It was early New Year’s Eve morning.  A knock on my bedroom door, and a small little voice alerted me to the fact that something wasn’t quite right.  The little voice proceeded to make her way into the bedroom, and with a very firm and demanding tone she said, “Mommy, you need to take me to the doctors right now!”

I immediately flung myself out of the bed and ran to my littlest daughter.  I expected blood to be trailing off somewhere, maybe from a missing limb or a fractured skull.  Not seeing the cause for such an alarm, I asked her what was wrong.  She said, “Mommy, come here!  I’ll show you!”  In which she proceeded to drag me to the other side of the house and into the bathroom we went.  “See mommy look!  My poop is all big and messy and I had to sit in here for a whole hour!”

Her eyes were crazy and wild looking, as she seemed to have no concept or recollection of ever having diarrhea in her entire life.  I almost started to laugh, as her demanding little face pleaded with me to help her make some sense of this agonizing experience.  So I began to explain to this child of eight, that she just had a stomach bug, and that she would soon be better.  I ended up giving her some anti-diarrheal medicine, sat her in front of the television, and told her that no matter what, she was not to eat anything until her stomach righted itself.

Well since it was still so early, I decided to go back to bed and see if I could get a few more minutes of shut eye in before enduring further chaos.  Climbing back into bed, my husband proceeded to tell me that she had been throwing up several hours earlier.  I was completely shocked by his statement and I said, “What do you mean?  Where was I? And who cleaned everything up?  He just simply smiled and said, “I took care of it all, I didn’t want to wake you up.”

I was completely dumbfounded by the fact that I had not woken up and even more shocked that my husband had cleaned everything up by himself.  To imagine him enduring that grueling task all by himself, made me feel so very guilty for not being there, and blessed at the same time, for having a husband who would attend to such a mess himself.

Now that a week has passed, I was sure we had sailed that ship, and didn’t expect to see the boat return so quickly.  And yet unfortunately, there was another reoccurrence of the entire event last night.  Only this time, hubby was at work, and I was left to attend to my poor child who was squirting from both ends.

Of course I’ve told all of you before, Autumn is my happy child.  Always smiling, always thankful, and through it all, she was thanking me for helping her, and smiling up at me and snuggling next to me, once the squirting eventually stopped.  This time she seemed like she had a better handle on what was going on, and didn’t seem so eager to rush to the emergency room.

Fortunately, my daughter Autumn is rarely sick, and so the week before had been the very first time in her eight year old life that she had experienced any kind of a flu bug.  I’m guessing that nursing her for the first two years of her life, is the reason behind her incredible immunity to illness.  I nursed her the longest and it really has made a difference when I compare her to my other daughters and how often they were all sick.

Anyway, today I am thankful for a child who can still find something to smile about, despite having the stomach flu, and I am thankful for a husband who surprised me last week, and took on a task that most people would shudder to do.  This time around, I sure was missing his help, and I am so tired today because of being up all night.  Fortunately my daughter is feeling better once more, and I’m just hoping and praying that we don’t have another repeat of this in another week.

Hope all of you are having a fantastic week and starting the New Year off on the right foot.  Remember when things don’t go as planned, tomorrow is a new day.  A chance to start over, another opportunity to get over the many hurdles, and carry on with God’s plan for your life.  It may not always be rosy, and you may face a few battles.  Just don’t ever give up!  Love you guys so much.  Hang in there, the weekend is finally here!  ~M xoxo