Allergies, Baby Brain and a Mystery Cat

Most of you know that I have severe allergies, and pregnancy is not my friend this time of year. Yes, the doc said it was OK to take my Flonase (miracle steroid nose spray) and Claritin, but for some reason, it wasn't OK with my last doctor when I was pregnant with Sean. So given that I'm in the critical first trimester, I made a deal with myself that for the first trimester, I would not take the Flonase at all, and only take the Claritin when I absolutely needed it. At first, I thought pregnancy cured my allergies, as a month ago, I had hardly any symptoms. What I failed to appreciate was that with such a cold early Spring, allergy season was just starting later than usual. These past two weeks, I've been sneezing like crazy, and secretly wished that I had one of those golf course ball washers so I could pop out my eyes and give them a good bath.

So Wednesday it rained all day, making me even more sleepy than my normal pregnant-self. Luckily, my kid rocks, and played to his heart's content while I laid on the couch like a slug, drifting in and out of consciousness. It also gave me some renewed energy for yesterday (Thursday) morning, and I woke up with an urge to do some cleaning! This urge hits me rarely these days, so I jumped on it!  And then Baby Brain kicked in. (Baby Brain: The phenomenon that occurs when the baby you're body is building taps into and sucks out your brain, rendering you a bumbling, stumbling idiot.) I decided to start dusting!

And not just spot-dusting, but deep dusting, we're talking the top of the entertainment center dusting.  I started in the living room, and had moved on to Sean's room when it finally hit me that this was a mistake.  The full body sneezes were my first clue.  If you've never seen a full body sneeze, just imagine that there's a string in the center of your back, and when you sneeze, it's as if someone jerked on that string hard, sending your arms and legs flailing in front of you.  So I stopped dusting in Sean's room, but decided it was smart to vacuum those rooms that I dusted.  I was not prepared for what happened next.

I finished straightening up Sean's room, and pulled out the vacuum, which, I'll be honest, hasn't seen the light of day in two weeks.  Last time I saw it, Trey used it in the dining room, and then gave it a good cleaning.  So I turn it on in the far corner of Sean's room, and am immediately hit with an odor I have yet to fully describe accurately - a vinegar/ammonia/concentrated cat piss smell, so incredibly strong, my stomach immediately hit my middle-throat.  For some reason, I insisted on finishing Sean's room, by which point, his room and hallway were filled with concentrated cat piss.  OMG! 

Not really sure if the smell was emanating from the vacuum or the carpet itself, and not completely convinced that there wasn't a mystery cat in the house, I got down on all fours and inhaled me some carpet fibers.  As if my lungs weren't already screaming.  It definitely was not the carpet.  At a complete loss for what was going on, I understood that Sean's room was in a horrific state, so I pulled out another lung-irritant, and doused Sean's room with some Oust and turned on his fan.  At this point, I decided a break was in order, and I fixed Sean and I some lunch while his room deodorized.  I also called Trey at work to ask him what the hell he did to our vacuum, but I'm pretty sure he thought I was completely crazy when I relayed this story to him over the phone, and he had no idea where the order could be coming from.

It didn't take long for the Oust to knock out the smell, and Sean was down for a nap about an hour later.  And I was wiped out!  If you have allergies, you know that it's more than sneezy symptoms - an overload of allergens can not only turn you into a snotty, runny mess, but really knock you out physically.  So I was done for the day, barely able to leave the couch to even feed myself.

And I continued to pay for the Dusting Incident, as I didn't even think to take my Claritin until bedtime, and it was just too late.  I was up half the night sneezing, and wishing I could gouge my eyes out with a fork.  It was 4am when I finally thought to seek out my allergy eye drops, which did finally give me some relief.  And now I'm just tired.  And I'm afraid of my vacuum cleaner.  Gives a whole new meaning to "Where's the Cat?"  

Not familiar with the "Where's the Cat?" phrasing?  Well, next time your loved one rolls over first thing in the AM to say good morning, and his or her breath knocks you out, ask them "Where's the cat?"  They'll ask "What cat?"  To which you answer "The cat who sh*t in your mouth!"  Or, apparently in my house, pissed in your vacuum cleaner.