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?".