Sisterhood of the Screaming Diaper

Pie-der

2012-05-07T15:32:00.000-04:00

I'm not quite sure how it happened, but my youngest child (2) has discovered a new pastime that she seems to enjoy more than chocolate milk - making Mommy jump in fear. I know it might be frickin hilarious to a two-year old, but to me, it's ... Ok, it's still hilarious. What?

A few days ago, I saw a spider web on the ceiling. "Honey, don't move, but there's a spider web above you," I whispered to my boyfriend.

"What?" he yelled. Not a surprised Oh-my-fucking-God-I'm-creeped-out yell because he understood and realized he was in danger for his life or anything. No, he yelled because he's going deaf in one ear. (Or maybe because the TV was loud, and the girls were yelling next to his head and dancing. On him. They were supposed to be tickling Daddy, and got side-tracked by the music from the movie, but it looked more like a military blanket party (without the blanket) than a tickle-attack.) So I muted the movie, told the girls to quiet down, and whisper-yelled: "There is a SPIDER WEB ON THE CEILING!!" while I went in the kitchen. (To get sippy cups, not to view the web of death from a safe distance.)

"So?" And he doesn't move. You just don't realiE how close to death you are.

"You know what, never mind, I'll get it myself!" See what I get for saving his life? Then he tried to extoll the virtues of spiders, blah blah. Whatever.

"You know, a true gentleman would kill the spider for me," I yelled from the kitchen while I poured chocolate milk. When I came back to the living room, he had his head on the wall, and his hand (is that a Kleenex?) on my couch pillow. Where I lay my head! Oh God, the inhumanity! OMG! Did he just drop it?! On my COUCH?!?! "What the fuck?!" He walked in the bathroom and flushed the toilet (which is an "approved-by-me" method of spider-disposal) while I was still trying to make it throught the gate from the kitchen. I vomitted questions at him: "Why did you put it on my pillow? Are you sure you found it when you dropped it? Did you check the tissue before you flushed it? Are you sure you got the spider?" Great! Now I have no way to verify the spider is dead! "And why did you put your head on the wall?"

"I fell." Too many words.

"Where's the spider? Are you sure you flushed it?"

"Yes, I flushed it." Don't make me scream, you know you hate it when I scream. What-ever!

Ok, the spider is gone. Allegedly. No, it's really gone. How do I know? Because it has to be gone, that's why. Daffy (my youngest) ran up to me, and I picked her up, giving her relieved, happy-we're-both-alive kisses. We're safe from any and all deadly spiders for the moment. Because there can be only one.(Spider at a time, that is. Obviously.)

"Pie-der," my toddler said.

What? "What did you say, pumpkin?" That almost sounded like...

"Pie-der!"

"Oh my God, oh my fucking God! Where, pumpkin, where? Show Mommy the spider!"

I put her down so she could show me the spider. (And so I could see the floor better. Floors are prime spider real estate. She just said, "Nite-nite," and went in her room. I was dumbfounded. I just stared after her as she walked away, and I was just so astounded, I couldn't even say a word.

I turned around to see if 'Daddy-AKA-Contributor-of-the-Ornery-Gene' noticed is little drama, and saw her father laughing his ass off! Ass-wipe! It's not funny! Ok, yes it is....

And then she did it again today. While I'm making eggs for her breakfast, she starts yelling, "Pie-der!" then she laughed and laughed, while I'm frantically checking the ceilings, the floor, the countertops...

The Divisible Dog

2011-11-20T11:04:00.000-05:00

Some kids are whiny. And too easily upset. Case in point: a 4-going-on-14 year old girl. I routinely say normal things that cause sudden, unexpected crying fits in my "toddler pre-premenstrual" mini me. Seriously, what normal kid cries uncontrollably when their mom tells them to change clothes? She and I will start off with a normal conversation, then BAM! She sprials into a whiny, teary, crybaby, seemingly out of the blue! She might as well turn into a diaper - leaky and full of shit.

A few weeks ago, she's coloring with her (mess-proof, dry-erase) markers quietly, creating a Crayola masterpiece, when she decided that her butterfly picture needed a dog. She informed me of this, and I gave her the obvious answer: "Well, draw a dog, then."

But that wasn't good enough: "Picture me a dog, Mommy!" she told me.

"No, pumpkin, I'm not a good 'picture-er.' Why don't you ask Daddy?"

"Daddy, can you picture me a dog?"

Daddy had been engrossed in TV, and therefore did not get the license plate of the bus he was thrown under - "What?"

"Daddy, the butterflies need a dog! Can you picture me a dog?"

I can be helpful...sometimes. "She wants you to draw a picture of a dog."

"No, I can't draw a dog." Then there were tears, and quiet whimpers, and sniffles... "What the hell is she crying about now?" Which, ironically, is the same phrase he uses every time I say something that sets her off. Well this time, babe, it's you!

"She wants you to draw her a dog to go with her butterflies." At this point, I'm just relieved it's not me making her cry.

"Fine!" and he waves the marker around over the marker board. "There you go."

She dries her eyes, and asks, "But where is the dog, Daddy?"

"It's an invisible dog. There you go!"

"But I don't want a divisible dog! Mommy!" she wailed, as I'm trying to smother my giggles in my T-shirt. Damn, that's impressive! I'm super jealous, I never would have thought of an invisible dog! "Mommy, it's not funny!"

