Motherhood: A Descent Into Madness

I'm Trying To Inspire You

2015-04-22T14:10:00.000-07:00

I know it's been quite, quite, some time since I've written on here. Maybe someday I will go into why, but in the meantime, I decided to stop shriveling in horror every time I walked past the utter disaster that was my sons' toy/game room, and I put on my diamond armor (we're colon-deep into the Minecraft world here) and attacked that room with the viciousness of a rabid dog in heat.

I jotted down some thoughts about the process with the hope that I can inspire you to de-clutter as well. It feels so good, you guys. I practically skip down the hall past the toy room now, pigtails fluttering in the breeze.

**This is a tough love approach so don't be all sensitive.**

First, create ambiance. No seriously. You can't do this without some attempt at making your environment pleasant. My suggestions:

Drink one or two drinks beforehand, then take a shot then pour yourself a large drink to take with you when you enter your personal seventh circle. It really loosens you up and helps with the "I don't give a shit, TOSS IT" mindset you're going to need.

Put on some music. Or if TV is your thing, put it on or bring your laptop or whatever. I put an 80s station on Pandora and it was like a painkiller/happy pill combo.

Make sure the kids are nowhere in sight. Not only do you need to concentrate, they don't need to see you throwing out their coveted plastic piece of shit that they haven't seen in four years but is suddenly the toy they will die without. I spent my valuable kids-are-in-bed-FUCK-YEAH time to do this and it was time well spent.

Be prepared to dedicate a minimum of two hours to this life-changing project.

Second, bring multiple bags. One for recycling, one for trash, one for donation, one more for recycling, then two more for trash, then one more for the what the hell is this but I'm not sure I should throw it out pile (eventually, you'll just throw it all out, FYI), and one for the crap that belongs elsewhere in the house.

And maybe one more for trash, and one for the stuff you find that belongs to other people not residing with you (I'm NOT kidding, you'll see).

P.S., Nina, I have a big surprise for you...

Okay, now you're ready. But I get it, you take one look at the sandstorm that's in front of you and you immediately want to give up. Don't do that. You suck if you quit, you quitter.

Here's a big tip: To start, zero in on the one thing on the floor that just pisses you right off. Pick it up and throw it the fuck away. Just throw it in the trash. You can do it. It's so liberating.

For me, it was these math flash cards. There are at least 400 of them I swear to Christ, and they never use them for the intended purpose. Apparently, they are math wizards (they're not) so they don't need them and every day is someone's birthday somewhere in the world so let's throw those fuckers around like confetti to celebrate! HAPPY BIRTHDAY, STRANGERS!

I pick them up every month. Or tell them to. No more.

I felt guilty at first because it's like, those cards are educational, but wake-up call... When they're not being used as their intended purpose, and never will be, let that shit GO.

Once you've started with anger, you're good to go. Anger is a great kickstarter. Just dig in and start tossing, sorting, tossing, separating, tossing, organizing, and tossing some more. You got this. Just keep tossing. And you'll realize how good it feels to purge, purge, purge, and then you'll purge even more. It's like a cleaning orgasm that builds and builds upon itself.

Some tips for along the way:

1. You will doubt whether or not you should throw something away. Every other toy. Be realistic. You KNOW what they really play with. Trust yourself.

The second you find yourself thinking, well, maaaybe one day they'll play with it... just slap yourself. Slap yourself right in the fucking face and throw that damn toy away. Be reasonable. No they are not going to play with that toy, ever again. They won't even notice it's missing.

They are probably so overwhelmed with the sheer amount of "options" they have to play with that they likely have mini-seizures every time they walk into the room. It has taken me eight years to realize this. Do them the favor and throw that shit away.

2. Know the toy's value.

Just because they played with it for 12 seconds last week, that is no reason to hang on to it. If it doesn't command at least 10-30 or more minutes of their attention (read between the lines there) then it is garbage and therefore belongs there.

Example: This amazing thing.

I held onto not one but three of them for as many years. Because I suck. Because they're BIG. And they came from a Happy Meal. And I had that, well maybe one day... bullshit thought. I finally really looked at it and realized that its sole purpose is to turn the yellow crank/tree penis and OHMIGAWD, the monkeys and elephant will totter up and down!

That wouldn't entertain a six-month-old for longer than ten seconds, much less a four- or six-year-old. They are all in the garbage and my soul weighs 18 less ounces.

3. You will triple their Lego collection. It's a total win-lose situation. They win, you lose.

I mean, where else do you think those tiny evil bastards go when you're not being brought to your knees by stepping on them? To every crevice in your house's existence. And you will find them. And find more. And find even more. Pretty sure they are having orgies in those dark corners and multiplying like motherfuckers.

4. While it's tempting to bulk-toss the massive amounts of paper/schoolwork/"art" you come across, take the time to go through each piece. I found some true gems that I never knew existed, like this:

That sweet boy adores his Mama and it will never get old. At least until he's 16, then it'll be a bit creepy and weird.

But also have some sense about what you keep. Again, know the value. Trust your eye, and you'll know what to keep.

I mean, I kept this?

But this:

Was definitely worth keeping. It's no Monet but it's a pretty good piece done by my then-six-year-old. Just remember that you are going to be buried in your child's schoolwork and artwork, enough to craft yourself paper wardrobes for the rest of your life, so you can afford to be choosy.

Tip: Artwork with glitter or other shedding things on them are to immediately be put in the garbage pile. No regrets. Think about it... has ANY van Gogh, Picasso, Chagall, Munch, etc. painting ever featured glitter or yarn or beads?

NO.

For a fucking reason.

5. Figure out the mess and annoyance factor. Be tough. Be honest with yourself. Do you cower in horror every time they play with it? TOSS IT.

Things with more than, say, ten pieces? With few exceptions (see #2), TOSS IT.

Does it make the noise of a thousand screaming banshees in the throes of menopausal rage? TOSS IT.

Just think of the peace your whole house will experience. Think of their hearing. You're saving their ears' lives.

More tips: Take an allergy pill, wear a dust mask (and probably gloves, or better yet, a full-body condom), and close your mind to the disturbing shit you find. Oh, and carry wet and dry rags and clean while you're deep in that dark hole. Might as well. I miraculously didn't find anything too disturbing (don't know how), but a couple of weeks ago I pulled out their bunk bed and found dried puke on the wall and carpet edge. I'd given up on wondering why their bedroom smelled like fermented juice and old shrimp. Figured it was par for the course with boys.

Once you've purged (and I mean more than the contents of your guts), organize like a motherfucker. I genuinely wish I could provide organizing tips for you but I swear to Christ, if I had the golden ticket answer to organizing kids' precious objects in some sensible, practical, real-life way that actually was maintainable on a daily basis, not only would I share it with you but I'd be a multi-millionaire. I've ripped my already-hormonally-thinning hair out trying to figure out a way to make those cute little fuckers understand how to consistently put the balls back in the fucking BALL BUCKET but I've finally realized:

They're kids.

And kids don't give a fuck about the balls being in the fucking ball bucket.

They won't until they're close to being adults and the state of their living quarters directly reflects on them personally. And even then... questionable.

And, I'm an adult who has better things to do than Type-A supervise my kids' every playing moment and subsequent clean-up, (although I'm seriously getting really close) so in the meantime- many years later- I've finally realized:

The less they have to throw around, the less they will throw around. Less stuff is bliss. It's so much more manageable.

And they are really not bored. They actually play and use their imaginations instead of stroke out from over-stimulation every time they walk into the toy room. Kids are beautifully simple and do not require much.

I wish I had some before and after pictures for the post but inspiration to write about it didn't strike until I was like 70% finished. Hindsight is 20/20, but I'm legally blind so I was pretty much screwed all around. I do, however, have this after picture of my face. Look at the peace and bliss. AAAAHHHHHH.

You too, could have peace and bliss. Go throw some crap out!

If you have some tips to add, especially ones based on organization, help out and throw them down in the comments.

A Failed Tubal Ligation

2014-01-29T17:49:00.000-08:00

My tubal ligation failed.

Yep, I got pregnant again.

I should be surprised, but I am not. After my perfectly placed and still-present IUD failed, and I was taken to the depths of shock and surprise, I guess my ability to have faith and be shocked in the birth control arena has been eradicated. I certainly did not have any faith in my tubal ligation.

I wanted to. I hoped that I was wrong not to believe in it, but ultimately, I knew.

I even made jokes about it. "Well, if a tubal is going to fail, it's going to be mine!" I told Nate that I didn't trust it and he should back it up with a vasectomy. He didn't. Why would he? Why listen to your crazy wife?

This month, two weeks after missing my period, I was looking at this positive pregnancy test. I felt hollow, I wanted to laugh because it was just so fucking ridiculous, I felt numb.

The next day, I was looking at another positive pregnancy test, and two days after that, I was looking at two more positive pregnancy tests at my OB/GYN's office.

Concerned about an ectopic pregnancy, my OB/GYN (who was in complete denial that I could possibly be pregnant) inspected my fallopian tubes via ultrasound and found nothing. In my uterus, he found what was not a 6-week pregnancy, if we were to go by the date of my last period, but what could be a roughly three-week pregnancy, indicating that I either ovulated very late and was only three weeks pregnant, or the not-viable pregnancy stopped progressing after three weeks and I just hadn't miscarried it yet.

He ordered a blood draw to check my hCG (the pregnancy hormone) level, and that night, I started bleeding. The next day, the results came back with a level of 89, which is pretty low.

I kept bleeding and knew without a doubt that I was losing the pregnancy. Yet, I was also nauseous with morning sickness. I was having weird starchy cravings and gaining weight. My boobs looked like I had turned into a zombie; veins pregnant with excessive blood protruding across them like a road map.

The blood draw done two days later showed that the hCG level had dropped to 48, which given the amount of bleeding that I was having, was what we expected.

The pregnancy was not viable and I appear to have lost it, and given that I never wanted it in the first place, I am fine. I know those words are harsh, but they are 100% honest.

I am also angry. Not because I lost it; because it even happened in the first place. Not that the world needs more examples of "unfair" but here's a glaring one: There are people all over this world, today, in this moment, who would give anything to have even one child, and I have done everything short of resorting to abstinence within my marriage and I still cannot keep from getting pregnant. What cruel, unfair distribution to those who want to be pregnant and have children and are struggling to or never will. I know some of those people. I have seen the tears and bottomless pain in their eyes, and it does not land on me lightly.

Nate and I were that couple that said, if we never have kids, we'll be fine. We will not take drastic measures to become pregnant, or even find out who has the problem that is preventing us from having children. We will accept our fate.

And here we have three, with a fourth lost. We never expected three, we never tried for even one of our beautiful boys. I don't understand it, and I never will. It is what it is.

But the world is not fair, and I need to step off of my soapbox.

I now have no idea what to do with myself. I'm thinking of making a cape for me, emblazoned with "Super Uterus," and a cape for Nate emblazoned with "Super Sperm" and we could be some kind of super heroes. We could fight crime! Or better yet, we could spread our excessive fertility to others. The Super Fertiles!

Maybe we could perfect some kind of magical touch. Or a special cape move. "We now pass on our super fertility to you." And then we'd vanish into the night and the recipients will become pregnant over and over and have many babies.

On a more realistic level, I could have the entire length of my fallopian tubes removed, effectively (ha.ha.ha.) cutting off my ability to get pregnant. Nate could get a vasectomy that probably wouldn't take, given our luck. My original tubal ligation was a "cut and burn" kind; the doctor removed a roughly half-inch section of each tube and cauterized the open ends, from what I recall.

In the meantime, the OB/GYN wants to see my hCG level drop to zero before he does anything. The last draw, done a week ago, showed that it's still at 37. I will get another draw tomorrow and hopefully it'll be much lower so we can get on with things. So I don't have to be afraid that if Nate breathes on me, I'll get pregnant.

