The Great Cat•astrophe

If you read my last post, then you know I brought home a kitten. Well I forgot to mention that I'm allergic to cats. I've had cats before (about 10 years ago) and found out that I was mildly allergic to them. As long as I took an antihistamine everyday and washed my hands after petting them, instead of rubbing my eyes or touching my face, I was fine. Maybe a sniffle here and there.

Well. Apparently I went from mildly allergic to highly allergic. Like deathly allergic. Finn, the kitten, sent my sinuses into a wild fire of sneezing, coughing, itchy eyes that I wanted to claw out of my face, and what I would call feelings of lockjaw. 

At one point, I was changing Ansel's diaper using the changing table and I sneezed. I guess it caught Finn's curiousity and he began digging his claws into my pants and climbing up my leg above my knee, almost to my hip. Now imagine me trying to maintain a smile towards my child who thinks it's hilarious to grab and try to chew on the cloth I use to cover him so I don't get peed on, snot pooling below my nose, and dancing like I have ants in my pants trying to get this demon kitty off of me. 

 

I was miserably sick. We decided that we couldn't keep Finn. I already felt like shit physically and began to feel it emotionally. It was because of me we had to get rid of Finn and it was because of me that we had him in the first place. There was a knife stuck in my chest and it kept going deeper and deeper. When we were leaving him with his new home, Cody began to cry. He cried the whole way home. Knife went deeper. I kept apologizing and he kept saying "it's fine". 

That night, my mom picked up LittleMan for a Grandma's House sleep over so Cody and I could relax together. We were both getting on each others last nerve which usually means we need to escape from responsibility for a night. So we bought some beer for him and cider for me and watched Catching Fire (go ahead and laugh). Well by the time I went to lay down, I felt feverish and on the verge of hospitalization. Drinking a couple ciders probably wasn't the best idea. But Cody came to my rescue after making a comment that we better not have gotten rid of Finn for no reason. Knife went deeper. He researched all of my symptoms and confirmed that I was having a mad allergic reaction to Finn which had kicked my fibromyalgia into overdrive. He researched what medicine I could safely take while breastfeeding. Within 10 minutes of taking some medicine, I went from hysterical to calm and laying my feverish head on Cody's cool chest. I was out like a light for 9 hours straight. It was glorious! 

After washing and vacuuming everything, I'm beginning to feel better, slowly but surely. Now we know to NEVER get a cat again, stick with dogs or fish. I just hope that one day Ansel doesn't suddenly ask "did we ever have a cat?".

Kids Birthday Parties Are Dangerous

I feel as though birthday party invitations for kids should come with a warning label. Somewhere, even in small print, but somewhere on the back of the card or at the bottom of the FaceBook invite there should be a caution statement. 

LittleMan and I survived attending our first birthday party. Since the 2 year olds party was going be held outside at a park playground, I took every precaution I could think of: lightweight clothing for the heat, homemade sunblock via my sister, a hat for Ansel, and all the necessities of the daily diaper bag. I thought we were prepared. I was wrong, very wrong.

The party mom was amazing through the whole event. I don't know if I could've done it better. And besides for the birthday boy briefly crying once, everyone had a great time. As for the party's caution, I did get a little carried away when writing it (but only a little).

This is what the party's warning label should've been:

WARNING!: anxiety may occur when other peoples children wander off towards the parking lot or restroom pavilion alone. The birthday child's mom wants everything to go as planned however it won't because children have short attention spans and won't want to complete any of the planned activities so please help the mom out so she doesn't have a panic attack or decide to go full Rambo on the father who takes an hour to retrieve the pizza or the party participants. Be prepared for strangers to join the playground, it is a public park, and their kids may want to slide first or knock over the pine cone bird feeders you made. Some strangers may approach in close proximity with a cardboard box labeled Free Kittens in which case you will call your significant other and ask for permission to bring home one of said kittens since the stranger who barely speaks a word said he was on his way to the animal shelter and thought he'd try us out first. Once you retrieve a kitten from sketchy stranger, know that the kitten is probably too young to have left it's mother and will have fleas that will take an hour to bathe and comb out of its fur in which case it will scratch the f*** out of you. You're welcome.

My sister holding LittleMan 

And Finn (our new kitten) and LittleMan