"Okay, okay, honey, give it here." and I drew a lopsided dog, and she was happy. For about a minute: "Mommy, draw me a kitty cat!"

"How about I draw an invisible cat?" Aaaannnddd ... cue the tears .... there they are!

"No, Mommy! I don't want an invisible kitty!" with more tears. Quiet whimpers. Sniffles. So I drew her a cat. A strangely dog-like cat. But, of course, not as cool as an invisible anything.

And then her dad set her off by saying, "Invisible dog," more to himself than to her, but she heard him. More tears. Quiet whimpers. Sniffles. "Invisible dog" is now the Pavlovian bell for tears.

I tried to head off that crazy train at the pass and sent her to get her sippy cup, and she perked right up, and went to find her sippy cup. Whew! Thank you, short attention span. Until the next crisis, whatever-it-is, occurs to spiral her into "Toddler Pre-Premenstrual" psycho. Again.

Her two year old sister is evidently not immune from the TPPMS, either. The baby came out from her room yesterday morning, and I do what I do every morning - I told her to go get her sippy cup. Ironically, sippy cup must translate into baby language as "scream, cry, and flail about like a fish on dry land." Another Pavlovian bell?

I, of course, had to test my theorum: "Sippy cup." Scream, cry, and flail about. "Sippy cup." Scream, cry, and flail about. Really? "Sippy." Scream, cry, and flail about. "Cup." Scream, cry, and flail about. Hmph. It must be synoymous with both words.

Her dad walked out of kitchen. "What's wrong with her?"

"Watch this - sippy cup." Scream, cry, and flail about.

"Why's she crying, though?"

"Beats me. Sippy cup." Scream, cry, and flail about. "See, every time. Sippy cup." Scream, cry, and flail about.

I went to start breakfast, and I heard, "Sippy cup." Scream, cry, and flail about.

I yelled from the kitchen, "Invisible dog!" Nothing. Hmmm. Then, "Sippy cup!" Scream, cry, and flail about. Well, at least her grasp of the English language seems to be improving. "Hungry?"

She stopped screaming. "Yeah," she told me in her cute little baby voice.

"Go get your sippy cup, then."

"Okay," and she went to go get her sippy cup.

Hmm. Hungry must be an "anti-cry" Pavolvian word. An anitdote for TPPMS. Pamprin in verbal form. It's good to know. Maybe someday there'll be a cure.

Even Hell-Spawn Have To Sleep Sometime

2011-11-13T11:36:00.002-05:00

Well, my fantastic, peaceful "golden days" of bringing order out of the living room chaos are officially gone, flushed down the toilet like the shit and toothbrushes flushed by my youngest mini-me, or "Spawn" as I (lovingly) think of her. I know the "terrible twos" are supposed to be bad, but never, and I do mean NEVER has any of my offspring been this downright ... ornery. It all started a few weeks ago...

My youngest child, 2, figured out how to get over the gate in her room. I might have mentioned this, but it bears mentioning again - she made it over (and under) the gate, so we decided to take it down. Seriously, what's the purpose of having a gate if everyone (including the dog) can get over it? At that point, it becomes a "hurdle" not a gate, so why make a game of it? But ever since we took it down, the littlest...monster has been causing chaos. (Side note: she won't answer to her name, or turn to look when I call her, but if I say, "crazy," she comes running. It's because somewhere in her toddler brain, she knows that the word "crazy" now has her picture next to it in the dictionary. And her name in the thesaurus as a synonym.)

She has decided that since she can get into the living room, it's her room now - her TV (Get off the TV stand!) her couch (That's my chair child, move over!) her side table (Leave my phone alone!) her pillows (Get my pillows off the floor!) ... everything! "Daphne, blankets don't belong on the floor! And stop jumping on the couch!"

She's sly, too. One morning, I was sitting on the couch, and she was sitting in her dad's chair, staring at the remotes and other "do-not-touch" items sitting on the table beside the couch. I noticed that she was staring at my coffee cup specifically. I told her a resounding, firm, "No!" while pointing at the coffee cup, and went back to reading. I saw movement out of the corner of my eye, and she was leaning over my cup with her mouth on the rim, poised, like she was preparing to take a drink without picking up the cup. "No, Daphne!" and she leaned back, giggled, and sat/jumped down in the chair. I went back to my book.

A minute later, I saw movement again, jerk my head around, and there she is, poised for a drink again: "No, Daphne, Mommy's cup. Your cup is right here! Drink your own drink." And she sat back down, laughed loudly, and waited. Yes, I knew she was waiting, because I was waiting, too. I pretended to start reading again, and sure-as-shit, she moved closer to the coffee cup. I looked up just as she had her mouth open to take a drink... I was just starting my rant, (Get away from ...) when I saw a glob of baby spit fall in my coffee cup. Fuck! She caught a glimpse of my face and she laughed. At me! I'd like to believe she didn't do it on purpose, but that child is just plain ornery. And if that time wasn't on purpose, the six times since then that she's spit in my cup HAS been! Ornery, I tell you! And she just loves tormenting me.

I got home from work a few days ago, and found my charging cords (Blackberry, iPad, etc) in the living room stretched out toward the middle of the floor. Son of a bitch! She must have woken up early (Daylight savings time can bite my big red ass!) slipped out to the living room, and wreaked holy havoc on all forbidden items: throwing pillows and blankets on the floor, spilling leftover cups on the side table, and chewing on my cords. I looked at the iPad charger, didn't see anything bent, so I plugged it in. 'Not charging?!' WTF?

