Have you ever had something happen to you and you immediately look around for an adult to help you fix it? And in looking around for an adult, you realize that you are an adult, and all your friends are adults and yet, you still need an adult. A more adulty adult. That was me earlier today. That’s still me right now, I’m just… just trying to give myself a little break from combing through my dogs fur and my own hair for ticks. Yep, ticks. Let’s back up, shall we?
I decided to take my pups on long hike this morning. It was gorgeous out, we ran into a ton of other pups, I closed the Move loop in my Apple Watch, it was a really great hike.
On the drive home, the smallest pup sat in my lap and got a little 1:1 TLC while the big pups tripped all over each other in the backseat, struggling to get their heads out the open windows. I was scratching the small pup’s ears when I felt… something. I pinched the something and pulled it out from her fur- IT WAS A TICK. A red, squirming tick. GAH. I immediately tossed it out the window and started scratching her with a purpose. ANOTHER TICK WAS FOUND.
I love my dogs, I really do, but I have a lot of them. Think of the person in your life who has the most dogs. Thinking of them? Okay, now just accept that I have more dogs than that person. Because I do. And because I have so many dogs, I can’t always afford to buy the fancy, expensive, preventative medicines that I know I should buy but… I don’t have the extra cash floating around for. Queue poor Dog Mom guilt. Anyways. My dogs are not currently taking preventative tick/flea medication and I just found two ticks on the small one. NOOOOO. This is some worst nightmare shit right here.
I sped home, put the big dogs in the backyard, and tossed the small dog in the bath. I found three more ticks. Five ticks total on the small dog.
The rest of the dogs each got their turn in the bath and ultimately, the tick count ended at twelve. Oh wait- Thirteen because I found a tick in my own hair. Literally every cell in my body is itching now. I must look like a crackhead furiously scratching at myself, closely examining my nails for tick remnants. It’s awful, really. But it gets a little worse.
With all of the dogs bathed and dried, I armed myself with a comb to hunt through their fur for any tick that managed to hold on for dear life and not drown in my tub. I went into my bedroom where small dog always sulks post-bath and found her in my bed ALONG WITH TWO MORE TICKS. Seriously? What the fuck?!
So the bedding got torn off my mattress and is currently in the washer which is set at the “High Soil” level. I furiously vacuumed my bedroom and just spent the last, oh I don’t know, hour? two hours? combing at my dogs’ fur and intermittently my own hair.
What do I do now? Seriously. There has to be an adulty adult amongst you. Someone please tell me what to do. Everything itches. I can’t stop picturing red ticks with their gross little legs squirming their way through my carpets plotting to jump into all the fur/hair that this household contains. And believe me, there is a lot of fur/hair in here.