OCD Guide to Life: Germaphobe’s Guide to Surviving Germs

Hello, I may have mentioned a time or two around here that I am nuts. Like, certifiable. One of the strongest manifestations of my crazy is that I HATE throw up. I hate every single thing about it and I can not cope. So I have cultivated quite an arsenal of tools to avoid it at costs, and survival skills to endure it when it does happen.

Can I tell you guys that just writing about this makes my hands sweaty and my heart beat a little fast? Ugh.

We are back to school and back to my kids being surrounded by other nasty little germ factories kids while confined to indoor spaces.

My therapist bullies me into taking them to the gym childcare and indoor play places and other places that make me break out in anxious hives and want to take a bath in bleach. Something about how keeping my children isolated in our house for their entire life may not be the best for their developing psyches or their immune systems.

So, armed with hand sanitizer, probiotics, and many deep breathing exercises, off we go into the world of disgusting germ vectors people.

Stuff to use:

Clorox Hand Sanitizer

This hand sanitizer is one of the few that kills norovirus, aka public enemy number 1, in my opinion. Norovirus is the stomach virus that takes out entire schools and cruise ships and it is the stuff of nightmares. I require my children to take a shower in it every 2 minutes. Okay not really, but I do spritz their hands anytime we can’t get to sink and wash with soap and water. Also, Nate calls it “hanatizer” and I love it and hope he never stops.

Hydrogen Peroxide Cleaner

This is one of the most effective and safest surface sanitizers out there. I clean doorknobs, toilets, remotes, and other frequently touched items routinely. And when someone in the house is sick, it is basically an extension of my arm, and I sanitize the everliving crap outta every nonporous surface. To clean plastic toys, I spray them down with this stuff, then put it all in the shower and rinse thoroughly with hot water. I run small plastic toys through the dishwasher.

Probiotics for kids and for grown ups

I suppose it could be anecdotal, but my kids and I have been so much healthier and come down with so many less bugs since we started taking probiotics. We also eat a lot of yogurt around here, for additional natural probiotics.

Humidifier

The first year we lived in Colorado, it felt like we had never ending stuffy noses and sore throats. Then we started running a humidifier every night in all of our rooms. We are all so much healthier, and when we do catch a cold, it helps alleviate the symptoms. Just make sure to actually clean it frequently, or it can grow mold and that’s a whole ‘nother situation.

Laundry Sanitizer

Anything that can’t be sprayed with disinfectant or run through the dishwasher goes into the washing machine with this stuff. This is especially useful for fabrics that came into unfortunate contact with unfortunate bodily fluids. Obviously you need to remove what you can from the item first, and all *shudder* solid matter (KILL ME NOW). I like to run the washer twice when disgusting stuff is involved; with the hottest water setting available.

Things to do:

• Wash your hands immediately upon returning home. Always! My kids know this. Little germaphobes in training.
• Take your shoes off in the house. And then briefly faint when you see your 1 year old take the shoes out of the basket and put them in his mouth.
• Don’t touch your face, and teach your kids not to. Nate was having a major issue picking his nose. I told him that his boogers have germs and picking his nose can make him really sick. This effectively helped him stop picking his nose, and I’m saving now for his future therapy bills.
• Don’t share drinks, and teach kids not to. I don’t let my kids drink from my cup mostly because I do not like my drinks to contain solid material and they are incapable of making only withdrawals. Seeing something floating in my drink makes me dry heave. But floaties notwithstanding, I want my kids to learn not to share drinks with their friends at school, or utensils or chapstick or anything that comes in contact with people’s gross mouths.
• Use hand sanitizer after being around other people/touching shared surfaces, and then wash hands with soap and water as soon as you are able to.
• Hey speaking of washing your hands- wash them. Before eating, after the bathroom, after being outside, after playing with friends, after school, after blowing your nose. Teach your kids the same. And teach them how to wash their hands well. Nate knows to do fronts, backs, between fingers, finger tips/nails, then rinse.
• If things are real germy at your kid’s school- like you know something is really making the rounds- have your kiddo change clothes when they get home. I did this when Nate was in preschool in the winter and I had a newborn.

And when you do get sick…

Despite my best efforts and my fervent pleading, we get sick. It happens, man. And there’s not much you can do besides pray for earth to be struck by a meteor so the misery can end, but there are a few things that help me survive.

Zarbees Nighttime Cough Syrup

This cough syrup works great for my kids. I especially like the nighttime version, because it helps them sleep through their coughs.

Neilmed Sinus Rinse

For all colds and sinus issues, this is a game changer. The squeeze bottle works a million times better than the weird genie lamp thingie.

Hospital pads for kids beds

When someone in my house is doing unspeakable acts of bodily fluid carnage, I force them to sleep on a bed of these hospital pads. Easy clean up. Well, there is no such thing as easy clean up for me when barf is involved, but anything that keeps me from having to make direct contact with my greatest fear is an improvement. Also, line barf bowls and trash bags with garbage bags.

Emesis bags

Steal ’em from the hospital or buy them on Amazon. Keep them in the car, too. Plus, once someone has thrown up in one of my bowls, it really ruins that bowl for me for the rest of my life.

This post has made me both nauseous and very anxious. May the winter illness powers that be smile upon your household this season, and spare you these horrors.