So, since Mommy is crafty (like her Hell-spawned daughter, where exactly do you think she got it from?) I pull out the spare charger that I had bought a few weeks ago when she first developed an interest in the cords and I charged my precious iPad. All was well, until I left the room to make lunch. Where did the little shit go? Straight to my charger and started chewing on the cord. Mother fucker! By the time I made it back through the other gate, she'd demolished that one too and ran to her room, laughing like a hyena on crack!

You know what? You are not going to win, child! You will not outsmart me! As God as my witness, I will never be iPad-less again! And I refuse to be out-maneuvered by a two-year-old! I ordered a spare charger on Amazon, and got the girls ready to go shopping. "Now, we're going to get Mommy a charger for her iPad, but if you're good in the store, Pumpkin, we'll stop at McDonald's on the way home, ok?" Maybe I could get some hairspray, and mittens for the girls while we're there...

I parked, walked up the door, and put the baby in the first available clean cart, where she immediately tried to stand up: "Sit down, Daphne!" and I sat her on her butt, took off her coat, and turned to take off Diana's coat...

And she stood up again. Well, I'll fix your little wagon! I buckled her in the cart. I love the seat belts for grocery carts. Greatest. Invention. Ever!

She immediately started screaming at the top of her lungs, squirming in her seat and trying to escape from the belted monster that held her to the cart seat, unable to make a single mess in a warehouse full of breakable items. Nothing I did made her stop, nothing I gave her appeased her, and I wasn't about to unbelt her - she's a runner, and with two girls to watch over, there's no way I'd catch her while towing a cart and another child. Fuck this noise! And fuck these seta belts! She'll just have to get used to the buckle. My other daughter (quietly standing with her hands over her ears) decided that now was the perfect time to pull out her "Captain Obvious" impersonation: "Mommy, the baby's crying!"

"I know, sweetie, I can hear her! C'mon, let's get you in the cart, too."

So I let let the baby scream. All the way through the grocery area (which might have been slightly enlarged) the clothing area (also magically six times the normal size) the seasonal areas (so many fucking seasons! Worse than Angry Birds!) while she's screaming bloody murder at the top of her lungs, banging herself around the cart like she's having a seizure, trying frantically to escape, while my preschooler is sitting in the storage area of the cart with her hands over her ears. Ah, thank you God, there's electronics! "Excuse me miss, where are the iPad accessories? The iPad accessories. The iPad accessories! I NEED A CHARGER FOR MY IPAD!"

She pointed me on my way, and ran for the hills, because evidently screaming babies clear out the immediate area quicker that the raunchiest fart. Ok, I found the charger, now where in the fuck did the cashier go? There!

We were rung up ("I'm sorry, do you have any tissues? Tissues! KLEENEX OR TISSUES?! There's some. RIGHT THERE! Thank you. THANK YOU!") I paid, and darted for the door like I'd shoplifted something and the fuzz was on my heels. Or like a screaming baby was following me. Seven minutes from entrance to exit, and it still was the longest fricken seven minutes of my life so far! And yes, that includes all my labors put together. In a quiet moment (she's still an air-breather, at least until she returns to the mother-ship at puberty) I heard one of the shoppers say that someone needed a nap. Abso-fucking-lutely! Can you watch them while I sleep? Although in retrospect, she might have meant the snot-nosed screamer that was currently river-dancing my last nerve.

So, I got my charger, the screaming alien fell asleep in the car, my preschooler got Mickey Dee's, and everyone was happy. For about a minute.

This morning I got home and found her asleep on the floor in the living room, covered with MY blanket, using MY pillow, with MY iPad cuddled underneath her ... with the screen protector crumpled in a ball at her feet. Well, shit! Now I have to go shopping again...

Escape!

2011-10-15T16:34:00.001-04:00

Yesterday is a day that will forever live in my memory as the day my youngest daughter slipped her leash, caused mass chaos and hysteria, yelling and screaming (it wasn't just me either) and pretty much freaked Mommy the fuck out – she made it over the gate several times. (And under twice.) Let me back up and explain:

I might have mentioned once or twice that my youngest children reside in “The Gated Community," with toys, TV, dress-up dresses, and dolls. Many times a day, I hear "pitter-patter" footsteps followed by high-pitched girl squeals that pierce my brain like little sonar ice picks. (Wielded by angry leprechauns. On steroids.) And like an expensive residential community, the Gated Community is exclusive (population 2) and requires committee approval to enter (our criteria is simply anyone under three-and-a-half feet tall) but it's also sort of like a prison in that they’re not supposed to escape. They get time outside (or, “outside recreation”-slash-“living room time”) for good behavior, and put back in “behind bars” for bad behavior.

I had (kind of) suspected for a few weeks that something big was up because she’d been really nice and well-behaved. She must have been planning her “Andy Defresne” escape (kissing ass as she made headway on her escape: she “crawled through a river of shit and came out clean on the other side." Well, technically, she only crawled twice - she climbed the other 115 times. And there was no shit, just so everyone's clear on that, it was just a quote from a movie.)

I just … wasn’t expecting the tantrums and a sudden lack of holding facility THAT day. I'm not ready, dammit! I haven't child-proofed the living room, or fixed the door handle in the bathroom, nothing! She had free reign for her terror spree!