I guess that's it for now. For once, I don't know how to end a blog post. All I can do is shake my head and say, "holy shit."

Actually, I do have one more thing to say. I took that picture of the test so I could text it to a friend to ask her if she read it as "positive" like I was reading it. (Talk about denial.) And now I am really glad I did, because it's something tangible for me to have of #4 that wasn't to be.

You happened. You couldn't stay, but you happened.

The $268 Banana

2013-12-18T07:34:00.001-08:00

I'd been waiting for this day with my asshole puckered tight since my firstborn was about 4 months old, knowing it's going to happen. We've all heard the stories about the balls through the neighbors windows and other shit kids do to break something expensive that the parents have to pay to fix or replace, and we wait with terrified, baited breath for our turn.

I am less than thrilled to announce: Our time has come.

Frankly, three boys later, I'm surprised it hasn't come sooner than this.

A couple of weeks ago, the toilet in our downstairs bathroom clogged. No amount of plunging (which I HATE to do because of a toilet in our former house that clogged daily) would unclog it. We were at a loss until it started dawning on Nate and I that perhaps one of the boys had flushed something they weren't supposed to- another thing I'm surprised hasn't happened sooner.

I asked the boys if one of them flushed something other than poop or pee down the toilet. I knew without a doubt that it would have been Connor (5) or Brandon (3), so I was floored when Ethan (7) fessed up.

Just when you think you know your kids...

Story goes: Ethan was sitting on the pot while eating a banana (gross) and when he was done with it and "didn't want to hold it anymore" he flushed the peel down the fucking toilet.

He didn't throw it in the GARBAGE CAN that is less than a foot away from the toilet, he flushed it.

Just when you think your kids are really smart, you realize: They are still kids.

I called a plumber, he arrived, heard the story, and we talked over our options. For $125, he could snake the toilet and try to fish the peel out, but in doing that he could also inadvertently shove the peel into our whole plumbing system, it could get trapped, then all the toilet paper and whatever else we put into our system (MORE BANANA PEELS?) could clog up behind the peel and cause a whole house plumbing problem, potentially causing us hundreds or maybe even thousands of dollars in damage.

OR, he could do the more-expensive-than-snaking option of taking the toilet off the floor and fish the peel out that way, and we wouldn't have to wait with baited breath for our plumbing system to die and flood our house with shit.

I asked him how much that would cost. Answer: $368.

My mouth dropped open and I just blankly stared at him while I processed what I heard, which was not "Three hundred and sixty-eight dollars." What I heard was, "A week and a half worth of groceries" or "Christmas present money" or "Partly the cost of the washing machine that we'll need to replace soon" and "What a complete waste of money for such a stupid fucking mistake."

My blank, horrified look unexpectedly convinced him to say that he could take $100 off the price because our toilet didn't look all that hard to take off and put back on because it's new, bringing the price to $268.

Still a big ball of suck, but when I weighed it against the gamble of a potential future- and more expensive- problem, I told him to do it.

I opened our garage door so the plumber could bring in his equipment, and left the door from the garage leading into the house open halfway. I went into the house while he stood in the garage processing the work order on his iPad. Not one minute later, Brandon (the three-year-old), who was eating at our kitchen counter about 15 feet away from the open door to the garage innocently asked me, "Mama, is that fat guy in the garage?"

Because we needed this to get worse. As I cringed and hoped that the plumber had already gone to his truck and didn't hear what Brandon said, I heard his truck door shut and thanked God that he hadn't heard while I quickly lectured Brandon that it isn't okay to call people fat.

The plumber got the peel out, I numbly handed him our credit card, and off he went.

Since I can't sell Ethan to depraved pedophiles to pay the bill, he is now my slave. Anything he is capable of doing that I don't want to do myself, he's the man. His ass is working this off, and he really thinks it sucks. But every time he complains, I remind him that it sucks even more that he flushed a banana peel down the toilet and cost mom and dad a bunch of money.

He's starting to complain less and less. Frankly, I think it's good for him. He's of the age that he needs to be a bigger contributor to the chores and workload of this household and I grudgingly guess that this is a good- but expensive- segue.

The scene of the crime. Note that cylindrical, silver thing RIGHT NEXT TO the toilet? Mmmm hmmm.

Santa's Letter To The Kids

2013-12-13T09:03:00.000-08:00

Dear Children Of The World,

Listen up, kids. You come see me in the mall or Walmart or the park or any other of the eleven million places a day that I show up at, sit on my lap, and ask me for all kinds of crap, which is lovely, but I have a few issues I need to take up with you:

- Your screaming and crying is interfering with my hangover. And blowing out my eardrums.

- You love me for my presents, but when it comes to actually asking for them, you can't take 30 seconds to sit on my lap without losing your mind? What is this shit?

- I swear to God, the next one of you who craps their pants while sitting on me...

- Stop being such greedy little bastards. Do you even know what half the stuff you're asking for IS? What happened to BB guns and Barbie dolls? Oh that's right, you'll shoot your eye out and develop body image issues.

- My beard is not a toy. I know, it looks like snow and is so soft and has food in it! SO ENTICING! But keep your grubby little mitts off it.

- You know what else isn't a toy? My eyeglasses.

- Those of you who are asking for a new brother or sister might want to work out a trade with the other kids who are asking for their new little brother or sister to go away forever.

Please note that I am not eligible for workers' compensation. This is a seasonal job; "job" being a generous description since the wages I receive are barely enough to cover my booze budget. With that being said:

- Please stop kicking, hitting, and elbowing my balls. I cannot afford a protective cup on the five dollars an hour that I get paid to do this shit, or go to the doctor to make sure that the trauma is not permanent or serious.

- Speaking of injuries, if you're going to flip out, it's okay if you come see me while you're encased in a straight jacket. Really! Then maybe all I have to worry about is you rearing back and headbutting my chin.

- I totally get that you're excited to see me and/or have lost your top two front teeth, but please learn to talk without spitting your flu virus, hand-foot-mouth disease, cold germs, and God knows what else in my face. My glasses and beard only protect so much of my face. SAY IT DON'T SPRAY IT. On this note, if you have lice, a green runny nose, a hacking cough, or any of the above-mentioned afflictions, save seeing me for another day. My Lysol baths can only do so much.

Thanks,

Santa

P.S. If you're going to leave me cookies and milk, I actually prefer bourbon and biscuits.

Visiting Santa

2013-12-12T08:47:00.000-08:00

When Ethan was 5 months old, I took him to see Santa for the first time. He lost his shit. It's apparently pretty common. Parents sent me these pictures of their kids being traumatized, and here you go! Sharing is caring.

It's okay to laugh. The kids all survived it.

Smile through the pain, Santa.

Santa is about to get the "reflex check" on his right knee.

Same family, plus the cousin.

Twins share everything, including a fear of Santa.

I may not have loved you last year, Santa...

...But now, I do. I'll talk to my sister, inform her of your greatness.

Santa's eyes are so peaceful, but they did not have a calming effect on this baby.

Christ, this guy is WAY TOO HAPPY.

Come back tomorrow for Santa's letter to the kids!

Rules From Young Kids And Parents For Hanging Ornaments

2013-12-06T00:35:00.000-08:00

FROM KIDS

- Once the tree is in or on the car/out of the box, beg mom to hang ornaments all day long.

- Cry when you don't get to do it right now because you have to wait for your brother(s) to nap, get out of school, finish eating, take a dump, etc.

- Hang ornaments for 5 minutes, then lose interest and run away, leaving mom with ornament blue balls. Just kidding, we knew we were going to have to finish [it] off ourselves, anyway.

- Stake your claim on a one-foot-square area of the approximately ninety-foot-square (very rudimentary math- I'm literally guessing) tree.

- ALL of your ornaments MUST be hung ONLY in that one-foot square.

- The ornaments HAVE to be touching.

- Repeated commands from mom to space out the ornaments shall be ignored.

Sigh. Six ornaments in a 9-inch-square area. But I like one-eyed Gingerbread man. It's as if he's winking; like he's saying, "It's okay, Mama. I'm down with the touching. I'm grabbing Santa's ASS right now. He's making out his naughty list, and I'M ON IT."

- Drop 80% of the breakable ornaments, and 0% of the unbreakable ones.

- Be in utter denial that the ornaments are not actually toys.

- When mom says, "Aww, this ornament is from when I was one year old! Can you believe that Mama was ever one year old?" ask, in all seriousness, "When was that? Nineteen twenty?"

- Completely ignore the look of horror on mom's face.

- Fight with the brothers over who gets to hang mom's ballerina ornament (from, apparently, 1920), not because you actually want to hang the GIRLY ornament (OH THE HORROR), but because you want to WIN.

FROM PARENTS

- Totally regret giving your child(ren) any kind of time frame for when the ornaments will be hung. Next year it will be vague answers of "someday," then surprise them when it's actually time.

- Mix a stiff, large, stiff, extra large drink beforehand.

- Remind yourself that you will just rehang the ornaments after they go to bed. Stop nagging about spacing them! They don't listen anyway.

- Remember, the more ornaments the kids break, the less you have to hang next year. "Have," as in both "have to" and "have," as in, physically possess.

- Every ornament hung earns you one ~~giant gulp~~ sip of your drink. It's the Christmas SPIRIT(S)!

- Keep your sense of humor when the 1920 reference breaks out. The drink helps a lot with that.

- Smirk when they fight over ornaments. Because smirking is all there is left to do, outside of crying.

- Remember that you only have like 10 more times to do this with them before they completely lose interest or move out. This is what memories are made of. Either cry or jump with joy, depending on your personality. Or mood at the time. (No judging here.)

A New Alternative To Biting And Hitting

2013-12-03T11:01:00.000-08:00

Any human being might take one look at our kids' faces and ask the perfectly logical question, "Oh, did you get a cat?"

"Particularly, a feral cat that you forced into your home who attacks your kids on a regular basis?"

No, no cat, feral or otherwise. Brandon (3) has entered a "scratching phase." You know, like the biting or hitting phases, but he scratches out of anger or excitement or self-defense or hell, for no reason at all.

And Connor (5) is usually the intended victim because Connor is the "aggravator" of the bunch. But, Connor doesn't just sit back and take it when Brandon lashes out, he scratches back.

And joy of joys, they are getting each other in the face.

He looked at me wrong! Scratch.

He took my Lego guy! Scratch.

Let's "play fight!" Scratch.

I feel like being a little dickhead today! Scratch.

It's straight-up fisticuffs. I thought I birthed boys, but apparently I have a couple of teenage girls in tiny little boy bodies living in my house.

(As if my written word is their command, Brandon and Connor literally just started doing actual fisticuffs next to me on the couch. Excuse me while I break up this cat fight.)

I'm back. So Brandon looks terrible. His face is scratched up everywhere but Connor's isn't because Brandon hasn't quite learned how to really dig in to maximize his nail-scratching like apparently Connor has. I don't love this particular phase. I much prefer that they are like this with each other:

One of my favorite things about Brandon is how he rests his hand on his brothers' heads when he sits next to one of them.

The picture is blurry because I was rushing to capture it before they saw that I was taking pictures of them and started hamming it up. As you know, there is a .04 second window that we parents can actually get a candid shot of our kids.

I'm thinking this scratching phase won't last real long because Brandon is quickly learning that it's not fun to get scratched. Also, I cut their nails down to the quick, so... their weapon is essentially gone.

There truly is a thin line between love and hate.

Potty Training Is The 15th Circle Of Hell

2013-11-26T13:27:00.000-08:00

You guys. YOU GUYS. The day that I have been waiting for for seven years, four months, and nineteen days has ARRIVED.

EVERYONE IN MY HOUSE IS OFFICIALLY OUT OF DIAPERS.

I want to marinate in a bathtub of champagne. Now that we no longer have to buy diapers, I can afford to.

