‘EWWW WHAT IS THAT? I saw it hanging out of my daughter’s chewing mouth, while she smiled smugly. I pulled it out and realized it was a HAIRY LEG OF AN INSECT.’: Mom’s hilarious run-in with insect has her freaking out

“EWWW WHAT IS THAT?

Yeah, that’s what came out of my mouth in a shriek when I saw it hanging out of my daughters chewing mouth, while she was smiling smugly.

I quickly pulled it out and thoroughly examined it nice and close to my face until I realized it was a hairy leg of an insect, and I jerked that thing out of my hand so fast I threw it all the way to Greenland (okay, more like a meter away).

Now, I have ‘morning sickness,’ and I’m trying not to vomit while my daughter is crying hysterically because I took away her afternoon snack.

Because this girl could literally eat dog food and say ‘mmmm yummy’… I mean, she’s a good eater. I should be proud. She also gets real nasty if you take anything out of her mouth and turns into an angry chihuahua, with her little baby teeth and scratchy claws, and cries like you’ve stolen Christmas.

So, I call my husband, because of course he’s not home, to tell him our daughter ate a cockroach…

So, I call him and say, ‘We have a serious problem,’ and I can feel his eyes roll on the phone because I know he knows I’m about to get really dramatic about something that probably doesn’t need this kind of hysteria.

‘Sofia ate a cockroach.’

He responds ‘What?? A cockroach?? What the…’ And I’m shocked because normally he doesn’t care about a play-by-play of events. He then says, ‘I will have to call an exterminator.’

And I start crying because if he’s panicking, then crap… we are doomed.

I start crying and start rambling about a plague of cockroaches in our house, and now my daughter has eaten a bug that can survive a nuclear war, and now it’s probably having an infestation in her stomach.

‘Should I take her to the doctor?’ And then I start crying hysterically because I failed her, and now she’s going to be like that little boy on ‘Stranger Things,’ and the bugs gonna host her body, and she’s going to doom us all to the upside down.

‘No, she will be okay, but one cockroach means many, so I’ll call an exterminator.’

Okay, my brain at this point exploded, and I don’t hear anything else. I imagine all these large cockroaches regenerating and my daughter becoming their queen, as she is the host for their leader, and now they have a human avatar to control us humans and take over the world.

Anyway, I hang up on my husband because I always do that when things get real, and honestly, he’s used to it. I go rush to get the disinfectant spray and prepare for a bug infestation war… and I see it. I see the rest of the bug…. minus missing a leg. A little bastard cockroach.

‘Oh, my lord!’ I call my husband back, ‘It’s okay!’ I say. ‘I found the rest of the cockroach. She won’t be a host anymore.’ And he replies with a ‘what?’ I hang up on him, take a photo, and send it to him.

I send him the picture of it and I call him back, and he says with a little laughter in his voice… ‘Laura that’s a cricket, not a cockroach. Cockroaches are a problem, but crickets are harmless. It probably hopped in from outside.’

‘Oh right.’

I paused for a long time, took a deep breath, and said, ‘Well, I should let you know the house has been fully disinfected to the point I can set it alight and we can start again.’

I can hear his eye rolling again while he laughs at me (bloody prick). ‘Yeah, I’ll be home in 5 minutes. Just don’t do anything until I come home.’

Don’t ask me how the leg came to her mouth. I’m guessing she took a bite of it and it sprung away screaming, ‘Every man for himself!’ And it didn’t quite make it.

RIP Jiminy. Thinking of you still makes me gag, and now my house smells like bleach.

P.S. I’m sorry I thought you were a cockroach. Things just got real, really quick. You understand yeah?”

This story was submitted to Love What Matters by Laura Mazza, where it originally appeared. Follow Laura on Instagram here. Do you have a similar experience? We’d like to hear your important journey. Submit your own story here. Be sure to subscribe to our free email newsletter for our best stories, and YouTube for our best videos.

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