Itsy Bitsy Spiders

To give you a sense of the pre-Mom/utterly-terrified-by-bugs Vicki, one of my favorite birthday gifts of all time from Tom was a bug vacuum that I proudly display in my kitchen. It has a 4 foot long hose that sucks up bugs and zaps them to ensure they're dead- perfect for when Tom's traveling. Ever since childhood, I've had to trap bugs with cups or tupperware and leave them for someone else to dispose of, and whenever I'd hear something buzzing near me, I'd immediately cover my ears and close my eyes until it went away. The icing on the cake was 6 years ago when I lived with my dear friend Matt in Somerville (wow, time flies), I had a terrifying experience in my bedroom with something that resembled a silverfish except with a ton of legs (I saw it crawl down from the ceiling to the floor while I lay in bed freaking out and then it disappeared). I had to pull all my furniture away from the walls and plug up holes in the floors. For weeks, Matt, my "Bug Hero", had to inspect my room with a flashlight before I felt safe enough to go to bed, and I remember having at least 2 nightmares from the grotesque sighting..

Now that I have Griffin, I seem to have acquired a new super human mom ability, where I can kill small (ok they're tiny), not too gross looking spiders (with non thick & non hairy legs) and other little critters without having a mini heart attack, screaming, crying, or feeling mentally damaged from the experience. The new and improved me can now somewhat stay in control at the sight of an unwanted pest. I find myself thinking that I have to protect Griffin from it, and I'm empowered to fix the situation rather than freak out about it. This is not to say that I am miraculously cured of my severe arachnophobia (I still use a wad of at least 8 tissues to snag a spider the size of my pinky nail), but it is still a change in me worth blogging about. :)