I want to run screaming down the street wearing a cape made of our leftover diapers. I want to burn them in a garbage can while laughing maniacally and inhaling the toxic fumes. I want to scream and laugh and jump 50 feet in the air. I am going to flip off the billions of boxes of diapers when I pass them in Costco, then take our forty dollars and buy milk for the boys to spill on the floor and the seven-ton bag of carrots that we can't possibly go through before half of them go bad.

And we're not just saving money! I have no idea what I am going to do with all my new found free time. I should start a hobby!

But you don't care how happy I am about this. I know what you all really want.

You want the "secret." WHAT IS THE SECRET TO POTTY TRAINING A KID?

I have it!

The secret is...

.......Drum roll.......

....There is no secret. There is no "right way." There is no guaranteed trick that will work for every kid. There are ten thousand tricks, and maybe one of them will work for your kid, maybe not. Ultimately, they have to be ready and capable.

Sorry. I know, I know. Fuck you, Elizabeth! First you're gloating that you're done with diapers forever, and now you're saying there is no secret to potty training a kid?! I HOPE YOUR TUBAL LIGATION FAILS!

Don't worry, it probably will. (UPDATE: It fucking DID.) Anyway, three kids, and three different things got them to potty train. Here they are, in case one of them might work for you. Take your pick. It's potty roulette! A grab bag of potty tricks!

Note: Mine are all boys. Girls are different, from what I hear. I really don't know.

ETHAN (The first kid)

Ethan refused to potty train. At three and a half, he was still in diapers. He was scared of the toilet, he was scared of letting go of the only thing in his entire world he actually had sole control over. We, being first time parents were at a loss as to what to do.

We begged. We bribed. We demonstrated. We threatened (to take privileges away). We put Cheerios in the toilet for him to aim at. We drank, heavily. We kept changing his diapers. (And the diapers of our one-and-a-half-year-old.) We were so over it.

I talked with a friend who has a jillion kids and works with a jillion kids as a special-ed teacher. She said we had to go hard-core and just take his diapers away. She pointed out that he's old enough, he has control over it, he knows how to do it, he's exhibiting all the signs of being ready (hiding to poop, staying dry for several hours between pees, asking for his diaper to be changed- which means he understands what he did in it).

So we went hard core and told Ethan that he was not allowed to wear diapers anymore, except at night. It was brutal. He did not take well to that.

He would sit on the potty and cry and refuse to go. I would sit with him and read him a book or sing to him or play toys with him in an effort to relax him enough to go, but he still refused and begged for diapers.

With the pediatrician's words echoing in my head Don't force him, he'll hold it and may get bladder infections or constipated, I was scared and starting to panic, but determined. Desperately, I offered him the option of peeing into the bathtub drain. He did it, but then off course, that's all he wanted to do. We told him he could do it a few more times, then he had to use the potty, no choice.

When he finally did pee in the toilet, you'd have thought he was a Grammy-winning rock star who had just cured cancer, the way we treated him.

But he was still holding his poop. After two days, I told him that if he didn't poop in the potty, I was going to have to give him yucky, yucky, yucky medicine (a children's laxative) that would make the poop come out, whether he wanted it to or not. He still refused, so I gave him some and he took one drink of the juice I mixed it in and refused to drink anymore of it. I was pretty pissed. I told him that I was going to have to force him to drink it because he was not pooping and then, he gave up.

He finally went and from that day on, we had no more issues- during the day. Then he started holding his pee to go into his nighttime diaper and I told him that if he did that again, I was going to take away his nighttime diapers too. That got him to stop.

Five or so months later, we took away his nighttime diapers, too. We definitely waited too long to do that, but live and learn.

And today, at seven years old, he exhibits no trauma from having his precious diapers taken away. Maybe it will manifest itself later and he'll be one of those 40-year-olds who dress like babies and wear diapers as a fetish, but I'm not really worried about it.

Needless to say, potty training him was total hell. But he's made up for it by not having any accidents, except maybe one, and never wetting the bed.

CONNOR (The second kid)

Connor was so easy to train that I actually have little memory of it. He did exactly what we suspected (and hoped) he would do: Follow his big brother's example and just start doing it on his own. He wanted to do everything that his coveted big brother did, which included peeing and pooping in the potty.

We still had to cajole and encourage and bribe him a bit to get him to do it consistently, but it was way less angst-inducing than it was with Ethan. I didn't actually want to shoot myself in the face with him!

We can't remember exactly how old he was, but it was either just before he turned three or just after that he was officially out of diapers. We did do the nighttime diaper thing for another month or so, then stopped those and he's never wet the bed.

BRANDON (The third kid)

We mistakenly thought that Brandon, having not one but TWO older brothers to follow the example of and want to be like, would be even easier to train than Connor was.

AAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA<------fake, soul-crushed laugh

The crazy thing is, he started peeing in the toilet right after he turned two. He was so short he had to stand on a step stool to even get his wang over the lip of the toilet (he didn't want to use a training potty) but the stool made him too tall and he had terrible, terrible aim and pissed everywhere, all the time.

And by doing this, the little effer got our hopes up. OH HEY! He's going to potty train EARLY! This is AWESOME!

No.

He continued to cocktease us with the potty training for another year. He'd pee in the toilet for a solid day, our hopes would get up, noooooope, the next day, the toilet was the devil in a smelly, piss-soaked white dress.

Then he'd pull three days of peeing in the toilet out of his hat. We'd treat him like an even better Grammy winning rock star who'd eradicated the flu and diabetes. Then, like a punch straight to the soul, he'd treat the toilet like it had Ebola and refuse to use it.

Then he'd poop in the toilet consistently, but stop peeing in it. It was one or the other. It was old.

Now that he's three years and four months, I got kind of mad. He wasn't refusing to use or incapable of using the toilet, he was refusing to use it consistently.

I took away his pull-ups, put on some undies, and very sternly told him not to pee or poop in them. I told him that he knows how and when to use the potty, and he needs to do it. I also threw in the "trouble" word. At this point, not using the potty was becoming an act of defiance.

And then I asked him about 5 times an hour if he had to go. Every 15th time or so, he'd say "yes!" and run to the bathroom.

This has been going on for nine days now, with one pee (thankfully, not poop) accident. We still put a nighttime diaper on at night, but that's only going to happen for another month or so, tops.

So, with that, I say,

And, to you warriors still fighting this battle, hang in there. It WILL happen for you and your kids. Promise.

For those who have fought and won, what worked for you and your kid(s)? Put your tips in the comments!

I Totally Broke Character And Let's See How This Goes

2013-11-18T10:31:00.000-08:00

So I just went all Clark W. Griswold on decorating my house for Christmas and now I know I am completely insane.

Yes, I've already put up Christmas decorations. MOCK ME, I DON'T CARE.

I wanted to do something new and special for the boys by decorating their bedroom (the dorm) and surprising them with it, which when I see through my rabid cloud of winter wonderland insanity, is really fucking stupid given that they're boys and they trash everything.

We're also in a new house and therefore, I had to figure out how to make the old decorations fit in our new space. I felt like I needed time to figure it all out. I wanted to get to work.

First of all, how to create something magical for little boys? I tried to tap into my inner child and draw upon what made Christmas magical for me as a kid, which should be super easy since I've never really matured beyond that of a 12-year-old boy, but no, it was harder than I thought. My ability to make constant penis references wasn't helping me out here.

After much deliberation and thought, I started to pull some ideas together. This was actually really hard because I'm no Martha Stewart Mom. Crafts are not my thing. I spent about 10 minutes looking on Pinterest, somehow got zero ideas, and realized that I was on my own.

Then I visited the magical wonderland of the Dollar Tree and was thrilled to find nearly everything I wanted, plus ten million other things I didn't know I needed until I saw them.

At home with my cheap lead-based goods that will slowly kill my family, I went to work. And, like I knew I would, screwed a lot of it up.

IDEA #1: Wrapping paper names

I thought the boys would enjoy having cutout letters of their names wrapped in Christmas wrapping paper and hung on their bedroom wall. Since I'm totally lazy and opt for gift bags over wrapping paper, I have shitloads of 10(or more)-year-old wrapping paper around and figured I could spare some for this. I started cutting their letters out of lightweight cardboard and about two letters in wanted to stab myself in the face with the scissors.

What the hell was I thinking? I've never in my life wished I had kids named BJ or CJ more. My hands were cramping and it was such a pain in the ass. But cutting out the letters wasn't even the worst of it; wrapping them in fucking wrapping paper was.
Basically, let's try wrapping a feral cat high on catnip and fear, it might be easier.

It took HOURS.

To top it off, as I was wrapping the Ns, I kept noticing that they were looking kind of funky, but I could not figure out why.

It wasn't until I was hanging them on the wall that I noticed: I had wrapped them backward.

BACKWARD.

Check out the last one in Brandon's name.
Of course, out of the 18 letters that their names are comprised of, five of the letters are Ns- the highest percentage. I wrapped three out of the five wrong. WAY TO GO, me.

... And, I'm a college graduate. MONEY WELL SPENT.

IDEA #2: Snowflakes hanging from the ceiling

We don't get much snow here on the coast of California, and by "not much" I mean, none at all. So I thought it'd be nice for the boys to have "snow" in their room. But without all the mess. MAGICAL!

I got snowflakes from the Dollar Tree because fuck taking the time to cut out my own. I have letters to wrap, damn it. Plus, I knew they'd end up looking like a drunk 4-year-old made them.

I thought I'd save some time the night before OPERATION DECORATION commenced by tying the strings around the flakes so they were hang-ready the next day. After tying the strings around them, I carefully placed them on top of each other, hoping that the strings wouldn't tangle.

You can wish in one hand and shit in the other, see which gets full first.

I basically made up for the time I "saved" prepping the strings by having to untangle the massive mess they made somehow on their own, overnight in the garage. It was worse than a massive ball of Christmas lights.

I almost gave up on that part of the project, but I could see from the few I had managed to hang that it was going to be worth it. So, as I was attacked around the head by the already-hung flakes as I hung the newly-untangled ones, I persevered, and goddamn, they are going to stay up year-round.

Because they look good (far better than I could capture via camera), and because I'm never doing that shit again.

TIP: To easily adjust the lengths, just pull the end of the string through the tape, which is what I used to secure them to the ceiling.

IDEA #3: A paper Christmas tree on their wall

My drawing abilities are terrible (my 7-year-old can draw better than me) but I free-handed an outline of a tree on two large pieces of green card stock, cut it out, then immediately saw that I screwed it up and it looked like a huge spiky penis. Fortunately, knowing I'm a craft fuck-up, I had bought an extra piece of card stock and was able to fix it.

I stuck on glittery paper ornaments that were actually gift tags (I wasn't going to make my own for the same reasons as the snowflakes), tied some bells on some of the branches, then used red glitter glue to make "tinsel."

I decided to see if the card stock could handle the weight of the bells and picked up the tree by the top.

That was a mistake. The glitter glue was not dry and immediately ran in giant globs down the tree.

Whoopsie.

I looked at the screwed-up tree and almost trashed it, but damn it, I am not a quitter. The boys were going to get some kind of tree decoration, no matter how janky it looked. I realized I could stick actual tinsel over the glue and did just that.

It still looks like a drunk four-year-old made it, but I hung it up anyway.

IDEA #4: Doors "presents"

Even though I've never seen this pain in the ass idea before and came up with it on my own, it's probably already been done by seventy million people.
I say pain in the ass because getting the taped ribbon to stay stuck to the door WITH THREE WILD BOYS AROUND isn't so easy. So far, I've retaped it like four times in two days.

Some other things:

The spray snow on their bathroom mirror does a GREAT JOB of covering up their toothpaste splatters! And they've already touched it and messed it up but who cares, right?
Namaste.

Here's the snowy village I told them not to touch, that they've touched approximately 4,289 times in two days.

