The Vomit Chronicles: Sympathy Vomit

I was recently transported back to my childhood days at daycare where I witnessed the strange phenomenon of The Sympathy Vomit. One kid would throw up, and in rapid succession, two or three more would stop wherever they were playing to follow suit.

At the time, I never thought about it from the director’s perspective, but now, I like to think I understand what she was going through, except she had carpet and that always makes vomit worse. Yes, even worse than cleaning it out of car seat buckles, which is my favorite place to clean up vomit.

A few weeks ago, we made the trek downtown to the new Regions Park to watch a Barons game. It was Saturday evening. We had already attended a birthday party that morning and we took nice long naps in the afternoon. We had lunch at the party and snack on the way home and we were planning to eat supper at the ballpark. What we did not do was have a snack before we left for the game. It was a rookie mistake on my part. I know better.

Ella was acting puny for most of the drive, but I tried to convince myself that she was just tired. We’d had a busy day; she probably didn’t actually sleep at nap time, etc. Then she started coughing and I started calculating the number of hours since she last ate. They were too many. She coughed again, I asked if she was okay, and she said she was. I willed our car to transform into a helicopter and air lift us the remaining few miles to the ballpark. It didn’t. When she coughed the third time, she started crying and vomit ensued. I searched frantically for The Vomit Cup. It wasn’t there. I don’t know when it made its way out of the car, but it did. She had her car blanket wrapped around her, so I yanked it up to cover her lap and told her to finish throwing up into the blanket. Her shirt was done for, but I wanted to at least contain the mess.

It was then that I had a flashback to daycare, when, from the other side of the backseat, I heard a gag. Lacking The Vomit Cup and minus a second Vomit Blanket, I grabbed the only thing available to me. I stuck it in Luke’s hands and told him, “If you need to throw up, do it in this. I will wash it.” He said he didn’t need to. Dave made a noise of protest (disgust?) from the driver’s seat, but didn’t say anything. I’m assuming he was feeling grateful that he was driving that day. I turned my attention back to Ella and started handing her baby wipes to clean her face and hands. We’d made the executive decision to drive the rest of the way to the ballpark and change there, so I was trying to help her clean up the easiest parts as best I could from the front seat.

I heard a tiny noise and a little whine from the other side and glanced over my shoulder to see that Man Cub was indeed throwing up in a Pucci Pets White Pony Designer Purse.





Pucci Pets White Pony Designer Purse,
 for carrying ponies and catching vomit.



It was sympathy vomit at its finest.

Once we parked, I helped Ella change her clothes and finished wiping her down with baby wipes. Luke only needed his face, hands, and the chest clip of his seatbelt wiped. I wrapped all of the mess up in The Vomit Blanket, tossed it in the cargo hold, and sprayed the whole backseat and Ella’s seatbelt with Febreze.

Guess who else almost sympathy vomited with them? Me. I made it all the way to the gag before I tamped it down with a very rational argument: “What are you doing?! You can’t throw up right now! You have to clean up their vomit first.” Parenting is full of sacrifice.