Mommy Guilt

The night is a little blurry. I know that I got up to pee at 1130, which is unusually early, and I looked in on Natalie. I also remember her coughing funny during the night. Like a gag like cough, which she did twice, pretty close together. I can't remember if when I got up to look was when she coughed or not. At first I thought it was, but now I think it can't have been.

Mike got up extra early for work today to make a doctor's appointment in the afternoon and still put in a full day. Right before he leaves, he always looks in on Natalie. Today, he comes back to me, peeing in the bathroom, and says she threw up during the night. He rushes back and makes sure she is okay. I was terrified for about a 30 seconds. He wakes her up so we can clean her off. She is covered in puke. Two big piles of it at different ends of the crib signal that she must have turned around. Its all in her hair and her face. I pick her up and snuggle her while he strips the bed. Then, he runs the bath for me and gets her undressed while I get some more layers of clothes on. Her forehead isn't the slightest bit hot, and once she wakes up a little, she is happy and babbling. I wash her up and he puts her sheets in the wash. He finally leaves for work while I'm getting her lotion on. I go through the whole bed time routine and even though she seems wide awake, she sucks her thumb and goes into the crib without a peep.

But I feel so horrible. So horrible its boarding on numb, if that makes any sense.

Why didn't I get up and look in on her? I knew that those sounds weren't normal when they happened. I couldn't have looked in or I would have smelled the puke, right?

I can't believe that she didn't cry. She pukes twice and then goes back to sleep laying in it. Wasn't she the least bit scared or uncomfortable? Was she that tired? At least she was smart enough to rotate the first time so she wasn't laying her face in it.

As guilty as I feel, at the same time, I know that Mike didn't hear her. If he'd been home alone he wouldn't have heard her cough at all. And there are plenty of moms who probably have stopped using a baby monitor by almost 17 months. Or, who would sleep through just some coughing themselves. This doesn't make me feel better, though.

Mike says to forget it because its over and done. But I am so upset that she could have choked.

And, we don't really know why she threw up. She was acting funny yesterday, but I constantly checked and she had no noticeable fever by touching her forehead. She refused breakfast, but ate all her other meals just fine. I think the funny behavior was me not paying her enough direct attention. I think maybe she puked because a piece of her meat from dinner might have gotten caught somewhere in her system, which happened to my brother as a toddler. But, that doesn't make me feel too good either. We should have made her hamburger into smaller pieces last night. I did think some were a little big, she didn't seem to be having any problems with them.

Maybe talking with other moms at play group or home visitor when she comes tonight will make me feel better. All I can say now is that I feel selfish for not getting out of bed to check on her, but my memory is so confused about why I randomly decided to check on her 1130 when we only went to bed an hour before.

Our bed time routine is pretty powerful. Natalie got up, took her bath, and got into her pjs just to go back to bed at 6am. I'm sure that the fact that it was still dark out helped us. I'm glad for that at least so that I'm getting a little time to worry over this event alone. I felt wide awake before, but now I'm starting to feel sleepy and should go back to bed myself. But, I think its not worth the effort if she is going to get up soon.

Her room still smells like puke. Luckily, it didn't get on her favorite toy Kitty, but it did get on Glow Worm, who is the only non-machine washable toy in her crib. Also, I think Mike left the paper towels with the puke on them in there. And, even though I scrubbed her hair with a face cloth and shampooed it, it still smells like puke. That will be a sad reminder every time she sits in my lap today.