She made it out of the room first thing in the morning, just as I was finishing up with the dogs. I covered my suprise with a "Well, hello there!" greeting, then continued our morning ritual: diaper change, highchair, fill dog dishes, etc. I fed her a huge breakfast (hoping that food would make her forget, or that it was a total fluke) and put her back in her room. She usually calmly walks over, sits down, and starts watching TV, but not that day - she started throwing a hissy fit, falling to the floor (gently, because she threw herself down on the hardwood floor once, and she's more careful now) screaming in octaves that made the dog wince the whole while like she'd lost a finger. After ascertaining that all of her digits were in fact intact and not severed, I went back the living room and waited.

And then she arrived, bursting into the living room like she'd never seen civilation and had absolutely no idea how to react to "no-no" items. She wasn't raised by wolves, dammit! She has sat quietly one point or another, I'm pretty sure... But that day it was like King Kong and the scryscraper - she was hitting/smashing/grabbing/jumping on stuff, followed by my "No, Daphne!" yell, then laughter (hers) and hitting/smashing/grabbing/jumping on stuff again, followed by a smack on her (diapered) bottom, then screaming and crying (mine and hers.) Rinse, lather, repeat. Where are the airplanes and the army when you need them? King Kong has possessed my precious baby girl! She never throws fits like this!

After she went over the gate a few times, I raised it, creating a small space underneath that I didn't think she could fit through. And I was right. Kind of. She tried to climb the gate, couldn't get her leg up to it, and promptly "threw" herself to the ground (carefully) and then suddenly noticed the opening. I was watching from the hallway, and she flipped over like an Olympic gymnist and slid right underneath, slick as snot. Well, until her head got stuck - then she screamed bloody murder! I slid her back INTO the room (all the while telling her that this is why girls shouldn't go underneath gates) and as soon as I stopped actively sliding her in, she started sliding back underneath. Yep, her head got stuck again. I bitched at her some more while I un-hooked the gate, slid her into her room, and re-attached the gate. She was still screaming (in anger) so I left, but as soon as she realized she couldn't fit "under" she tried "over" and escaped again.

But I can honestly say it was a difficult day for both of us since my honey was at work, I had little to no sleep, and OH MY GOG! SHE'S HITTING MY TV! And that was the final straw! It's a plasma on a stand, and if it falls and hits her head... Well, let's just say she'd be eating mushy food for life and I'd be changing her adult diapers until I die! I smacked her bottom harder this time, but she laughed at me again. Well, that's it! So the rest of the afternoon was spent standing at the gate or near the gate, telling her no and putting her back. I have got to get her potty-trained so these spankings actually hurt! Spanking her with a diaper on is like hitting King Kong in the head with a feather.

I couldn't believe that my entire day off was spent corraling her (corral, another good analogy - she was like an unbroken stallion, bucking 'authority') into one place or another or away from one place or another. By the time her dad got home, I was exhausted. And I suddenly knew exactly what her Nonna does all day when she has her.

See, their grandma keeps them often, but the youngest always wears her out and gets picked up before bed. I know why too: her poor Nonna chases her constantly for 10 plus hours, and by the time we get her home, they're both (Grandma and Grandchild) just worn the fuck out. I tell her and tell her, gates are a Godsend, but she was raised in an earlier time (I guess when Parents were Parents and spanked their children like it was a religion, and we, I mean they, minded and did what what they're told at Grandma's house.) After coming home, my youngest usually takes two steps into her room and then falls to the ground, sleeping where she lands. And no, I don't move her. I let sleeping babies lie, if you know what I mean. And I bet Nonna does something similar at her house after we leave.

I'd like to say we're now going to civilize her and get her teach her how to act when she's been "freed" instead of allowing her to run willy-nilly wherever in the fuck she wants to go, screaming and throwing tantrums at will, but I'm not that adult, because I want her out of my shit! I'm shopping for new (taller, better, un-climb-able) gates next week. In the meantime, I asked Nonna what she does when the baby throws a fit. She told me she sits her in the highchair and gives her a snack, or an activity to do, or a popsicle.

Now wait just a fucking minute: she throws a fit and you give her something FUN to do? Ok, this rampaging animal just might not be my fault. But I do know how to fix it, by God! And it starts with "potty-training" and ends with screaming (hers, not mine!)

The Know-It-All

2011-10-09T04:25:00.001-04:00

I should write a book: Stupid-Ass Conversations With A Four Year Old "Know-It-All." I could make millions, maybe get a TV show. Or a sanity check. SACWAZAFYOKIA. It even has a (somewhat) snazzy acronym, I can picture SACWAZAFYOKIA plastered across billboards everywhere, with people saying, "Sack was a eff why o'kia?" Catchy, huh? Now just try getting that shit out of your head. Go ahead. I'll wait.

I may be the "queen of the catch-phrase" (even though I'm self-crowned) and I even have a couple that I pass on to my employees when dealing with idiots (specifically, You should never have a battle of wits with an unarmed person, and If you argue with an idiot, passers-by might be unable to tell the difference between the two of you) You would think I would remember that when dealing with my stubborn clone, the fruit of my loins. I'd like to think I'm "arming" her for any future "battle of wits," teaching her a calm method for disagreements. I know in my heart it's not true though, because she drags me into a pointless conversation (that quickly pisses me off) nearly every day:

Me: What do you want for breakfast?

