I Made This Product for Moms Like Me – And Last Week, I Was Reminded Why

A few years ago (five, to be exact), I came up with the idea for Vommat after my oldest daughter, a toddler at the time, had her first stomach bug. She woke up in the middle of the night and made the craziest mess. We got everything cleaned up, got her settled, got back to sleep… and two hours later, it happened again. The exact same thing.

I remember thinking, “What can I cover her bed with so I don’t have to deal with this again?” The next morning, as I got her cozy on the couch, I had a similar thought: “What can I put on the couch to protect it from destruction?”

I wanted something soft and quiet to lay on but absorbent and waterproof. I didn't want to have to wash it, either - please make this problem disappear! I couldn’t find anything that checked all the boxes so I started thinking maybe I’d create the solution myself.

I didn’t do anything with the idea right away, but every time the need popped up again — and it did — I kicked myself for not following through. Two more kids later, and plenty more stomach bugs, I finally got serious during Covid. Long story short: Vommats are now a real product that you can buy, and I’ll ship them straight to your door. Cool, right?

But somewhere in the messy, relentless grind of getting a product to market and then running a small business (turns out it’s pretty hard 😂) — I lost sight of the original point. My day-to-day became all about website traffic, shipping logistics, and figuring out how to pay for all the stuff you don’t even know you’ll need to pay for until you’re deep in it.

Then, last week, we came full circle.

My oldest, the one who kicked this all off, woke me up at 5:55 a.m. And wouldn’t you know it… she threw up. Right off the side of her bed in the exact same spot she did five years ago. It was too late to save that first round, but this time, we had a new weapon for what came next.

I grabbed a Vommat from my stash, laid it out, and we tried to get a bit more sleep. She threw up again — right on it — and we tossed it. Just like I’d envisioned. Later, when we moved downstairs, she got sick again on another Vommat. And again that afternoon. But we were ready and I didn’t have to clean a single thing up.

She’s older now, and we even talked about it: “Look how much time I just saved by not needing to clean THAT up.” We both laughed.

She got over the bug in about 24 hours (we love when that happens), but a few days later, her brother went down. More Vommats. He kind of lays across the couch with his upper body hanging off the edge but it's all good, everything is fully protected. We basically had the largest catchment zone for vom you can imagine. Whatever happened, it was contained. I didn’t have to stress about where it was going to go which meant I could just focus on helping him through it. They really make the whole ordeal so. much. better.

I’m writing this now because the last week reminded me why I started this wild journey in the first place: I wanted to make things easier for myself and for any other mom in a similar boat.

Using my own product, seeing it work exactly how I imagined it, and feeling the benefit firsthand.. it was pretty cool. And it gave me a little more energy to keep going. Cheers to keeping on keeping on. 

Featured image by Jasmin Maag on Unsplash