Firsts... and not.

To start, I'll give you a "not" first-- I got yet another Thanks-but-no-thanks letter from SCOE regarding my application to become a program assistant/secretary. Yes, you read that right-- apparently, I'm not even qualified to do the job I'm doing now as an administrative assistant. Is this why I'm paying for those student loans??

On another note, we reached a First of sorts with Ethan this week. Very early Friday morning, I woke up to the sound of a click or knock of some sort, and looked over with my groggy, 4 a.m. is way too early for this stuff, eyes to see a light on in our hallway. A light that wasn't on a mere four hours earlier, when I went to bed. I shoved Joel and said "What the is happening?!?" and pointed at the light like it was a five-legged alien about to do some serious abduction maneuvers. He went into the hallway and found Ethan had gone into the bathroom to go potty, turned on the light, and handled his business. Wow! I was impressed, despite my sleepiness. Then he saw me and said "Mom, hold me!" and I realized my night was just beginning.

We went to lay down together in the living room, where he wanted to watch TV. I said no and we started to go to sleep when he said "My tummy hurts." I asked him if he was hungry and he said yes, so I got some crackers. I know, I know, not the best response, but sometimes you do what you gotta do. Anyway, he calmed down and I took him back to his room to lay down with his crackers. Not half an hour later, just as I had fallen deeply into my "Please God let my alarm not go off any minute" sleep phase, I woke to hear panicked cries and coughing coming from his room. The first thing that ran through my mind was that he was choking or gagging on his crackers. I ran in there and found him making spitting sounds, so I thought at first that he had spit out whatever he was choking on. Then I turned on the hallway light to see better-- and realized he had been throwing up. All over his favorite/only embroidered "Turkish" style pillow and his bed. My poor thing! I've never seen him do that before!

He was so scared by the very act of having vomited that he kept crying and half-screaming for help for several minutes. He kept saying "Mom, I was coughing and then I was spitting and it was all on my blanket" and so on... poor thing. It must be so frightening to have your body just rebel like that. Anyway... we cleaned him up and basically stayed up with him. Three and a little hours later, he seemed much better, so Joel took him to daycare. Whoops. She called me by 10:30 saying he had thrown up again-- and it was a lot. A ton. A huge amount. Poor things, all of them! I left work to take him home and take care of him, and all seemed to be going well until this evening. He'd finally taken in some crackers and juice, and then walked back to go potty when-- again-- the keening cries rang out from the bathroom. I ran down to find him standing on the potty, wailing, and when I got there, it happened-- projectile vomit, which I proceeded to catch like it was liquid gold. What the?!?

My poor boy... He threw up everything he'd just eaten/drank, and was miserable the whole time. I feel so bad for him! He's never thrown up before, so this is all new to me... a friend suggested ginger-peach tea, so I'm going to shop for it tomorrow. I just feel so helpless about it all. I wish I could give him medicine to make it all better! :(