Her: Hot dogs and ketchup and cheese!

Me: Hot dogs aren't a breakfast food, what breakfast food do you want for breakfast? Cereal? (No) Oatmeal? (No) Peanut butter toast? (No) Yogurt? (No) Cereal? (No) Well, what do you want, because you can't have hot dogs?

Her: Grapes!

Me: Grapes are only part of breakfast, what else do you want?

Her: Hot dogs and ketchup and cheese!

(For brevity's sake, just imagine this conversation repeated about three times before she decides on cereal. With milk. And a napkin.)

The only time breakfast is (relatively) easy is when we have pop tarts. Both the "know-it-all" and her sister will eat chocolate pop tarts without question, I don't even have to run down the list of available (AKA nutritional) breakfast foods, just slap a pop tart on their plates and call it a day, and honestly, I adore pop tarts for that reason alone. Viva la Kellogs!

Yesterday, I let the dogs outside while her dad got her breakfast, since he had to hurry and take them to Nonna and Poppa's house. What did she have for breakfast, you may ask? Yep, hot dogs. I nearly had kittens in the kitchen, I was so pissed. He (of course) didn't understand why I was "upset."

"Why am I upset? You have no fricking idea the battles we go through in the mornings over what she'll eat for breakfast! Every. Fucking. Day!"

"I asked her what she wanted for breakfast and she told me hot dogs, so I got her hot dogs. She's eating it, problem solved. What's the big deal?" And I told him we needed to watch Bill Cosby sing about chocolate cake (and we will watch it. Soon) before he would understand the daily fucked-up arguments my daughter and I engage in over truly inconsequential stuff. Like hot dogs for breakfast. And "nicknames that she likes" versus "nicknames that she hates so much she cries." And other various miscellaneous bullshit topics.

If you ever see an adult woman and a toddler walking down the street arguing over the color of the grass, I would be the one (pulling my hair out) telling her the grass was green, while she would be the one disagreeing with me and telling me it looked brown to her (lack of rainfall, what can I say?) And we're still working on her colors - for reference, you might remember the "turquoise is a shade of blue" conversation I mentioned in a previous post... and now I think I'll hate turquoise forever just on principle. It "worx" for me! Of course, my mother tells me she acts just like I did when I was a child, but she's full of shit! I never did half these things, because I was a well-behaved child, dammit!

I'm seriously trying to prepare my little mini-me for school - you can't argue with the teachers like that, they tend to get pissed. We've gone through mostly everything else: we've hit the (capital and small) ABC's, (mostly) nailed colors and shapes, memorized sight words, and we're ... (somewhat) finished with potty-training. All that's left for her to learn (other than the whole do-not-fucking-argue-with-Mommy rule) on her list of shit-your-child-must-know-or-we'll-call-you-a-bad-parent is 1) tying her shoes (Velcro is both a blessing and a curse) 2) her address and 3) her telephone number.

And this is where shit falls down: we don't have a home phone, only cell phones. I think we fall in the majority of households now-a-days that ONLY use cell phones. I mean seriously, what's the point of a house phone? Bill collectors? I have a cell phone that shows caller ID, I can silence that shit! Marketing call? Fuck you, telemarketer, I'm not answering! Friends and family just send me a text or email me on my smart phone. When you can carry your "personal" phone with you practically anywhere, why do I need a home phone again? So someone can call and wake me up in the middle of my day-slash-sleep-cycle? I don't think so!

Oh yeah, it's because my pre-schooler needs to memorize it before she starts school. I think this is a capitalist conspiracy to make us all spend $50 extra dollars a month so our kindergartner has a number to memorize. Even if I had a home phone, I wouldn't fucking answer it - everyone has my cell number if they really need to talk to me, and anyone else can go fuck themselves. Right? All of the (older) kids have cell phones, the adults (and I use that term loosely, Mr. "Hot dog" man! Wait... anyway) have cell phones.

My mom brought up a good point, though: "What if she needs to dial 9-1-1?"

"What? She's never alone, why would she need to dial 911? She can learn that shit later."

"When you were three, you called 911," she told me. "Don't you remember?"

"No, I ... Wait, I do remember something - I remember playing with Granny's phone when I was about three, and seeing the numbers 9-1-1 printed on the face of the phone, and then pressing the numbers, but when someone started talking, I hung up. Granny was pissed because they sent police to her door, and then everyone was upset with me. That's really all I remember. It was the house she lived in when I was three. Did you teach me that or something? And how is that story supposed to encourage me to get a house phone exactly?"

"Nope, I was only 20, I didn't think about teaching you shit like that when I was younger. Well, that explains it then! I've wondered for years how you knew to call 911 when your babysitter died, but now I guess I know."

"What?! No, I don't remember a babysitter dying AT ALL! When was this? What happened?"

"When you were about three and a half, your babysitter died while she was babysitting you. You're sure you don't remember it?" If I'm the queen of catch-phrases, she's the queen of understatement-of-the-fucking-year.

"Uh, no, I don't. I called 911? Seriously? I don't remember a babysitter dying while I was there. What the hell happened?"

