don't ever trust an eight-year-old with your secrets

Last night, I went to bed at 12:30 AM.  Henry crawled in to bed with us at 3:37 AM, a mere three hours and seven minutes later.  I remember the time because when I sat upright to catch his vomit in my hands, I spotted the clock. It never ceases to amaze me how our children only get sick in the middle of the night. And, how I always manage to wake out of an absolutely sound sleep and catch the puke before it hits me or the ground.  It must be some kind of gene that only mother's have because Charlie does not possess what I have come to consider the R3 or "Rapid Reflux Reflex".

While Charlie brought Henry to the bathroom, I scrambled to wash my hands and check in on William who was sleeping soundly on the bottom bunk. While in his room, I noticed that William's comforter had been doused by his little brother, who had been sleeping on the top bunk and obviously launched the first load before he made it in to our room.  I stripped the blankets off the bed and cleaned up the boys' room while Charlie cleaned up Henry. My husband then retreated to the couch at 3:54 AM, while I crawled back in to bed with my sweet five-year-old who was sick every 20 minutes, on the dot, for the next seven hours.

In those 18 luxurious minutes spanning his recurrences, I would doze off to sleep and have the most bizarre dreams.  In one dream, everyone in our home, including the dog and guinea pigs, was sick to their stomach. In my dream, I was running around with buckets and bowls and doing my best to cleanup.  In my dream, I was so tired that as I was cleaning up a pile on the floor that the dog had left, I picked out what looked like a lovely banana nut muffin (that had apparently been swallowed whole) and popped it in to my mouth without contemplating what I was doing until after I had eaten it.

Fairly certain, that is the most disgusting dream I've ever had. And the only reason I'm telling it now, is because I was so ridiculously tired this morning, that in my delirious state of exhaustion, I made the mistake of telling our children about my dream as I drove them to school.  However, before I told them this dream that I thought they would think was funny (because eight-year-olds would think that was hilarious), I made them promise that they would never repeat this yucky dream that their mother had experienced. And my little rosy cheeked children who were securely buckled in to their seats, promised me. They said, "Mommy, we pinky swear, we will never tell this secret you are about to share with us!"

And like a fool, I believed them. 

Tonight as I was helping the children get ready for bed, William informed me that during circle time this morning? When the entire class was gathered and they were sharing stories?  Elizabeth decided to share the sacred story that her mother was so tired she ate a banana muffin that the dog threw up.

But oops!

She forgot to mention that it was a DREAM. 

Last week, I was embarrassed when in setting up my Linked-In account, an invitation to join this professional networking site was sent to my entire address book - including our children's second grade teacher. Think it's safe to say the embarrassment from this experience easily trumps that one.