A Mom's Reflex

Some mom instincts and reflexes are amazing. The way a mom can wake up literally 2 seconds before her baby starts to cry during the night, how you can catch a child the second before they hit the ground from a trip or a falling chair, catching a sippy cup, or anything for that matter, as it's about to tumble off the highchair are examples of the superpowers that you get when you become a mother. The one I don't understand is the instinct to catch vomit as it is coming out of your child's mouth. Take today for example. I'm sitting in our local ice cream shop and everyone is happily eating their vanilla cups with brownies and sprinkles (we banned cones last week as they were putting me beyond the edge of sanity). All the sudden Larkin turns to me and says ugggg.... what do I do you ask?? I'm nursing Brooke with one hand as my other hand flies out to catch the barf that spews out of Larkin's mouth. How did I know she was going to barf... and why... oh why... did I feel the urge to catch it. It must be genetic, because I have vivid memories of my mom catching more than her fair share of vomit (once, in my most humiliating moment, my mom caught my barf in her jacket at a restaurant only to have it ricochet around the entire restaurant... and when I say entire... I mean Everywhere! There was not a server around as no one wanted to be tasked with cleaning it up. I think the restaurant had to comp every one's meal after that!). The think is, you can't catch a full tummy's worth of vomit in your hands so why do we try? I'm going to work on curbing this reflex. This is not the first time I've caught it in my hands, but it was definitely the most complicated cleanup.