The "family photo tree" is now a "Christmas tree."

There's also a bunch of other stuff that I didn't picture here but you get the idea.

THE AFTERMATH

The boys love it. I talked with them about not touching stuff and not being rough around it all, knowing it was futile but giving it a try anyway. I told them that if they liked it and wanted me to do this again in the future, they needed to touch it with their eyes only.

That's not going so well, but hey, it's totally what I knew was going to happen anyway.

You're Doing Better Than You Think

2013-11-08T08:40:00.001-08:00

Connor had a special thing at school where he was interviewed in front of his class by his teacher, who also videotaped it.

For a couple of days before the interview, I practiced the questions with him so he didn't look like a fool if she asked him something he didn't know the answer to, and to generally prepare him for what to expect. One of the questions was, "What do you like to do in your spare time?"

Every time, Connor's answer was to play with his brothers, which was sweet and awesome and made me happy. They may fight like mofos, but at the end of the day, they are each others' favorite people, and I love that. It's exactly the kind of relationship I want them to have.

His teacher emailed me the video of his interview (I didn't get to see the interview in class). I watched it, smiling at how cute he was and how well he answered the questions, exactly as he had answered during practice.

Except one.

When asked what he likes to do in his spare time, Connor answered, "Play with my Mama."

I nearly fell over with surprise. I might have even gasped.

I felt so honored that out of all the things he could have said (playing with his brothers, playing his coveted video games, and so much more), playing with me, ME, was his answer, then I immediately felt like I didn't deserve for him to say that.

I've been beating myself up a bit for having such a hard time lately, I rag on him, I feel like I'm such a dick sometimes. I am striving to be better, to be more of the kind of mom I want to be, but it's easier to notice my failures than my successes in the parenting department. It's easier to see and feel the bad when living in the near-constant ball of frustration that raising small children creates.

But watching that video showed me something: I'm doing better than I think.

And I'm willing to bet that you're doing better than you think, too.

Things That Didn't Need To Happen: Episode 1

2013-11-04T09:55:00.000-08:00

This last week, we've experienced some great fun around the MotherhoodADIM house.

- I was walking down our stairs and my foot only touched half the step and before I knew it, I was on my back and thumping down the last third of our staircase.

Honor me by laughing with me here:

Let me tell you, it was only five or six steps but I was terrified as I slid uncontrollably down those effers on my back, a look on my face that was probably "America's Funniest Home Videos" worthy- if only Nate had had the foresight to know I was going to pull a dumbshit move. He super regretted not having his phone camera ready. He said it was fucking hilarious. I believe him.

- I was at the park, chasing after the boys (for fun, versus trying to save them from oncoming traffic) and I tripped. So I'm (for once) running at top speed- those fuckers are FAST- and suddenly I felt the jolt of my toe hitting the upper half of an uneven surface and before I knew it, I was splattered on the ground, my knees exploding and my face a millimeter from smashing into the ground.

But that pain was nothing compared to the humiliation- there was a group of parents standing about 12 feet to my right- of course they saw it, and before I was even back on my feet, were asking me if I was okay through their held-back laughter.

Yes, I was okay, if you don't count wanting to die from embarrassment.

Side note since you're probably wondering: NO, I was not drunk during either of those incidents. Hmm... maybe that was the problem...

- While trick-or-treating, Connor lost his mind when he saw that someone was giving out chips and granola bars. I wanted to lose my own mind from embarrassment at his bratty-ass behavior.

- After trick-or-treating, back at home Brandon lost HIS mind and screamed for a solid 17 minutes. So, in short, fuck Halloween.

- After the boys' baths or showers, they do this thing where they say, "Smell my hair!"

Well, this:

Brandon to me: Smell my hair!

I smelled it.

Me: It smells so GOOD!

Brandon: Smell my penis!

Me: Um, I'm not going to smell your penis.

Brandon: But it smells so clean!

Me: I'm not going to smell it. Stop.

I really feel like I got an intro into his future pickup lines, and I'm sorry for that.

- The boys were digging into their Halloween treats and the next thing I knew Connor was licking spilled Fun Dip powder off the floor like a complete crack addict who dropped some of his score. Then he and Brandon were bartering jelly bean and other treat trades like a bunch of junkies and you should have heard them. It sounded like a straight-up drug deal. I mean if I ever heard a drug deal go down, I'm sure that is what it would sound like.

- Nate accidentally washed one of Brandon's diapers in the washing machine and eleventy billion absorbent gel balls got all over our clothes.

- Speaking of diapers, why is my three-year-old still in diapers?

- I went on a walking field trip to a pumpkin patch with over 50 kindergarten and second-graders along a busy street and thought I was going to have a heart attack about 4 trillion times. LITTLE KIDS ARE SO HYPER. Then, while watching the crazy show at the pumpkin patch that this crazy couple put on, I seriously felt like I was on LSD. I mean, if I actually knew what being on LSD felt like.

- Daylight savings. Fuck you. Just... FUCK YOU.

How Working In A Jail Prepared Me For Motherhood. Seriously.

2013-10-04T10:01:00.002-07:00

I worked in a jail many years ago. It was a shit job (sometimes, literally a shit job), but I learned a lot from it. More than I ever would have guessed! In many ways, it actually really prepared me for motherhood. WHAT? Yes. Here's how.

- Whether it's a freshly arrested, drugged up or drunk inmate repeatedly screaming "FUCK YOU, YOU FUCKING WHORE" at me through his jail cell door, or my kids whining "Mommy, I don't want to get my jammies ooooooon" 500 times, I can tune it out like I'm deaf.
Like I'm sitting alone in a field of daisies, reading a book and mainlining wine.
What's that noise? A bird chirping?
Beautiful.

- Restraining a fighting inmate intent on killing me or giving a kid medicine, same tactic. Wrestle them to the ground, sit on them, and restrain their arms, fearing for my life, limbs, and eyes the entire time. It's all the same. Only, kids are shockingly stronger! They have more stamina, and are slightly insane.

- The dependency. Whether inmate or child, they depend on you for EVERYTHING. Meals, medicine, soap, clothing. It doesn't matter if I'm at the jail or in my own house, the constant requests for things are, well, constant.

- I had to check on the inmates within their housing units at least once an hour to make sure they weren't killing each other, themselves, escaping, doing drugs, etc. Good prep for checking on the kids every minute to make sure they aren't drowning in the toilet, lighting fires, choking each other out, shaving their legs with my discarded razor they dug out of the trash (true story- good job, son), eating glue, you get it.

- I also had to do head counts every shift at the jail. It's the same as having my kids out in public. One... two... ohshitwhere's- oh, three. Repeat every 15 seconds to two minutes, depending on where we're at.

- Monitoring television time. If we put on a channel and it was showing the same show or movie as the night before, the inmates acted like we were cutting their fucking faces off. IT'S THE SAME THING AS LAST NIGHT! CHANGE IT! CHANGE THE CHANNEL NOW! OOHH MY GOD MY EYES ARE MELTING OFF MY FACE!
Kids pretty much throw the same fit over TV except in the opposite way. They want to watch the same exact thing over and over and over and over and over again. Then over again.
Either way, it makes me want to blow up the television with glee.

- The fighting. Whether at home or jail, I'm constantly breaking up fights. He touched me! He touched me first! He took my pencil! He farted on me (that one I've heard at jail AND at home as excuses for fighting. NO JOKE.)! He was looking at me! He's walking too slow!
Just shut the hell up. All of you.

- The paperwork. Whether registering a kid for school or booking an inmate into the jail, the paperwork is enough to make trees cry. And me.

- The insane inmates were awesome prep for motherhood. When a toddler is doing something really, really strange or babbling incoherently, I just know to politely nod my head and soothingly say, "Okay, yes, I hear you. I understand" while wondering in the back of my mind what the fuck they are talking about or doing. I also learned how to handle unpredictable people, which, let's be honest here: kids are TOTALLY that.

- Searching them for contraband. Inmates hide anything and everything everywhere. Really, everywhere. After having conducted thousands of body searches, I can guarantee you that my kids have no chance of slipping anything by me on their person.
Whether having an inmate open his or her mouth after taking medication to show me that they didn't "cheek" their meds, or prying a kid's mouth open to see what he's hiding in there, it's all the same. I know what a hand looks like when it's concealing something, kids. I see your shifty eyes. And don't even think about using the other cheeks to hide anything, sons. I know how to search people by having them bend over, squat and cough. Unfortunately.

On second thought, I wasn't paid enough at the jail. At least at home, I am paid in snot-soaked kisses.

I Have Been Letting Motherhood Defeat Me. No More.

2013-09-30T10:14:00.000-07:00

I have been down in a hole with parenting lately. By "lately" I mean for years, but especially the past year. Totally on edge, constantly losing my mind over stupid shit like cupcake crumbs on the floor, blood from nosebleeds on the brand-new carpet, constant demands, whining, screaming, anything, everything, all of it. I have hardly been feeling any joy in parenthood.

My patience has taken a hike. It's off somewhere, drinking on a beach, laughing. Frustration and anger, near rage, have moved in and are consuming me, every single day. I've barely been in control of myself; I'm sliding down a slope, desperately grasping at anything to get a grip, and missing. These past months, I have hit bottom.

It feels like shit, I feel like shit. I am not in control of myself. I am not being strong. I am not being the parent I know I am capable of being. She is lost somewhere, and as much as I've fought, begged, to get her back, she has been evading me.

I hate feeling this way about motherhood, like I'm failing at the most important job of my life. It makes me feel like I am failing my children. I read about true human depravity and what people have suffered through and I feel like a fuckface for being such a wimp over my children.

I can just imagine a Holocaust survivor standing in front of me with utter contempt on their face, telling me - accurately - that I have not even begun to understand what suffering is.

I have been letting motherhood defeat me.

I am stronger than this.

All throughout my childhood, I had nightmares about drowning, of sinking deeper and deeper into the dark, watery abyss while I desperately looked up toward the surface. I was afraid of the ocean, of being drug out to sea, of what was underwater, and - whether in the water or on land - of the dark.

In college, to confront my fears, I obtained my Open Water Diver certification, then went for the Advanced Diver certification. The Advanced Diver cert involved completing six dives in roughly 30 hours, which is A LOT, in the brutally cold Puget Sound in Washington State. These were not easy, mellow dives; they were deep water dives, current dives, a night dive, and they all involved us having to swim from the beach out to our dive point, with pounds and pounds of gear on our backs, waists, and ankles.

Scuba diving is physically exhausting, especially with grueling back-to-back dives like that, and emotionally draining because it's dangerous. There is no room for error when you're 30 or 90 feet underwater. I was diving through thick beds of seaweed, terrified of getting caught in it and drowning before I could be saved. I was diving in ocean currents, terrified of getting ripped away in a current and carried out to the vast and scary ocean. The night dive was especially terrifying because it combined two of my biggest fears, underwater and the dark.

Diving was a lot of mastering my fear and stretching my physical limits, and it was taking its toll on me.

After the fourth dive, I was done. As we were gearing up for the fifth dive, I looked at my cold, wet, sand-filled wet suit and the thought of pulling it on once again, freezing and abrading my skin and getting into the cold ocean to feel more fear was too much. There was nothing left in me. My chest was tight and my throat was clogged with exhausted, utterly defeated tears that I didn't even have the energy to spill. I just wanted to get in my car and drive away.

I sat on a rock and the instructor could see it in my face. He squatted next to me and I told him I was done. I was going home.

He said in so many words, "You've done four dives, you have only two left. You've come this far. I know you're exhausted, but if you get in your car and drive away, how are you going to feel about yourself?"

He let that sink in.

"Elizabeth, you are not a quitter. If you give up now, you're always going to regret it. And, you'll set yourself up for being a quitter because if you start giving up now when things get tough, that's what you'll always do. You need to find your inner strength. It's there."

