Implosive Therapy

As long as I can remember, I've been something of a clean freak.  I hate to be dirty, sticky, smelly or otherwise defiled by germs, slime or grit.  I don't even like to look at blood, grease or raw chicken.  It's not quite bad enough to be OCD, but it does limit my activities sometimes.

For example, I don't really enjoy fishing.  When we lived on the Gulf Coast in Texas, I had a friend who was a commercial fisherman who invited me to do some night fishing with him.  He said later that the experience was like taking his girlfriend.  I had a great time as long as he touched all of the gross stuff.  He learned that this was a good way to torment me.

I can eat fried chicken without ever touching it with my fingers.

I like ice cream best when I can suck it through a straw.

I almost passed out once while my wife was having blood drawn.

I could never be a contestant on Survivor or Fear Factor...I can barely stand to watch them.

I love to be the guy the roasts the Thanksgiving turkey, but someone else has to pull the giblet-bag out of the carcass.

You get the idea.

As you can probably imagine, this little disorder has been severly challenged since the birth of my daughter.  The original birthplan called for an all-natural approach in which I was probably going to be presented with a slimey, screaming newborn with no more protection than a receiving blanket.  I worked through the anxiety and decided that I could do it without passing out...maybe.  As it turned out, there were some complications and Elle had to be delivered C-section.  The nurse invited me to look over the drape when the doc pulled her out and I initially declined, but the curiosity (and fear of eternal regret if I missed it) finally got the best of me and I watched them pull my daughter out of my wife's belly.  It was a wonderfully gross, magically disgusting moment and I am proud to say that I managed not to hurl...barely.  The good news is that the nurses cleaned her up before handing her to me, securely wrapped in TWO receiving blankets.

I thought it couldn't get any grosser than that first visual experience, but in the 2-1/2 years since, I've encountered a myriad of bodily functions and excretions, with tactile and olfactory add-ons, that topped it.

Still, nothing had me prepared for what happened yesterday.

We were hiking at Roxborough.  I had hiked there with my daughter on Monday but my wife had been working.  It just seemed like a great way to kick-off the long weekend, so we headed back.  It was great!  We saw 8 or 10 deer and a coyote.  Della shot some pictures and I carried Elle in her backpack.  It was a nice day to be out, though a little overcast.  We stopped and had a snack and some water and hit the trail again. 

Then I heard a very alarming sound just to the right side of my head...a sort of inhuman gurgle-cough and I kinda went blank for a minute or two.  I vaguely remember saying, "Oh no," then more gurgle-coughing and someone screaming, "Get it off me!  Get it off me!"  I think my wife was laughing but that can't be right.  When it was all over, I had the remains of a pomegranite fruit snack, part of a caramel brownie Luna bar, cheddar cheese Goldfish crackers and a pint of water over my right shoulder and down my back.  I spent the better part of a half-hour in the park restroom trying to wash out my shirt and get the goo off of the backpack.  In the end, my shirt was ok, but I doubt the backpack will ever be the same.

Inexplicably, the baby was completely clean, except for a piece of fruit snack stuck to her chin.

My wife, the psych major, calls it "implosive therapy" then laughs at me some more.  Ah, the joy of parenting...