And she told me the story: I had gone to the babysitters house like normal, but that morning, the babysitter had asked my mom to pack me a lunch because she wasn't feeling well. Then around ten in morning, my mom got a call from the police, who were at the babysitters house with me. All the information she had about what happened was from me (and three is not really considered a reliable age for factual story-telling) and what little the police told her. I guess I had walked to the store around the corner to get the babysitter aspirin, but she didn't wake up when I got back. I called 911, but she was already dead by the time the police and ambulance arrived. My mom didn't know why she died (they never told her) but the police officers were very impressed with the three year old (me) who called the police. My mom was much less than impressed with the woman sending her precious three year old (me still) to the store to buy aspirin, but there was nothing she could really do about it, since the lady was already dead. Seriously, what was she going to do, fire her? I guess the police even gave us a ride home after putting her bicycle in the trunk.

"You don't remember her dying at all?"

"Nope. Not even a smidgen. Just what I told you about what happened at my great-grandma's house."

"Huh, I thought you'd be scarred for life, but I guess not. Anyway, you should probably teach Diana how to call 911. You just never know."

Well played, Mom, well played. (Grandma -1, Mommy Already Knows It All - 0) Great, now I have to get a home phone. Shit! Anyone know a cheap home phone service?

The Right Path

2011-10-02T12:37:00.000-04:00

I went to pick up the boys at their dad's house yesterday, and my little mini-me decided that she wanted to come with me "to the brudders house" as she calls it. They live a short 30 minute drive away, so I get some good music time (and talking time) with the munchkin if I take her along. We discuss rhyming words, and numbers, and philosophy (stranger danger, the benefits of doing what Mommy tells you do to, and my tried-and-true favorite: how much she likes/hates pizza and has always liked/hated pizza at any given moment.) And no road trip would be complete without singing chick songs (Lady Gaga is currently her favorite, but P!nk is a close second.)

She has a new stuffed animal she's carting around, and of course she had to bring it with her: "Snak-ee wants to come to pick up the brudders, too."

"Ok, bring 'Snak-ee' with you," I tell her. Anything to get her moving, I'm going to hit traffic, FCS! I finally got her in the car, and she told me that snak-ee needs buckled in too. "Well, snakes don't usually get seat belted, pumpkin. Just get your seat belt on, and Snakee can sit on your lap." I helped her with her belt (while she's bitching about 'Pumpkin' - "My name is not pumpkin Mommy, it's Diana!") then went around to start the car.

As I slid into the seat, I heard a *click* sound. "Got it!" she told me, and sure enough, the stuffed snake is secure in the middle seat in a seat belt. I'm buckling you in why? I thought to myself. If you can buckle the snake in, you can buckle yourself in! Whatever it takes, we're finally off.

She's usually particular about what music she wants to listen to, and she's absolutely not shy about voicing what's on her mind: "Mommy, make the music louder! Snak-ee wants to sing!"

"That's as loud as I'm putting it, my eardrums will explode!"

"You're ear-strums will explode Mommy?" she asked me with wide eyes. (Although I could barely hear her over the music.)

"Just sing your song, pumpkin."

"My name is not pumpkin, it's Diana!"

She has recently developed a dislike of nicknames in her strange pre-school brain. So of course, I have to use them at every opportunity, while she unknowingly evens the score with her loud singing: "You and me could write a bad romance!" screamed at the top of her lungs doesn't sound as great as you'd think. And I like that song! Or should I say 'liked.' No matter how much you enjoy a song, 1000 times later, it doesn't evoke the same joy, especially when performed by a four-year-old diva. Thankfully, she doesn't really understand the words, some of the songs she likes have words I really don't want her singing in public. Or in front of Nonna.

After her three songs are done, I turn it to the radio, and my little mini-me protests with, "I don't like this song, Mommy."

"I like this song, Pumpkin... Now don't cry, sweetie! Big girls don't cry, the song says so!" Ha! Take that! It's pouring on the highway, and I could easily hydroplane. If I go down, I'm doing it to MY music, not hers.

"My name is Diana, not sweetie! And sometimes big girls do cry, when girls' mommies play songs big girls don't like!" I swear she's going to grow up to be an attorney or something, the way she likes to argue. And she starts singing the rain song: "Rain, rain go away, come again some udder day...It's raining, it's pouring, the man in da moon is snoring, he had a cold when he went to bed, and didn't get up in the morning...rain, rain, go away, come again some udder day..." So I turned up my music to drown out her rain song...

We got to the town where my ex-husband lives, but their town was having a festival, which evidently can be held no fucking where else but the middle of their main thoroughfare, right through downtown! It's not like there's a second highway through here, assholes! You've blocked them all by blocking three roads! This ain't my first 'go round' on this festival merry-go-round though, and by now I know the ways to get around the 'main drag' close-out. I turned down a different road, with my munchkin still singing her 'rain song' while I'm cursing (fluently and loudly - what else did you think the loud music was for?) as I hit one-way streets one after another, all heading in the wrong direction. Yes, my ex moved to a town designed by a blind non-driving one-way-street-loving idiot, who evidently decided that closing all the roads around downtown twice a year would ensure that no one evet could leave. I think his last name was Stepford or something.

Then she stoped singing: "Mommy, I think that you are on the wrong path!"

Spiritually or physically, Pumpkin? "Listen, my little backseat-driver-wannabe, I know how to get to your brothers' house!" Grumble grumble... Now four-year-olds want to tell me how to drive! "Are you going to tell me how slow I'm going next?"

"What did you say, Mommy? I don't know any of these places, Mommy, this is the wrong way. Are you lost, Mommy? Snak-ee says this is not the right path, too."