I was 20 years old. I was learning not only about scuba diving but about who I was and what I was made of. I knew that the satisfaction of driving away and not having to do those last two dives wouldn't last for even the three hours it would take me to drive home.

I knew I was strong, not just physically but mentally, and that I was not a quitter.

I finished the last two dives and got my Advanced Diver certification. Obtaining it is one of the hardest things I have ever done, and one of the accomplishments I am most proud of in my life because of what I went through to get it. I am especially proud of it because it was not easy to get. When I was ready to quit, when I thought I had bottomed out and had nothing left in me, I dug in and found more.

The nightmares about drowning stopped.

I've been thinking about that weekend a lot lately.

I am being challenged again, but on a much, much larger scale. Like scuba diving, parenting is physically and emotionally exhausting. I'm once again confronting my deepest fears: My child getting sick and/or dying. That I will mess them up. That I will fail, not just myself but more importantly, them.

There are days that I am sitting not on a rock with the ocean lapping my ankles, exhausted and emotionally spent, but in my house with children at my feet, and I want to get in my car and drive, not towards home, but away from it.

There are days where it's all I can do to hold myself together until their bedtime. One more scream from my kids, one more whine, is as abrasive to my psyche as the sand was to my raw skin.

Once again, I am letting weakness take a hold of me. I am not reaching inside of myself for the deep well of strength that I know I possess.

I am forgetting what I am made of.

I've been thinking a lot about that weekend because I am trying to remind myself that I can do this. I am trying to remind myself that the 20-year-old me mastered her deepest fears, mastered herself. After a moment of burying her face in her hands, she stood up and jumped in and she fucking did it.

In the week that I have been writing, rewriting, and rewriting again this post, in admitting my darkest feelings and that I am letting myself and especially my boys down, I feel myself getting stronger. Some of the frustration and anger has left me. I have been feeling more patient and more calm. I've been enjoying my kids more, instead of wishing I was anywhere but with them. In the face of some of their worse moments, I have even been unflappable. That is amazing. I didn't know I could do that.

I've finally tapped into my deep well of strength, and for once, I feel like I can do this. I know I'll have moments where I will slide back, but I hope I move forward again, instead of getting stuck in a pit of despair. I am scared to go back to where I have just come from, because I was losing my fucking mind. I hope that what I've been feeling this year was me bottoming out, and now there is nowhere to go but up.

Either that, or Nate started secretly drugging me to calm me the fuck down.

While diving, those swims against the waves to get to the dive point were brutal, and some of the actual dives were even more brutal. But in doing them, I got to drop below the surface of the water to another world and see interesting, fascinating, and beautiful things that had I not pushed myself, I never would have gotten to see.

There was reward for my hard work; beautiful, satisfying reward- just like there is in parenting. I didn't love every second of becoming an advanced diver, but once it was done, I loved that I did it.

And one day, when the boys are off on their own, I will look back and remember that I didn't love every minute or even day of parenting, but I will love that I did it. I will be proud of what I accomplished, especially because it was not easy to do.

I just need to not let myself fall apart before I get there.

I can handle these fools.

The Porcupine Hand Incident

2013-09-26T07:24:00.000-07:00

So you know those times when you can hear a kid screaming bloody murder, I mean really giving it all they've got and it sounds awful and torturous? Like they're slowly being murdered, and the hair on your neck stands up and you seriously wonder if you should call the cops?

To all my neighbors who heard my kid screaming like that at approximately 3:25 Wednesday afternoon, thank you for not calling the cops.

It started when we picked up Ethan from school. Walking back to the car, Brandon didn't want me to hold his right hand, only his left. I thought it was weird but kids are weird so I went with it. We got home, I gave him a snack before his nap, and went to wash his hands.

He flipped out. He didn't want me to wash his right hand. I mean, really really really really did not want me to wash it.

Again, this was weird, but he's been flipping out about pretty much everything lately (he's three) so I thought it was yet another Really Stupid Thing he was having a cow about.

As we fought at the sink, with him trying to pull his right hand away from the water and me trying to force it back under the water (like the U.S. Government, I don't negotiate with terrorists), I saw it.

I vice-gripped his hand to get a better look, and he started shrieking. Zeroing in on exactly what the problem was, it took all I had not to start shrieking myself.

He had touched something that sent a rash of hundreds of tiny hairlike slivers into a section of his palm and finger.

Not the best shot, but considering the circumstances, I'm amazed it's even this good.

I nearly shit myself. It was that bad. What the fuck am I supposed to do with this? I hate removing slivers, and here I was being faced with hundreds of them, and stuck in a kid who was making a person in the throes of demon possession look like they were having a relaxing picnic in the park.

I've never heard screams come from him like that before. To top it off, he was finishing up the last bites of a fruit roll-up, so he was drooling (foaming) a bluish-blackish-redish fluid out of his blue- and red-tinted mouth.

He looked INSANE.

It was A MESS. I was trying not to panic. Nate was at work, so not able to help. I had no idea how I was going to get that many slivers out of this thrashing kid by myself.

You know how when someone is drowning and the person trying to save them has to punch the drowner in the face to get them to either stop panicking or knock them out so they can actually save them?

I seriously wondered if I needed to do that (<----things I shouldn't admit publicly). He was hurting, and I was that scared of what was stuck in his hand and I wanted, needed, to get them out and now. I could see blood under some of the slivers, also I was terrified that they had come from some poisonous plant and he was being injected with deadly toxins.

I realized that I couldn't actually slug my kid in the face, contemplated a sleeper hold, nope, can't bring myself to do that, either, then my mind shuffled over to medication options. Can I drug him? Well, I didn't have any roofies on me so what the hell was I supposed to drug him with? Melatonin? That would take too long.

My near-panicky mind was shuffling through other options while also registering that the neighbors have to be freaking out by now. "What the hell is that kid screaming like that for? That house is always loud but this is OVER the TOP. Honey, call the COPS."

I realized that I was just going to have to pin him down somehow, force his hand open, and one-by-one pull out the slivers. Except, a panicked three-year-old is freakishly, freakishly, strong, and I needed more hands. I thought about running to a neighbor's house and asking her if she could help pin him so I could perform surgery, then realized that 1. I didn't want to take him outside to delight our neighbors with more of his screaming, and 2. I didn't think that having basically a stranger (we're new to the 'hood) pinning him down would be really good for him and actually help matters.

I thought hard. I needed to distract him... Angry Birds Toons! HE LOVES THOSE BITCHES. I asked him if he wanted to watch Angry Birds on my phone so I could take out his slivers. Somehow, he heard me over his own death screams and, blackish-blue drool still pouring from his mouth, said yes.

I hurriedly got some Toons going for him, put the phone in his good hand, and went to work. But, the Toons barely distracted him; every time I even looked at his hand, his screams intensified. Even when I didn't think it was possible, they got worse.

I tried to soothe him with a calming voice, tucked his arm under mine and pinned it to my side with all my strength, then vice-gripped his hand with one of mine, but I also had to use my same hand to pry his fingers open- while he was wiggling and trying to fight it. This created a situation where I was pretty sure I was going to end up accidentally breaking one of his fingers (<----another thing I shouldn't admit publicly) in the struggle, but was completely at a loss as to what else I could do.

With tweezers, I pulled out a section of slivers, then another, then another. Progress was being made! My right ear was losing about 12% of its hearing, but progress was being made. Finally, they were all out, and no fingers had been broken in the process. I told Brandon that we were all done, the slivers were all gone, so he could calm down now.

I put some Neosporin on a Band-Aid, thereby giving him "a sticker." I scooped him off the counter and carried him to his bed and held him for a minute before laying him down for his nap.

Jesus. People who can parent without drinking your faces off, I don't know how you do it.

The Date

2013-09-09T09:18:00.000-07:00

Anticipation was building.

I was counting down the minutes. I put on some eyeliner and mascara, tousled some dry shampoo through my unwashed hair. Do I put on some perfume? No, that might be a bit much. My deodorant was fresh; it'll do.

Preparing to go, I put some water in my purse, made sure I had a snack. I didn't know how long I was going to be gone for. An hour. Maybe longer! I made sure I had everything I might need.

Finally, it was time. I kissed Nate and the boys goodbye, grabbed my keys and purse, and flew out the door. I clicked my heels together as I walked to the car.

As I drove, eighties music played on the radio. My spirits were high; I sang along like a fool to "It Must Have Been Love" and "Girls Just Want To Have Fun." The wind blew my hair around. I felt so free.

I drove too fast, especially when "Hells Bells" played. The music was too loud and it was glorious; the only eardrums to wreck were my own. The car seats were EMPTY!

Then, I arrived. I pulled into the parking lot, found a spot. I was there!

And I grabbed a shopping cart and went into the grocery store, all alone, to shop in peace.

Hold Me

2013-08-30T07:59:00.000-07:00

So I'm wrapping up the second night of being alone with the boys after surgery while Nate goes to work, and if I'm going to be completely frank, it's sucking.

Instead of stewing about it, I want to laugh about it, and to laugh, I write.

So I can't lift over ten pounds, not unless I want to cause myself considerable pain and set myself up for a hernia and therefore another surgery. I can't walk very quickly or for long distances, make sudden movements, or bend forward at the waist without feeling like a rod is being jammed into my sternum. Don't ask me why that is because I really don't know. My belly is swollen from all the trauma but at least now I only look like I'm four months pregnant instead of six. PROGRESS, people.

There is basically fishing line holding my abdominal muscles together. Fishing line. It can take up to sixty pounds of pressure!

And I'm in charge of newly minted three-, five-, and seven-year-olds. "Newly minted" meaning they all just had birthdays. And they're boys, so really, it's like 1-, 3-, and 5-year-olds.

I feel weak, helpless, and impotent. And kids sense weakness. They really do. Not only do they sense it, they exploit it.

The first night, it was like, OH HEY MOM CAN'T MOVE, LET'S FUCK SHIT UP! They preyed. They destroyed, and they annoyed. Also, I did too much, and by bedtime, I was in a horrible mood and put them to bed in a horrible mood and woke up in the morning feeling like a real dick. Which is a fun emotion to add to the weak, helpless, and impotent.

I vowed to be better Thursday night because I am nothing if not an eternal optimist, but deep down, knew I wouldn't be. Because I was scared, and animals lash out when they are scared. Or they run and hide, but I have nowhere to run and hide to.

After dinner, I walked them to the park. You'd think, for the older two, that after a couple of days of school after a mellow summer, they'd be wiped out.

NO.

I gimped, they ran to the park. It takes maybe four minutes. As soon as we got there, and I'm not shitting you, literally as soon as we walked into the park, Brandon went off to the side and stood there, refusing to move.

WELL, DON'T WE ALL KNOW WHAT THAT MEANS.

I had no wipes, no diapers, nothing. Four minutes. If only we had left four minutes later, this could have been avoided. I felt so defeated. Timing really is everything!

I thought, and thought hard. To buy us more time, I decided to change him out of the poopy diaper, let him free-ball it, and hope he didn't piss his pants. I took him into the bathroom to clean him up, and remembering that it hurts to bend over and forward, looked for a table or counter to put him on. Found one, and like a total idiot, lifted him onto it.

I was mid-lift when I remembered that I am not supposed to lift over ten pounds, and here I am lifting well over 30. Good thing my mom instinct took priority over self-preservation, or I would have dropped him on his face. I cleaned him up, then told him cling to my back so I could get him off the table, then awkwardly lowered him to the ground using my legs. As soon as I stood up and walked outside, I knew I had really screwed myself.

My insides were screaming. Five hours later, as I'm writing this, my insides are still screaming, They are tender and the pain meds are barely making a scratch on the surface of it. I'm totally stoked to get a hernia. I've never had one before! They're lots of fun, I've heard.

