Answer: Two weeks and one day.
Question: How long can we expect between installation of the new carpet and the first instance of sickness on it?
And we've been living on the carpet for less than two weeks.
Today, I faced two great mothering fears. First Daughter got sick and I cleaned her and it (mostly) up by myself. (I even caught some of it which seemed impossibly disgusting before but today I didn't even think about it until after the fact.)
Then, in preparing First Daughter's bath, I discovered a ginormous spider in the tub. I killed and disposed of it all by myself.
I won't say I've conquered the fears, and I certainly wasn't a pretty sight this afternoon. I think I was crying as much as First Daughter, and Second Daughter was blasting away from her swing while I was attending to other matters (which probably contributed to my tears as well). Now that I think about it again, that spider still gives me the shivers.
I'm struck, though, by what I can do when I focus on my children and their needs rather than myself. I did not want to face that spider. I seriously considered leaving it in the tub until Kansas Dad could come home and finish it off, but my little girl was standing there, spattered with sickness and crying even more because that spider was crawling on her rubber ducky and I just knew I had to take care of her (and therefore, it). So, death by flyswatter, a quick rinse of the tub, and First Daughter had her bath.