"I've lost something pumpkin, but we're not lost. Just sing your song, we're almost there!" (And that fucking snake is going to kiss pavement soon, I can tell.) It's raining, it's pouring, the man in the moon is snoring.. "Diana, where did you hear that song?" I asked her when it had finally got to be too annoying, even for me.

"Little Bear sings it when it's raining, and it makes the rain go away... This is the right path, Mommy! This is the way to the brudders' house! There it is!"

"Yes, I know, sweetie," I told her, and stopped in front of my ex-husband's house. The boys got in the car (while she's loudly complaining, 'My name is not sweetie, it's Diana!') and started arguing right away. Evidently, my youngest was having a bad day, but didn't want to talk about it. Fabulous! "Diana, sing the rain song for the boys!"

"Rain, rain, go away, come again some udder day," she sings at the top of her lungs.

I drove away to a slew of Mooom! Make her stop! and I told them the facts: "Stop arguing, or I'll have her serenade us all the way home!"

My 16-year old not only 'gets it' right away, he 'gets around it' by flipping on the CD to her songs, so she stops the rain song and starts with 'Poker Face.' Peachy! At least the arguing stops, and then my oldest son directs me to another way to avoid the downtown blockage. And before you ask, no it's not quicker than the way we came in, but he's going to be driving soon, and if he wants me to go another way, I will. A good navigator is not born, he's made, and I've been trying to train this one for years. The one in the back seat, however...

"Mommy, are you lost again?"

"I wasn't lost before, and ... no, pumpkin, only my sanity is lost."

"I am not Pumpkin, I am Diana!"

"Just sing your song, alright?" Russian roulette is not the same without a gun... I think I'm on the right path...

It's The Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown! (AKA The Miracle Baby)

2011-09-27T10:34:00.001-04:00

I was talking to my mother the other day, and she mentioned she had been reading my posts (and strangely, wasn't upset.) She said that she remembered when all these things I write about happened, and that one of her co-workers was impressed with the lie about boys that didn't eat vegetables turning into girls, and thought it was super-creative. "You remember that?" I asked her, and she also remembered something else - it worked. "Wow, you're right, I totally forgot that it worked! They ate all kinds of vegetables for months!" She also mentioned that in the post about our telephone conversations, I had left one out, and asked me to tell it because it was so funny. And so I am, the funny parts, and the not-so-funny parts.

I was pregnant with my first child. I was in the military, eight hours away from my entire family, recently married, and a little worried. Any of you with kids, you remember when you (or your wife) went into labor, right? I don't think I'll ever forget...

I had cleaned like a fiend the night before, and woke up at 6am with painful cramps. I called into my platoon sergeant to tell him that I thought it was time, and that I wasn't going to be there at 7:30, and he said, "You've said that at least once a week for the last four weeks!"

"Yeah, but this time, I think this is really it! My due date was two days ago, and..."

"Yeah, yeah, I don't want the details, just go into OBGYN sick hall after lunch. Let me know what they say," he told me. Guys are the same everywhere, even in the miltary: they don't really want to hear the gory details. "If you're not in labor, I expect you in this afternoon." Such a sweetie, right? To be fair, I had gone into premature labor at least four times.

I re-folded the baby clothes, re-packed my hospital bag, took two or three showers, and killed about four hours. The labor pains weren't stopping, this is it, I just know it! And it didn't even hurt as bad as I had heard! I was going to breeze through this labor thing!

Well, my husband was working, so I tried to call my mom, who didn't answer. I wanted my mom! Crap! Now what? Then I remembered my Grandma, an experienced 'birth-type-person' who had six kids - she would be able to tell me exactly what the fuck was going on, and more importantly, she would be home. It was almost eleven, so she should also be up by now. She answered, and I asked her how to time contractions. She told me to time from the start of one contraction to the start of another, so I got my stopwatch, and started timing them. "The last one was twelve minutes," I told her.

"Twelve minutes?" she asked me, chomping her gum in the background.

"Yep. What's that mean?" I asked. Not that I was worried or anything. Aren't they supposed to be closer together, though?

"Well, we have to time more than one to find out how far from delivering you are," she told me. So we talked for a while, about how I was sure it was a boy, even though the doctor thought it was a girl. She told me about how when she was pregnant for her twins, one was lodged, and she went into premature labor at seven months and her water leaked, but since they were lodged, she wouldn't deliver until the lower one was moved, so she just 'labored' for three and half more weeks on bed rest to give them a better chance. (I wasn't really worried for me, I could do three and a half weeks of this standing on my head! This shit was easy! All that stuff I'd heard about labor must have been about wimps or something.) The next contraction came along and it was ten minutes from the last one. She told me since it was my first, it would probably be a while. I told her the contractions didn't really hurt. She laughed (a lot) and told me labor hurt, and I should just remember to breathe.

We got off the phone, and I called the hospital. They told me to come in after one, but not to drive myself, but said that I could wait until after three when my husband got off of work. I went ahead and called the dispatcher to try and get a message to my husband to come straight home after work, instead of stopping at the PX as he had intended. The dispatcher had just had a baby not too long ago, and after exchanging symptoms, she promised to give him the message. "It's still early, I don't want to go to the hospital yet, so he doesn't need to leave work. Just tell him not to stop anywhere, ok?" she agreed.