After a while, we walked (I crawled) towards home. On the way, someone walking their dogs, one on a leash and one OFF, let the dog off the leash run up to my kids. No big deal, except two of my kids are scared of dogs.

People who let their dogs off their leashes on public streets and then do absolutely nothing as their dog runs up to children who are clearly terrified of said dog running up to them deserve to get kicked in the fucking teeth. They may "know" that their dog isn't going to attack the kid, but the kid (and parent) doesn't know that. And when a kid starts screaming in terror and running from their dog, common sense and general human decency should prevail and the person should call their dog back. Or, you know, have them on a leash in the first place. That's just my opinion, along with the opinion that people who don't call their dogs back are real dicks, and they're lucky their dogs don't get shot.

So that was fun. The dog was a big, loping idiot who just wanted to have fun, so it was a bit more forgivable. I calmed my kids and herded them away from the dog, then felt like a pussy for not telling the irresponsible dog owner what a dickface she was, because I hate confrontation.

Further down the street, we encountered a very friendly older lady who was absolutely fascinated that all three boys were mine. They're ALL yours? You're growing your own baseball team! Shockingly, I get this kind of reaction frequently and it only makes me wonder what people with more than three kids get. Are they looked upon as circus freaks?

As we chatted and I tried to pretend that my insides weren't blowing up, Brandon found a bright green glob of chewed-up gum on the ground and thought, best toy ever! He got it all over his fingers, every single one of them. I tried to clean off as much as I could with sticks and leaves but it was futile.

In hindsight, at least he didn't chew it.

Ready to collapse on my face, we got home and by sheer force of will, I got them into bed.

Friday will be better. I know it. I really do. That's not my eternal optimism talking, here. Their grandmother is taking them after school for the evening! Oh thank God. I'd jump in the air and click my heels together but you know, I can't.

A Fun Change

2013-08-20T10:41:00.000-07:00

Thanks to Schwang, I'm a bit out of commission so I haven't been blogging a whole lot, but I didn't want to leave the space here blank for long stretches so I asked one of the coolest writers in the world, Jason Good, if he could help me out in filling space and he very graciously let me rip off* one of his posts and re-post it here for you.

If you haven't read Jason's work, you're missing out. He's a married (so don't go hitting on him) dad of two boys, a comedian, a writer, a big kid in giant grown man's clothes, a closet cusser (he might love the F word as much as I do, but he keeps that under his hat- at least until he gets on stage where he "gets all his fucks out"), and a fellow Motley Crue/heavy metal lover.

He has a few books coming out not soon enough (next year and 2015) and you're not going to want to miss them. I might even buy a couple extra copies and do a giveaway!

Without further ado, check out this post of his, then go like his Facebook page and follow him on Twitter- Oh, what's that, you're not on Twitter? Okay, Google+? No? Then I don't know what to tell you. Bookmark his site.

The Wrong Rock

May 8, 2013

Saturday morning was crisp. The skies were blue and the sun had already dried the dew from the grass where Arlo and I sat to watch Silas’ T-ball game. On our walk from the car to the field, Arlo had collected two small rocks, which, in case you didn’t know, are religious artifacts to three year-old boys. They’re worshipped, clutched and squeezed like a rosary in the hand of a dying Saint. But the toddler is also easily distracted by birds, the position of his shirt, and interesting leaves. As we watched the five year-old boys of summer fiddle with their giant mitts and fastidiously untuck their jerseys, I heard that phrase which every parent fears,
“Daddy, I dwopped my wock!”
I tried to remain calm. I didn’t want to contribute any further emotion to a situation destined to escalate exponentially until the “wock” was located. “OK, let’s find your rock.” His voice became agitated as he pointed to a section of over-grown grass next to my foot. “I dwopped it wight heuw!” He showed me the other rock in his hand, “still have one wock, but other wock disapeuw!”
I quickly ran my hand through the section of grass but the longer I searched, the more anxious be became. “Wight heuw!” There was no rock “heuw.”
I started to search more feverishly, imagining that those watching us in their peripheral vision thought I’d lost my wedding ring. I stood up and brushed myself off, hoping that the small rock had simply fallen on me and become lodged somewhere in my pants. I encouraged Arlo to do the same. Nothing. The rock was gone. I finger-combed the adjacent yard of grass and felt something hard and solid–the rock! “Oh, I found it!” I proclaimed victoriously. When I showed him my discovery, all hell broke lose. He began weep-screaming, “Dat’s not da wight wock! Dat’s not da wight wock.” Then I made a rookie mistake. I asked, “Well, can you use this rock instead?” and henceforth unleashed the fury of one million rabid bats. “NO DADDY DAT’S A DIFFUENT WOCK!”

“OK, so NONE of these?”

I maintained my composure. People were watching now. The show on the sidelines had suddenly become more interesting than the one on the field. I made one more sweep of the area and found a contact lens, a Skittle, a dozen pieces of bark and something that might have been poop, but no rock.
“Well, let’s go look around for a rock that’s just like the rock you lost.” It was a Hail Mary of parenting for sure, but luckily, he agreed. And then, as if things couldn’t get worse, he announced, “I peed a widdle bit in my underweuwr, daddy.” “Ok, let me check.” I felt his pants and found them to be only a little damp. No big deal. “Do you have to pee?” I asked. “NO!” But his constant disco dance suggested otherwise. “There’s a bathroom right over there we can go to.” “I DONT HAVE TO PEE. FIND WOCK DEN PEE.”
As we continued our vision quest for the perfect rock, it became clear to me that we were looking for something very specific. Each one I offered him was either “too dawk” or “not da wight sape!” “Well, what did the rock look like, exactly?” I asked. “Wike a tiny hot dog. It wood wike a tiny hot dog daddy!” (everything is about the Mickey Mouse Club House hot dog dance these days.)
I was looking for a rock–the shape and color of a hot dog–with a child who was doing some combination of the Electric Slide and a hip hop pop ‘n lock. Did you know that no rocks look like a hot dog? They simply don’t exist–this was nature’s fault. I offered him rocks that looked like hamburgers, oatmeal and even one that looked like “the top of a lollipop.” Then I heard my other son’s coach yell, “Silas’ daddy, do you have water?” Damn, I had another kid there I’d forgotten about. So I ran back over to the field, leaving Arlo to dance alone while chanting “hot dog wock.” While I was gone, Arlo had apparently been visited by the Rock Gods who told him to “chill about the rock, bro.” In my absence, he’d found a suitable replacement relic and all was now calm except for his desperate need to pee.
Despite promising that he’d go pee after finding a rock, he insisted on returning home after the game. He told his mom that he didn’t want to pee with me because his underwear was wet. I know that doesn’t make sense because he had no further intentions to pee in his underwear, but maybe it’s kind of like not wanting to sleep in jeans. I don’t know. When he showed his mom the rocks, I said, “Check it out, one of them looks like a hot dog!” to which responded he with a look of wisdom (and slight annoyance) beyond his years. Then he disappeared to pee.
Parenting: it’s difficult and awesome.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Don't forget to check out his other posts and go like his page! It's always great to have a Dad's perspective, too.

*And please, don't rip off his work. That happens all the time to him, and it SUCKS a horse dong. He gave me permission to reprint this on my site because he's cool like that, but it doesn't mean that everyone can reprint his work, including Facebook posts, on their sites or Facebook without his prior consent.

The Hap, Hap, Happiest Christmas Since Bing Crosby Tap Danced With Danny Fuckin' Kaye*

2013-08-15T16:02:00.000-07:00

Announcing the birth of Schwang, a completely benign (NON-CANCEROUS) nerve tumor called a Schwannoma that an amazing surgeon removed from my abdomen.

He's a boy. I forgot to ask the little fucker's birth weight, but he's the size of a pomegranate. He was born, as most of you know, on August 8th, 2013, sometime around 2 in the afternoon. He is now residing in medical wasteland.

Since Schwang was immediately shipped off to the pathology department, I did not have a chance to get a picture with him. However, my awesome father-in-law found an orange (he could not locate an actual pomegranate) to sit in as Schwang's sub.

Proud Mama. Just kidding. Fuck that thing.

Please excuse my appearance. I had not showered in five days at the time of the photo (disgusting... and, a record), was heavily medicated (wait, still am), had (have) a giant incision from my sternum to my belly button (over six inches!), and was most likely in some pain.

Yes, my family is awesome and bought me the fruit, brought me an "It's a Boy" balloon, knit a hat, and I snagged one of Brandon's old baby blankets. We are weird and I love it.

So. The good news is, no cancer. The surgeon initially thought (just from eyeballing him) that Schwang could be a fatty sarcoma, which means cancer, and that I would have to undergo radiation. So I've been mentally prepping for that, and now I don't need to worry. Neither does my family, who would have had to suffer through that and me being out of commission AGAIN. Seriously, I'm more happy for them than myself, that they don't have to pick up my slack again while my insides got blasted.

Also, I got to keep my kidney. Schwang hadn't destroyed it yet.

So thank you to everyone who thought good thoughts, prayed, rain danced, sang a little song, or had a drink for me. Your efforts clearly did not go unnoticed, since all turned out well in the end. Thank you.

In case a few of you are wondering, recovery is going... well. If you call being in pain every time I stand up or move "well." But it's fine. It's not excruciating and could be A LOT worse. It hurts to yell, so I'm avoiding being around my children. Just kidding (kind of), I miss those goobers. I can't wait to run around with them again, also because running around will help shrink my disgustingly swollen belly. Yeah, I know, I lose a large tumor from the thing, and it's bigger than it was before. Thanks, gas and surgery swelling and loss of muscle tone.

*The title of the post is from National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation, one of my favorite movies of all time.

It's Not You, It's Me.

2013-05-23T07:46:00.000-07:00

Here are some things I've had to break up with in my parenting days. Most of them I don't actually even care about, so this isn't to be taken as complaining. Some of them, in fact, I even celebrate the loss of.

GREETING CARDS

Since my kids now know how to write and draw, we're breaking up, Hallmark. Gone are the days of dropping $3-4 for a piece of lightweight cardboard imprinted with meaningless platitudes for the receiver to toss in the garbage mere hours after receipt. Instead, our friends, family, and random people from school are treated to dramatic crayon scenes and unintentionally phallic drawings on cheap colored paper. And I love it. No more wasting 15 minutes trying to find the least stupid card in the store, or just plain blowing it off and saying, "Sorry, I didn't get you a card, here's your present, though" and hoping they don't care.

TV BEFORE KIDDIE BEDTIME

Watching adult television- no not that kind of adult television- before the kids go to bed is impossible if I want to actually hear it or pay any kind of attention to it. I rarely watch TV anyway, but I remember when all three boys were really little (4 and under) I once tried to watch a movie in the middle of the day while baby Brandon napped and the other two played with their Play-Doh. I nearly cried from the frustration of not being able to. Not because the movie was that great or important to me, but because it was frustrating to not even be able to do something as stupid as that. I've since come to terms with the fact that daytime TV watching isn't for me anymore and traded her in for her way more flexible younger sister, DVR.

DRINKING WINE OUT OF A WINEGLASS

Wine glasses break and/or topple over way too easily. Not a fan of your fragility, wine glasses, see ya. Coffee mugs and tumblers it is from now on. I cringe when a guest in my house wants to actually be classy and drink out of a wine glass. Then I watch the glass and its proximity to my boys and their flying objects like a hawk. CHAMPAGNE TASTES THE SAME OUT OF A RED SOLO CUP, PEOPLE.

