Parasites, flashlights, and scotch tape

 If I ever come down with a deadly disease, someone please send reinforcements to take care of me. God love Mr. Man, but he is the least sympathetic person in the world. Once when we were traveling back from my mom's, I came down with the "death virus." Overwhelming nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea hit me like a ton of bricks. Mr. Man was driving the beast and towing the camper, and we had agreed to stop at 9:30pm at our halfway point. 8:45 pm, another wave came over me, and I proceed to empty everything but my small intestines in a plastic laundry basket lined with a trash bag. Grabbing a McDonalds napkin from the glove box, I wiped my face down and waited for Mr. Man to pull over to empty my puke bin....5 minutes, Maybe there aren't any good exits? 10 Minutes, seriously, I'm not that particular ANY ole trash can will do. After 20 minutes, I asked him when he was going to stop. He looked at the clock, "We said we were stopping at 9:30." 45 minutes later, we arrived in the Walmart parking lot, and I got to empty my bin. I spent the evening lying in bed with terrible stomach pains watching my phone to see how many minutes had passed. The longest time I made it between bathroom breaks was 10 minutes. I also spent the night praying that my husband would catch the death virus from me to make him learn some empathy. (He never got it, but I'm not sure I can say I would have been sorry if he had) It wasn't until the next evening after we had returned home, that Mr. Man took me to the hospital . (Only AFTER, I cried and irrationally told him I was going to be the only woman in America to die from diarrhea.) The ER loaded me up on Demerol, potassium, IV bags and anti-nausea meds, and I finally final felt better. As we drove home, Mr. Man said, "I told you you needed to drink more and you'd feel better, that's why I bought that Gingerale for you."

 Fast forward to last night.. One of our boys came into our room and told us his behind itched. I immediately thought "pinworm" and grabbed scotch tape and a flash light and handed them to Mr. Man. He looked at me with a blank stare. "Um, you're his dad, I think he'd feel more comfortable with you checking," I told him. I was trying to keep this situation nonchalant-like, "Dad's just going to put scotch tape on your behind hole and check for worms." My son looked pretty horrified, and Mr. Man was not helping. He spent the next 15 minutes arguing and giving me reasons why I should be the one to do this.
"You're his mom, he'd feel more comfortable."
"I don't even know what I'm doing. I put the tape where?"
"You were pre-nursing, you'd better at this kind of thing."
"He's fine. Just tell him to wipe better." 

After many excuses and protests, Mr. Man took a quick and peek and declared him fine. Women, tell me why we EVEN get them to do these kinds of things? We're just going to have to go back behind them and do it correctly. I rechecked, and sure enough, I spotted a little helminth.  I called in another boy, and oh, yes, he has them too. The husband decided that we should just treat all of the boys and skip anymore checks. 

 I went to the drug store this morning and picked some meds up. We stripped the beds, disinfected the bathrooms, and I dosed out some chalky, oddly banana flavored medicine to the boys and myself. (The bottle said it was enough for a whole family, but it lied. I figured Mr. Man could fend for himself). And then, that feeling began to take over..accompanied with sweating, and stomach pains. Apparently, I was only one who got sick from the medicine. Mr. Man, who had spent the majority of the afternoon loading the camper for the all boys trip this weekend, came in the bedroom to tell me he was leaving. Then he kissed me on the forehead, so he didn't "catch anything."   

 On a side note, the older boys just returned from the Ex's house. I tried to call to notify him that he may want to get some meds, but as usual, he didn't answer. I figure it's not a big deal anyways. Pinworms go away on their own..after 14 weeks or so.