Holy Conjunctivitis!

Pink eye a.k.a Conjunctivitis

Kiki has Pink Eye! Last night her eye was goopy and after wiping it every 20 minutes, it dawned on me that the boogers coming out of her eyeball are not normal.

I have a terrifying early childhood memory of my mom rushing to get my older brother to school and my little brother is in his car seat crying because his eyes were glued shut from the eye goop drying and binding his eyelashes together. My mom didn't have time to wash it away in the early morning rush to get her 5 kids into the car so she could get the oldest to school.
I can still picture my brother crying because it fucking traumatized me. Much like a scene from a movie where a prisoner is being tortured by its captor, no one wants to see a toddler wailing because his eyes are glued shut.
Last night, while I was going to sleep I worried Kiki would wake up and be terrified she was blind if her eyes crust shut, so I sat awake for a long time waiting for her to call out to me. By the time I fell asleep it was middle of the night. Shortly after I drifted off Kiki shouted for me. I came running with a bowl of warm water and a wash cloth. Her eyes weren't glued shut, and when I tried to wipe away what little crusts were there she screamed, "I want to sleep!"
My daughter woke me up this morning by poking me in an eyelid with a finger she was probably using to rub her highly contagious eye minutes before. After four hours at urgent care we got her diagnosis and prescription for eye drops.
The line at the pharmacy was one where the distraction of an iPhone saved me from going completely ballistic by watching someone do their job at a snail's pace. Maybe the pharmacist was pissed she had to work International Women's Day, so she decided to do the minimum required without there being an uprising, and all the customers storm the storage cabinets for the medication.

I couldn't get too worked up over the line because I was thinking of how I was going to get the drops into my daughter's eyes. That involved pinning her down, and holding her eyeball open. She was screaming and crying, and I was scared I would stab her in the eye with the eye dropper. It was as horrifying as watching my little brother in his car seat.

The silver lining to her catching conjunctivitis; we got out of all social obligations this weekend!! We also did a disinfecting deep clean on the house, and finally planted our garden. A garden the kids will dismember one flower at a time when my back is turned.
I can kind of understand now why kids do things that seem psychopathic, like stomping on flowers, or squeezing a worm in half. Its retribution. The weak picking on the weaker, a downward spiral of violent actions.
I hope the eye drops go better tomorrow, but the flowers, are much more hopeful.