VELVET SUNGLASSES

No, not sunglasses made of velvet; sunglasses made by Velvet, the company. My face is very narrow in my temple area, making sunglasses tough to buy- they're all too wide. Velvet is the only company I've found who makes sunglasses that fit my narrow face without having to resort to buying kid's sunglasses (oh the horror), but they cost about 100 bucks. The first time my son broke a pair, I was stupid enough to replace them. When the replacement pair was (unobserved by me) grabbed by one of the boys and tossed over the side of the stroller somewhere in the mall and lost forever, I started buying cheapos from Target and enduring the too-wide frames. Velvet, I love and miss you. Sometimes, I lovingly stroke the only memento I have from our relationship- the fluffy pink drawstring bag a pair of shades came in- and remember all the good times we had. We'll get back together again when my boys are older, if I can afford you. Actually, I probably won't be able to. Goodbye, my love. (Picture Jim Carrey in Dumb and Dumber when he was driving the limo away from the airport and rear-ends someone while saying "Goodbye my love" to Lauren Holly. I DIE.)

WARM, UNINTERRUPTED DINNERS

Who likes hot food, anyway? Especially eaten uninterrupted? Fuck that noise. It's no longer a meal unless I get up to wipe a butt, break up a fight, stop the boys from throwing toys into their window blinds, dry a kid off, kiss a boo-boo, and feed half of my food to my kids. Goodbye, warm meals. You were too high-maintenance for me. Eat you right out of the oven/BBQ/stove/microwave and within 10 minutes? NO. *SLAP*

HIGH HEELS

This, my friends, is a truly painful breakup. I used to constantly wear high heels. I'm 5'6" but people (even close friends and family) always thought I was way taller because nobody ever notices that your footwear has boosted you several inches. I LOVE HIGH HEELS. But I love not breaking my ankles more. With the boys around, I may have to suddenly dart after one of them to keep them from getting hit by a car or jumping off a railing into a ravine. It is such a treat when I can slip on some heels. I feel at home again; like MYSELF again.

What have you had to break up with? I changed my comment platform- everyone can comment now!

The Possessed Bee

2013-05-20T07:29:00.000-07:00

Ethan had his last t-ball game on Saturday, and I hauled the other two boys into the bleachers to watch. We settled in, and I felt Connor twitch against me. Then he twitched again and again, and I spotted a bee hovering near him.

Connor hates flying things, even harmless things like flies, but he's especially scared of bees even though he's never been stung by one- must be instinct. Anyway, I swatted the bee away but it came right back and then, IT WAS ON.

Connor flipped out. He twisted away, simultaneously starting to shriek while kicking out his legs and nailing some old lady in the back. She swung around as I was saying "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, he's flipping out about this bee," and I tried to wrestle his legs down so we could stand up and get away. That was no easy feat as the kid was in full panic mode and flailing around while screaming his face off. I finally got him to stand up as the bee flew toward Brandon, so Brandon started screaming, too.

I quickly grabbed Brandon and herded him and Connor away from the bee, down the row of bleachers, but the bee followed us. Both of the boys were screaming now, so we were attracting the attention of every single person in the vicinity of the baseball field. I turned the other way, but the bee kept following us. It was like a demon bee, possessed, and would not stop until it got its clutches into Connor. It kept flying into his face and I'd pull him one way only to have the bee follow, then the other way, and the bee would still follow.

There were 24 other people in the bleachers (yes, I counted later) but this bee only wanted Connor. Back and forth we went down the row of the bleachers, ducking and swatting, both the boys screaming and flailing and tripping over the people who were surrounding us. The bee would not leave us alone.

I couldn't smash it with my bag like I wanted to because then I would have essentially been beating Connor in the face or head, probably causing him to get stung, not to mention having Child Protective Services pay us a visit later. I finally got smart and started leading them off of the bleachers, thinking that if we got to the field by the dugout, we could somehow escape the winged motherfucker. Or at the very least, stop spazzing out in the bleachers and give everyone's ears a break from the screaming.

We got to the end of the row and one of the dads somehow managed to swat the bee away. It flew off to go torture some other kid, and I hoped for the bee to die a painful death via blowtorch or perhaps, fittingly, torture by some sadistic sociopath of a kid.

What a fucking spectacle. We sat back down and it took several minutes to calm my sweating, shaking boys. They sagged against me like they just fought World War Bee (I'm sorry). Whenever a fly or some other insect came near them (within 25 feet), they tensed up and I could almost taste their post traumatic stress disorder.

Perhaps it was the shirt that attracted the bee.

MOM?

After the game, Ethan, who had been 90 feet away in the outfield during WWB, asked Connor why we had been screaming and running around the bleachers. Connor simply said, "A bee was twying to get me."

Clearly, that kid did not get my flair for the dramatic, nor my need to tell a story whenever I can. He's a (mini) man of few words, just like his Daddy.

Truth in advertising? I'm thinking NO.

2013-05-17T07:50:00.000-07:00

Have you seen that SC Johnson commercial with Fisk Johnson (WE MISSED THE BOAT ON THAT NAME, NATE) where he talks about how their products are all natural blah blah blah and then they show a woman cleaning the window? Specifically, this woman cleaning this window?

Then a little girl runs up right after and puts her booger hands right on the newly cleaned window.

And then, the mom laughs and hugs the little girl and life is perfect.

I DON'T KNOW ABOUT YOU...

But if I was that mom and my kid ran up and put their hand prints all over the window I had just finished cleaning, I sure as shit wouldn't be laughing and hugging him right after like he just created the next Jackson Pollock masterpiece with his fucking hands all over my newly-cleaned window.

More likely, I would flip out and be all, "Get your hands off the damn window! I just cleaned it for the first time this year! GAAAAHHHDAMMIT!"

And then I would mumble to myself about why do I even bother and I just wasted five minutes of my life and this is why I stopped cleaning once the boys were born.

So, SC Johnson and Fisk, I don't think many mothers relate to your commercial- at least, none that I know- hard as you tried to get us to do that. Yet, I will still use your window cleaner once or twice a year. I'm on the same bottle from 2005.

A Letter To My Sons On Mother's Day

2013-05-12T11:37:00.000-07:00

Dear Boys,

In spite of frequently being driven to want to desperately jump into the next car that drives down the street and take off into the sunset with whichever random stranger was unlucky enough to be passing me at that moment, I am so happy to be your Mama. I know how lucky I am to have you, you sweet, stinky, funny, too-loud, crazy boys.

I mean, how else would I know the sheer embarrassment of you as a teeny tiny baby ripping gigantic man farts in public, leaving me no choice but to let people believe it was me because what kind of dickhead would I be if I blamed a fart on my innocent little baby?

How else would I know that I can get puked on, and with puke hanging off my lip be more concerned about getting the puke off your brother's head? That's some serious internal fortitude right there, and I never would have known I have it without you guys.

Without you, I never would have experienced being driven to the brink of insanity by your screaming, your "whys," your sleepless nights, and been pulled back from the edge by your goofy, crooked smiles, your hand tenderly resting on my cheek, your "I ruv yous," and watching you sleep.

Because of you, I know the pain of having my throat stepped on, the utter release and euphoria of hearing your first cries, the nose-burning, eye-watering stench of your worst craps, and the fear and joy of wearing my heart outside of my body.

It is an honor to be loved "more than Night Wing loves it is wings," "more than Batman loves his cape," and "more than a bee loves its pollen."

I am so proud that you know the different between "then" and "than", Ethan, and used the correct one. I am also thankful (and somewhat surprised) that when you made me a Mother's Day coupon book, on the coupon for you to bring me coffee and tea, you didn't write "beer" and "wine."

You boys are the frosting to my cake, the cra to my crazy, the sweet and the sour to my chicken. Thank you for teaching me about the beauty and the beast of motherhood.

I love you all the way to the earf and the fishies,

Mama

What Happens When Two Moms Who Met Over The Internet Go To Mexico Together, Part 1

2013-05-03T04:24:00.001-07:00

As I'm sure most of you are not aware of, I went to Mexico last week with Julie from I Like Beer and Babies- Cancun, to be specific. Haha, of course you knew. Here's the story of the trip through an interpretive dance of photos.

Julie picked me up at the airport, meeting me at the curb (what's up with not meeting me at the gate with flowers and chocolate, bitch?) and I knew it was her minivan, Rambone, because of a sign she had secretly made and taped to the window, and she knew it was me because of a sign I had secretly made and was holding out, in some sign-making cosmic connection. Because we never would have recognized each other from all the photos on our respective blogs.

Getting into the van was one of the most surreal experiences because I was meeting her for the first time but it felt like I had known her for years. It wasn't awkward, it wasn't weird, it was completely natural.

I'm on the left, she's the carrot top with all the necklaces. Coz she a gansta.

We meet! We drink! Here's a portion of the drink menu at some bar in her city. It was the best menu I've ever seen (perhaps I don't get out much):

But enough about America. We flew to Cancun and upon checking into the all-inclusive hotel, they placed booze and food bracelets on our wrists so they knew that we weren't some bums off the street. Because we totally look like homeless Mexican nationals. Anyway, my very first thought was, OH MY GOD, THE BRACELET IS GOING TO LEAVE A DAMN TAN LINE!

I KNOW. Serious problems, people.

But, I quickly forgot my problems when I saw these IN our ROOM:

That's right, chicas, a booze dispenser in our room. We made drinks and headed down to the beach. Now, I live within a mile of the beach in California, and even still, I was in awe of the sand in Cancun. It's like baby powder. You could snort it off a hooker. It's so soft and fine and not at all gritty- it's some seriously fucking luxurious sand.

We stayed on the beach and in the bath-temperature ocean until sunset and until all the resort-goers stumbled into the hotel to die from their sunburns (we saw some gnarly, seriously fucked up sunburns there) and this allowed us to capture some people-free photos of one of the pools and these amazing built-into-the-pool recliner chairs.

And see this guy walking along the beach with the wares he was pedaling balanced on his head:

And then it was off to eat, and every buffet had WINE FROM A TAP. It was shit wine, but it was WINE FROM A TAP:

We also had some specialty drinks. The bartenders really liked making these drinks that are apparently supposed to represent the Mexican flag, but they tasted like shitballs of sugar and looked more like the flags of Bolivia or Ghana (fuck yeah I had to Google that). The chocolate martinis flanking the flag drinks, however, were NOT shit. They were spiked chocolate milk glory in our mouths.

And one more picture because why not:

Cancun was windy. We got blow jobs when we sat at a bar next to an open door:

And we enjoyed some scenery:

View from our deck.

Fountain in one of the resort restaurants.

We wore sombreros that smelled like body odor and probably crawled with a trillion lice, just to look like total dicks and because we were drinking.

Sunday, we went on a speedboat/snorkeling excursion.

I was being a dork with my snorkeling crap on, and got photo bombed by Monkey, the COOLEST GUIDE EVER.

We, and by "we" I mean Julie, drove a speedboat to a "private" area for us to snorkel in with 50 other people. After Julie got the hang of the boat and we felt confident that we weren't going to face-skate across the water and die, I put my swollen, sausage-like feet and cankles (more on that in another post) up and enjoyed the ride and the view.

When we returned, we took the opportunity to overpay for cheap crap in a gift shop/pharmacy/7-11 type mercado. I got some souvenirs for the boys that even though I knew they were going to break immediately, it still pissed me off when they actually did break them immediately, and this magnet for Nate, because he loves boobs.

I also learned just how the West was won. You think you know history? You don't know shit. The West was won with a tequila gun (look at the top of the box).

Then we got ready for our last night in Mexico. I didn't pack correctly and ran out of clothes to wear that didn't encase me in the humidity that we were already drowning in, so Julie graciously let me borrow not only an extra dress of hers but a necklace, too. It was like wearing a pelt of her skin and would have been totally creepy but I was too sweaty and hot to care.

DORK ON A DECK. With some sexy, frizzy, humidity-styled hair.

The next day we flew back to the States. After saying goodbye to Julie, I endured two more flights to get to my neck of the woods, with a layover in Denver, the mile "high" city. I went to the bathroom and was surprised to find this in the stall:

I'm always looking for inspiration in public bathrooms. As I was reeking of old booze and airport McDonalds and sweat and fear (from two airplanes rides with another pending), my hair frizzy, face greasy, makeup pooling in my under eye bags and melting down my cheeks, smelling my own urine and the shit of the neighboring stall, exhausted and my already long-ass day only two thirds over, I'd never felt more beautiful.

