last night, in honor of halloween, i sat down to type about my history of scary movies and how coupled with my over-active imagination, halloween is pretty much the worst time of year for me to watch any type of t.v. {or commercials for that matter}.
but my scary thoughts were interrupted by an even scarier sound. i had been on the phone at the time when i heard a loud and fast thump-thump-thump-thumpthumpthump coming from upstairs.
i asked ben, "what was that?" but he was in the middle of watching james bond {the cheesy pierce brosnan one with denise richards. because i had put a stop to any and all scary movie-ness. sidenote: denise richards is a terrible actress and puts a whole new spin on the word "scary."} and had been lost in the moving emotion {snort} of the movie so he didn't hear it.
thump-thump-thumthumpthump it came again.
"that! did you hear it?? what IS that?" i told my friend i'd have to call her back and took off running up the stairs.
my over-active imagination ran with me, convincing myself that i would find freddy krueger leaning over one of my children, just about to make them his tasty snack. or that the poltergeist was hiding in leah's closet and had snatched her in to our t.v. to try to make her his forever. i had almost resigned myself to give a call to the creepy little psychic lady who helps rid possessed houses of their evil demons. {sidenote #2: that lady's voice creeped me out almost as much as the clowns in the movie. almost.}
i told ben to check on caleb & i would check on leah. as i opened her door, i let out a huge sigh. she was safe in her bed, bum up in the air, arms wrapped around her blankies and stuffed hippo. but she was awake, and held up her head and let out a little cry. i couldn't believe she was still awake, it was almost 10:00 at night. she hadn't been feeling well for the past couple of days but seemed to be over the worst of it. i wondered if i was wrong though, and decided to give her a little drink of water, change her diaper and assess whether or not she needed some medicine.
i met ben at the stairway who confirmed that no clowns had captured caleb and drug him under his bed, and we went downstairs. leah was fussy, whining and wiggling around. i should have recognized the signs, but my mind was on other things, more worried about men wearing hockey masks peeking through our windows.
when suddenly, leah barfed. all over.
about a million green beans from dinner, a gallon of curdled milk and who knows what else came forcefully out of her and onto her favorite blankie. she had been sitting on my lap but luckily i missed the gushing nastiness. ben and i went into what i call "barf mode" {caleb made us professionals in this area} and as i tried to wrap the blanket to catch whatever else was coming, ben ran for the nearest bowl...which in this case held the rest of the halloween candy we hadn't handed out. luckily ben is good in a panic {unlike me} and dumped the candy out before reaching us just in time to catch the next geyser.
it went on for a couple of minutes and then her body finally calmed down. but leah herself was not calm at all, she was screaming at the top of her lungs. as ben cleaned up the mess downstairs, i took her upstairs for a bath. back in the days of caleb regularly throwing up every 48 to 72 hours, the bath would always calm him down. but it just sent leah into more of a fit, freaking out and repeatedly trying to climb her way out of the tub as i frantically soaped her up and washed away the vomit from her hair and hands.
once she was out of the bath, she wouldn't calm down long enough for me to even put a diaper on her. she squirmed and rolled and screamed her head off, to such extremes that i actually started wondering if we were re-living "the exorcist" and needed to tie her to a bed. as i softly spoke to her, trying to convince her to put on some clothes, she ran around her room buck naked, screeching at top volume.
she carried on this way, even involving ben trying to help out. as she screamed i could tell she was cold. and then the next lovely moment came, when she peed on her carpet. and it disturbed her so much that she then started yelling, "UH OH! OH NO! OH NO! SOWEEEE!" over and over. i wiped her off, and decided to momentarily give up on the clothing, wrapped her up in her towel again, held her close and rocked in the rocking chair with her.
her little body shook with the hup-hup's and finally calmed down. she looked at me through swollen, red eyes until i could finally tell that the need for an exorcism was over. she sat up and let me get her dressed, then she ate some goldfish crackers, drank a little bit of water, watched a baby einstein show and finally went to sleep.
i climbed wearily into my own bed a few minutes later and soon realized that there are scarier things than my over-active imagination, such as:
-leah's post-barfing breath
-caleb waking me up at 3:30 in a sneezing fit, letting me know he didn't feel well and needed some help
-having both kids sick at the same time
-my 2 day stint in just pj's
-leah's hair, after going to bed with it wet & unwilling to let me brush it before she went to sleep
-6:30 am, when caleb woke me up again, asking me to get him another tissue
-the dark circles under my eyes, after my mostly sleepless night.
someday i will write about my history of fear that began with a halloween episode of "the facts of life" and spans up to the present time that even now causes me to have to sleep with the closet light on some nights {ben is a very patient man}. but for today i will deal with the real, and un-imaginary.
and i never did find out what that thum-thump thumping noise was.
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