Last Minute Scramble

My nanny is getting married in Florida this week. I've known she wasn't available to watch Tory on these dates for months now, but it doesn't make the hassle of finding back-up child care any easier. With showers and bachelorette parties and other life events popping up last minute, there's been several days recently I've coordinated people to watch Tory while Andi and I are at work. And that's only on Tuesdays, Wednesday and Thursdays! I'm lucky to have a fantastic mother-in-law who offered to watch Tuesday and Thursday this week (and many Tues/Thurs in the past) and my SAHM girlfriend Val who volunteered to watch Tory on Wednesday. I thought I had everything figured out - phew!

To throw a wrench in my plans, Tory came down with the flu on Monday night. I heard her cough / gag around 3am and watched on the video monitor for a few minutes to see if everything was alright. It seemed to be; she never cried and nothing appeared to be out of place. My MIL came over on Tuesday (as per the plan) to watch Tory for the day and I told her to keep an eye on her after the weird nighttime incident. She text me later saying Tory had thrown up in the night (poor baby!) but seemed to be fine now, eating her breakfast and playing with her toys.

I nearly died in my office chair. Damn Cry It Out! The last few weeks, Tory has been sleeping through the night consistently. I don't want to start bad habits, so I try not to go into her room after I've put her down to sleep unless she really needs me. And she really needed me. I should've trusted my gut and checked on her. Thoughts of her choking on her vomit and me never knowing flash through my head. Screw the method! Parenting is so hard, sometimes.

Tuesday night, as I rocked Tory to sleep, she vomited again. All over herself, all over me (and in my hair, ack!), all over the chair, all over the carpet. Poor, poor kiddo. I decided to stay home from work on Wednesday. I couldn't very well take Tory to my girlfriend's house and expose her two kiddos and I definitely wanted to be home with Tory if she wasn't feeling well. The bug quickly passed and on Wednesday, Tory seemed fine. She wasn't her playful self, but she didn't throw up anymore either.

Wednesday night, Andi's mom came over to stay the night before her babysitting gig on Thursday. Around 7pm, she came down with the flu and said she felt absolutely horrible. I scrambled once more to find child care for Tory on Thursday, calling my girlfriend Val and asking if Tory could come over to play for the day. Thankfully, she agreed.

Thursday morning, I loaded up Tory in the car and drove her to my girlfriend's house about 30 minutes away. After re-routing once because I forgot Tory's milk, I finally made it to Val's house 90 minutes after I'd left. It was raining and traffic was unbearable. Poor Tory took her morning nap in the car because the commute time took THAT LONG. After I dropped Tory off, I drove 30 more minutes to the North Metro for a presentation, back to my office near downtown Minneapolis for another meeting, back to Val's to pick up Tory, before finally heading home. As I was sitting in traffic, my stomach started to turn queasy. By the time Andi got home from work, I was curled up on the floor and felt like garbage. Andi took over parenting duties and I went to bed at 7pm. Thankfully, the flu bug I caught seemed to be short-lived and I'm feeling better today.

What a mess of a week! I'm thankful it's Friday and everyone's health seems to be back to normal. I accomplished absolutely nothing this week but shuffling schedules and coordinating child care. If I didn't have to work tomorrow, outside in the cold for 12 hours, I'd be glad it's the weekend.