FLEAS!

I have been living with a constant level of anxiety all week- Sunday evening we discovered both of our (indoor) cats had fleas!  What a nauseating feeling, to go from thinking your house is relatively clean and peaceful, to wondering what items were contaminated and how to de-contaminate them.  I couldn't sleep, I was constantly feeling as though fleas were jumping on my ankles!

Monday morning, Trouble climbed on my head while I was asleep and started meowing loudly.  At first I half-woke... then remembered the fleas and leapt out of bed!  There were several fleas on my pillow.  I ran down the stairs, shaking my head, and made Eric comb my scalp to see if there were any in there.  I am getting chills just remembering, it was awful.

We put a flea-killing liquid on their necks, and then Monday got an oral medication to make them toxic to fleas.  But all of a sudden, I was seeing flea-signs everywhere.  Of course, once I knew what flea-signs were, I realized I'd been seeing them for weeks, not knowing what they were.  Bad mommy.  We washed all our bedding, I put it back on, and right away, a flea.  So on Monday night, I couldn't sleep again.

I did load after load of laundry.  I say "I" because Eric has claimed laundry incompetence and it has become a job only I can do.  And then I rewashed things if I saw a flea come near them.

Then we borrowed my mom's cleaning lady for the day yesterday so she could do a major cleaning of our upstairs (where the cats spend most of their time, hiding from the kids).  She did a great job.  And now we have to fire our current cleaning woman so we can hire this other woman instead!

The excitement of flea sighting has become like celebrity sighting in New York City, except I'm not seeing Dennis Leary at Tao, I'm seeing a live flea on the bathroom rug.

I haven't seen any fleas today.  I still haven't slept well, and every night I hope that will change.  We haven't had anyone over all week- I would feel terrible if someone came home from our place with fleas.  The positive of all this is that several things have gotten attention and are looking cleaner and neater than before.  But not worth the stress!