It was like a message from God.

Then I boarded my last flight and it was the second-worst flight I've ever had. The plane seemed to struggle while taking off and I came close to having the one and only panic attack of my life (so far). I kept creepily whispering, "What the fuck, what the fuck, this is NOT a normal takeoff, what the fuck!" while death-gripping my coat and sweating profusely as my breathing became more and more shallow. I wanted to crawl out of my own skin and use it to parachute out of the plane. It probably would have been best if the dude next to me had punched me in the face and knocked me out. It was torturous.

After 2.5 hours of refusing to think about anything in my past lest my life began to flash before my eyes, we landed and I silently said my "We live!" mantra. Seventy-eight times.

Nate picked me up at the airport when I landed in the middle of the night, and I crashed so hard in my own bed when we got home that I didn't stop snoring even after he kicked me 114 times. I felt like I had been hit by a truck the next morning. But the squeals of the boys when they saw me was like the biggest rush in the world. I totally understand what rock stars feel when they take the stage now, totally.

Happy boy. And YES, I know I look exhausted and strung out and like I just woke up. BECAUSE I WAS, and I HAD just woken up.

I can't believe I posted a first-thing-in-the-morning photo of me on the internet. Holy shit.

Funny story:

One night, we hung out in one of the bars with some guy from England (right Julie?) because he totally respected the fact that we were married with kids (we wore that shit like SKUNK SPRAY). He was completely wasted but was having fun and totally harmless. We laughed as we watched him making out with some random chick at the bar, he spilled a drink on me, you know, the usual good times.

We saw him the next day. He told us that he had woken up in his hotel room with blood all over his shirt and a broken nose, and no recollection of how he got it. We asked him if he remembered making out with the chick at the bar and he had no idea what we were talking about.

Oh my God. To be young and stupid again.

Just kidding. Like I want to wake up with a fucking broken nose and venereal disease, and no recollection of how I got either.

CAN'T WAIT FOR OUR NEXT TRIP!

To read more about the trip from Julie's perspective, click here.

A final shout out to Amy at Destinations by Amy for booking our trip! THANK YOU!

How To Play Catch, According To Toddlers

2013-05-01T13:41:00.000-07:00

Toddler rules for playing catch:

1. Find the hardest ball in the house.

2. Stand AS CLOSE AS POSSIBLE to opponent.

3. Throw the ball mostly at their face. (This is the best when you have an opponent who hates stuff flying at their face. Spastic flinches are the best to watch.)

4. PRETEND you're going to throw the ball at their face, watch them flinch and flail their arms, then merely hand them the ball.

5. After only handing them the ball several times in a row, suddenly throw it in their face when they have their hands down and aren't expecting it.

6. If they have a scrotum or breasts, be sure to throw the ball there a few times. HARD.

7. Throw a tantrum when they stop playing after three minutes.

Ready to catch, mom!

Raising The 1st vs. 2nd vs. 3rd Kid

2013-04-08T08:25:00.000-07:00

I've read many posts that insightfully document the differences between parenting the first and second child, like this one by Jason Good. I love posts like that, but for this mom of three, as I'm reading them, something's missing. Hmmm...

If the second kid ever thinks they got the shaft, the reality is they were treated like a king compared to their younger sibling. Third (and beyond) kids are basically fending for themselves "Little House on The Prairie" style, chopping wood, changing their own diapers, eating dirt, and honing their survival skills by the ripe old age of two.

And before all the humorless people start screaming about neglect and blah blah blah Child Protective Services blah blah blah, listen. It's a fact that for ~~most~~ some people, as each kid arrives, a few more parenting standards fly out the window, until eventually they're so low that as long as the kids are fed and still alive at the end of every day, WE'RE GOOD.

I'm one of those people, and I'm fine with that. Especially because *SAP ALERT* the one thing my kids are never shafted on is love. Or a raving lunatic for a mother.

BIRTH

1st: In the weeks before birth, everyone eagerly anticipates baby's arrival, including the checkout lady at the grocery store. They call daily, and when you don't answer (because you're in the bathroom for THE NINETIETH TIME that day), they assume you're at the hospital. After the birth, everyone floods the hospital, and you try not to feel awkward when even the dry cleaner guy shows up with flowers.

2nd: The week before birth, immediate family and maybe your best friend call "just make sure you're still pregnant!" After the birth, said immediate family and a few friends show up at the hospital.

3rd: The day before your due date, your mom calls to ask if you've heard from your brother about the dates for the family vacation in a few months. At the hospital, you call people to tell them that the baby was born and they awkwardly say they thought you had him two months ago and have been meaning to come by.

BABYHOOD

1st: You remember most details about them as a baby, have fond memories of all these magical moments of bonding, gazing into each others' eyes, and tickling toes.

2nd: Vaguely recall some big moments. Like the time they puked in your face.

3rd: Have to look at baby pictures (the few you took) to even remember what they looked like or things you did with them.

FEEDING THEM SOLIDS

1st: Spoon feed them until they're two.

2nd: At age one, hand 'em the spoon, even if it means a bit more mess. I mean, what's another mess?

3rd: At 7 months - YOU'RE NOT FEEDING YOURSELF YET, KID? What the fuck, step it up! *Scatters puffs and wagon wheels on the highchair* Figure it out son- I have laundry to do!

MILESTONES

1st: Remember that he walked at 10 months and 17 days on XXX date, at 7:12 p.m. You even have it on video!

2nd: Vaguely recall that they walked sometime around 11 months. Feel guilty that you don't have it on video.

3rd: Uhhhh...???

SAFETY

1st: Is not allowed to sit on backless bar stool at the kitchen counter until age four.

2nd: Started sitting on it at three.

3rd: Fell off it 397 times before he turned two. (Wow, kids are shockingly sturdy!)

DIAPERS

1st: Totally on top of changing diaper every two hours or immediately after pooping.

2nd: Four hours is not too long to go in between (pee) diaper changes. The two-hour thing is just a ruse to sell more diapers! Oh you pooped? I'll change you after I finish eating.

3rd: When was the last time this kid's diaper was changed? Holy shit- your crap has dried to your butt cheeks! (How did I not smell that? Oh, that's right, the entire house now constantly smells like shit. And feet. And farts. The smell is ingrained in my nose. IT DOESN'T WASH OUT!)

CLOTHES

1st: Mainly new things, mixed in with hand-me-downs from friends and family.

2nd: Eighty-five percent hand-me-downs, only gets new clothes on birthdays and Christmas.

3rd: Looks like a refugee from a concentration camp.

FALLING DOWN

1st: Run over to kid while reminding yourself not to react so he doesn't feed off your reaction and flip out.

2nd: Without stopping what you're doing, ask, "Are you bleeding? No? You're okay."

3rd: Vaguely register hearing a thump; one of the other kids will come tell you if it's serious.

MEALTIMES

1st: Oh, you don't like that? Here, let's try something else! (Over and over.)

2nd: Oh, you don't like that? Um, you get one other option, and that's it.

3rd: Eat it or starve.

OR:

1st: No, no, you've only had three servings of vegetables today! One more and then you can have your seventh serving of fruit, silly boy!
2nd: A bag of fruits snacks and some chips for lunch? OKAY! I'll feed you really good at dinner! (Lie.)
3rd: A lollipop for lunch? Sure. Whatever. JUST DON'T SCREAM AGAIN!
Oh dear God I'm so tired. So. Emotionally. Drained.

WHEN PEOPLE ASK FOR GIFT IDEAS FOR YOUR KIDS

1st: Oh, he likes, X, Y, and Z, and would LOVE some more of P and Q! Thanks for asking!

2nd: Um, he's pretty much good, maybe some more X or Y, or even a gift card. (That you use to buy diapers with.)

3rd: HE DOESN'T NEED ANYTHING! WE HAVE ENOUGH GODDAMN TOYS! Oh, you have to get him something? *Sarcastic jazz hands* Get him socks and a new toothbrush! He doesn't care! He's two!
*I'm not ungrateful for gifts... well... most of them.

PUBLIC SAFETY

1st: Everyone at the park is a pedophile, everyone! (I'm looking at you, grandma who's knitting on the bench!) Good thing I can keep a laser beam eye on my one and only kid.

2nd: Everyone is still a pedophile, so stay together, kids! I can't watch both of you if you're in separate areas of the park, now can I? *Quickly responds to text message. Guiltily (not really) checks Facebook.*

3rd: Okay, the grandma's probably not a pedophile, nor that 8-months-pregnant woman whom my crawler is lapping, where's kid #1? Oh that's him yelling somewhere over my left shoulder about being a pirate. Do I hear #2? Yep, that's him yelling about his penis. "HEY, #3, get that dog crap out of your mouth!" What's happening on Twitter right now? Oh yay, a new Dadspin post!

SOCIALIZING

1st: Kid goes everywhere with you. People invite you over to their house and out to do stuff- just throw the kid in a carrier or stroller, good to go! Parenthood isn't gonna cramp my style!

2nd: Still get invited places, can only go about half the time- after nap time and must return home early to get them down for bedtime.

3rd: No one bothers inviting you over or out anymore because they know you can't go, and they don't want you at their house anyway because it's like inviting the insane clown circus over and that last time, your kid pulled his penis out of the top of his diaper and peed on their carpet (true story). Feel like you need to bring Xanax or giant bottle of booze for your hosts, to help them get through the function.

PLAYING WITH OTHER KIDS

1st. They hit or bite a kid or rip a toy out of a baby's hand for the first time, and the world implodes. Feel like the shittiest parent on earth, apologize profusely, cry, are crushed that you're now a complete social pariah and your kid is going to be a total loser that nobody invites over to play.

2nd: Feel awful the first time they hit or bite another kid or steal a toy, apologize profusely, know that you're a social pariah, but so's everyone else, really.

3rd: Hits or bites another kid or steals a toy, you look at the other mom with a wild-eyed look and exclaim, "What can I say? THEY'RE LIKE GODDAMN ANIMALS!"

COLLECTING THE MAIL

1st: Dart out while they're sleeping to get the mail, terrified that the house will catch on fire in the twelve seconds it takes to get to the mailbox or that you'll accidentally lock yourself out of the house.

2nd: Dart out and grab it while they're sleeping, feel good about "getting out of the house" for the day. Feel stupid after realizing that the house was never going to spontaneously combust, nor can you actually lock yourself out, anyway.

3rd: WHEN WILL THE FUCKING MAIL GET HERE SO I CAN WALK OUT OF THIS HOUSE AND GET A FEW SECONDS OF PEACE? "Hey kids, don't set the house on fire while I go get the mail!" Click your heels together as you jump off the porch steps. Wish that you could lock yourself out.

DRINKING
1st: Wow, I really feel like I need a glass of wine to relax after the day I had!
2nd: Can't wait to get to my half a bottle of wine tonight.
3rd: Will a bottle of wine be enough for me tonight? *Catches toddler vomit in cupped hands* I'm thinking no.

GOING TO THE GROCERY STORE
1st: Stroll through the aisles, naming every item to the baby who doesn't understand a word you're saying.
2nd: "Sit down!" "Don't touch that!" "NO, we are not buying a bag of lollipops, a bag of marshmallows, more fruit snacks, etcetera!" "HEY! Get back here!" "I said, don't touch that!"
3rd: The boys want to poke a handicapped woman in the check out area and run away? OH WELL, THEY'RE BEING ENTERTAINED. (True story, and it's not as bad as it sounds. You HAVE to read this old, old, old as dirt post of mine <---- click the link. It's from before you knew of my existence, is one of my favorites and is *now* way funny.)

SEE? Look at the holes in his pants, REFUGEE STYLE.