A Calamitous Christmas

After all the presents had been unwrapped morning, my 19-month-old son toddled over to me and reached up with his arms, asking to sit in my lap. Isaac is a boy on the go, and these requests for cuddles are infrequent when lately he’d rather go play and explore than sit and snuggle. So of course I took him into my arms and gave him a big hug as he lay his head on my chest. It seemed like the best gift I could have received, until moments later, when he threw up all over me.

I graciously took one for the team, sparing the rug and the chair and everyone else in the vicinity. I took him up and gave him a bath, then took a shower myself and tossed our dirty PJs into the wash, trying to minimize the contact between the sick one and the rest of the family. I told myself that I was going to be fine, that I wouldn’t come down with whatever bug Ike had, that it was probably an incident related feeling off balance due to his latest ear infection and therefore nothing I could catch.

I wish I had been right. The day went on and I did the things I needed to do, cooking a couple side-dishes for dinner at my in-laws’ house, taking Ike for a walk around the block in the stroller to get him some fresh air, but despite my will, I started and finally succumbed in the early evening. Ike and I stayed home and missed Christmas dinner and we both were in bed by 7:30 p.m.

It doesn’t sound like much of a merry Christmas, but the whole time, I was uncharacteristically looking at the bright side and at all that had gone right with the day. The illness held off until after we’d unwrapped presents. All the planning we had done, all the and careful had been made and appreciated before things went downhill. So far, my husband and daughter aren’t ill as well, though I’m knocking on wood as I type that. And maybe this means that we are getting our traditional early January stomach bug over with a couple weeks early – usually it strikes sometime around my daughter’s birthday, so maybe we’ve preemptively dodged a bullet there (knocking on wood yet again).

The unfortunate holiday bug is making me realize how that when you become a parent, you redefine your idea of what makes a day picture-perfect and you learn how to accept what is already perfect about a day gone wrong.