that night and, I'm ashamed to say, I took the rest of Nicholas' Zofram to try and tame the vomitting because he was no longer experiencing symptoms. I was petrified that I wouldn't be able to stay hydrated enough to breastfeed Samuel John! The cramps were awful, I was delirious with the pain, and I was up all night long. I survived. My sweet parents let me sleep pretty much all day the next day. I drank some fluids and began coming around.

The next morning, Mama took ill. She maintained that it was the bad salad from the night before, but I knew better. I spent the day feeling responsible and therefore horrible! AND. I was forced to go to the beach and the pool. Can I tell you that 1) I look like a spotted walrus with shaving bumps in my new polka dot swimsuit and 2)that i HATE the beach. why? because I hate sand. and dirt. and places where sand and water meet and climb into your private crevaces.

That evening, Daddy fell prey to the bug. His was the very worst of all. I hear from mama that he is doing better, and now I am home on my couch. Both boys are sleeping, the dog is curled up on his bed, and I am here free to sit around in my bra and blog. But what a freaking week. I hope there is a bit more happiness to be spread around soon. I have faith there will be. Thanks for letting me share it all. you've helped more than you know already.

will you marry me?

Nicholas no longer stays in his bed until you come to get him. He got out of bed 8 times before giving up last night, once at 4:50AM this morning, twice before his nap, and maybe 4 times before bed tonight. This makes for less sleep and less peace in general.

Samuel John has lost all sleep training progress I had made due in part to his weepy eyeball, part due to his refusal of all fake nipples ie binkies, part due to my not being firm and simply putting the boob in his face to quiet him.

I laid around in my bed eating cookies with Nick this morning, and it subsequently gave him diarreah and a horrible red diaper rash. Nice mom. Make him fat AND miserable. oops.

I nearly canceled my personal training appointment but decided it would be bad. Stress makes me eat, and this personal training thing helps me not want to cheat and eat cookies and be lazy (with the exception of today b/c I was uber depressed due to missing my Matthew deeply after a lovely four day weekend and some crappy news being passed down the pipe.)

So I went to the training appointmet- and got stronger. yay! Nicholas said to me, "Miss Becky is going to help Mama be stronger!" It was so cute I wanted to pop his head like a pimple! I got Nick home and got him dinner and a bath. Then Mom and Daddy came, and I was so excited!

Then. It happened. I decided to take out the trash. And this is what I see one of these....

Yeah. ohmfg. it's a brown widow. apparently slightly less evil than the black one b/c they inject less venom per bite. It's wedged up unde the lip of the garbage can which means that had Jesus not deeply loved me, I woulda stuck my hand up there and got a not so friendly "hello." So. It scared the shit out of me, so I hesitated before I killed it, giving it just enough time to escape up under the lid. So I went in and got Daddy and he came out with me to "end" her. We looked for what seemed like hours but was probably about 1o minutes. Well. shit. we couldn't find her. So that thing is wandering around in my garage. great. well. it gets better. you ready? So.... we push the garbage can back inside after giving it a thorough inspection only to disturb one of these.....

My father, My Hero, helps it out of the garage while I try and get out a hoe to behead the beast. It slithered away and, all fingers, toes, and other digits in tact, I was free to have a complete sob fest/ freak out extravaganza in the garage. Seems like lately as soon as I say to myself, "it's okay, Jessi. This single mom thing is going to work out fine. you can do it," the ASS falls out and something crazy happens. ie a couple of weeks ago when my car battery died and I had both boys in the middle of a Publix parking lot sweating balls and screaming. That happened just after the hubby became complETEly unreachable for a couple days, and thank God a bunch of dear friends came to the rescue. Back to the garage. Just afterward, my darling husband called, and I yelled at him and cursed at him for not being able to be here as if he didn't want to be. Of course he did. Of course he couldn't. I told him I wanted to speak to his commander. That I was going to DEMAND he not be allowed to go and instead stay here with me to kill snakes and spiders for me. For some reason, he didn't give me the number!?! haha

UPDATE: We subsequently found and murdered the brown widow with a wooden stake. And I am now brave enough to enter my garage (during the daytime only of course....)

I need friends. a lot more of them. who can fill positions for my husband. Here are the ones that are available:

• general contractor
• snake and spider killer (obviously)
• vehicle mechanic (only outside of standard maitenance for which I have a service plan)
• babysitter
• cook
• entertainer
• date night hotty
• shoulder to cry on
• i'm sorry. you can't stand in for him on the sex thing. i kind of promised to remain celibate while he's gone... i know. it's old fashioned ;) .....
• singer of chillean love songs/ comedian
• general g.i.joe type to wander around the yard with a gun and a flashlight anytime there's a noise in the night.
• someone to pick on me, especially about my gardening
• umbrella holder/door opener/ cheer-er upper
• someone to make me laugh, mostly when I cry and am adamant not to laugh

pay will be... nothing. but i will probably write you a thank you note. you may get chocolate chip cookies out of the deal, and I promise to smile a lot!