I hung up the phone, and it rang almost right away. It was my aunt, my mom's sister. Grandma must have called her. She was also an experienced "birther," because she'd had both of her kids naturally with no pain medicine. I told her it might be too soon, since it didn't really hurt yet, and she told me, "If it doesn't hurt yet, don't worry, it will. I'm not going to lie and tell you it doesn't hurt, because it does. And I'm not going to tell you that you'll forget all about it when you hold the baby, either - that's total bullshit. What I will tell you is that it's a bearable pain. It's going to hurt like a bitch, but you will get through it." The most memorable words spoken, one's I've treasured in the many years since, the many kids since.

I got off the phone with my aunt, and the phone rang AGAIN. This time it was my mom. And as soon as I heard her voice, I wanted to cry, so instead I yelled: "Why didn't you answer the fucking phone!" All of a sudden, I wasn't 21, I was five!

"I was grocery shopping! I didn't know you'd go into labor! How're you doing? Is it hurting really bad?"

"Fine, the pain's about a two on a scale of one to ten, and I've been timing my contractions, which is why I called you to begin with, but Grandma told me how. But how close together should the contractions be when I go to the hospital?"

"Honey, I don't know how to time contractions, or when to go to the hospital. I had you and your brother cesaerian, remember?"

"Yeah, but you were in labor for me for a while, when did you decide to go to the hospital?"

"I was seventeen, and I don't remember much about the labor, I went to the hospital when your grandma told me to ... What's that sound in the background? Is that the TV?"

"No, the TV's off. It sounds like sirens. Must be something going on on post," I told her. The sirens were getting louder, I'd started to hear them when she called. That's not... it couldn't be! "Mom, it could be my husband, I left a message for him to come home after work..." By this time, the sirens were so loud I could't hear anything on the phone. They had to be close by, maybe right outside my door... Then the sirens stopped: "Mom, I might have to let you go, it sounds like my husband's here."

Just then, my husband burst through to door, like Kramer from Seinfeld. Through the open door behind him, I could see red and blue flashes. "You ready to go?" he asked me. "Where's your bag?"

"You're a little early. Wait, why are you still wearing your weapon? Well, go upstairs and change, it's going to be a long night, you might as well be comfortable," I told him, but my husband is still staring at me, standing in the same spot. "Hold on, Mom... Ok, what did dispatch tell you?"

"That you were in labor and I needed to come straight here."

"Shit, you needed to come straight here after work, not now! Dammit! (into the phone:) Mom, it looks like I'm going to the hospital now... (to my husband:) What are you waiting for, you might as well change clothes. You don't want to go to the hospital wearing your BDU's, do you?"

"But I'm here to pick you up."

"Yeah, I got that! Just go change, please?"

Just then, his partner walked in. "Uh, did you lock your door?" he asked my husband.

"Yeah, why? Did you?"

"Yep. The keys are still in it, too." I could see the lights still going. Fucking great. Well, I wanted to take my car anyway, I'm not going to the hospital in a fucking squad car, nuh-uh, not happening! It's like a bad episode of Cops! And what if my water breaks in the car? I'd never live it down!

"Mom, I've got to go, my husband's partner locked the keys in the car with the lights on and the car running and I think he needs the phone. I love you, I'll call you later, OK?" I asked my husband's partner if he needed to use the phone but he said, no, he'd already radioed for someone to come out with a Slim-Jim to unlock the door. My husband went upstairs to change and I grabbed my overnight bag and I was ready. "Do you want me to leave to the door unlocked for you?" I asked his partner as we're walking out the door. "You could just lock it when you leave," but he declined, and sat on the porch while we took off. After this travesty of prepared-ness, I had better fucking be in labor! I bitched the whole trip about fucked up communications, and my husband hit every fucking bump in the road.

We go to the hospital, and they hooked my up to beeping machines, and told me that yes, I was in labor (pain three on a scale of one to ten) and to walk around the hospital. "Ok, thanks, but I'm going home," I told the nurse. "I just wanted to make sure I was actually in labor." She asked me why, and I told her: "I can walk at home, and if it's going to be a while, I want something to eat, something besides ice chips to drink, and I want to smoke. Will I get any of that here? I didn't think so." So we left, and went back home. I asked her before we left when I would know it was time to come back, and she told me when my water broke, or when it hurt too bad. Ok, tangible guidelines. Sweet! Although that pain thing, well it only hurt about a four on a scale of one to ten...

Almost immediately upon our return, I noticed that it was ... hurting a little more. I would call it a five on a scale of one to ten, and I'm seriously regretting coming home at that point, but I might as well make it worth my while: I drank a glass of tea and ate a sandwich. By the time I finish eating, my contractions were steady at six minutes and my pain scale was at a five, so we headed back to the military hospital.

I labored for two more hours, and dilated up to seven centimeters, but I didn't go any further. They broke my water - still no more dilation. (Ok, I'd say, seven now! Seven on a scale of one to ten, and can-I-have-something-for-pain-pretty-pretty-please-this-hurts-now!) They gave me something twice to try to make me dilate - no dice, it just made it hurt more (EIGHT!) They had me sign a consent for an emergency C-section because the baby was in 'distress' (me too!) and I wasn't dilating any more. By this time, I'm on demerol, which is supposed to help with the pain. Does it girls? NOPE! It makes you sleep in between contractions, so it seems like one long painful contraction that Never. Fucking. Ends. Ever.

This fucking hurts! Ok, I'm going with a nine on the pain scale now! More pain meds please? What do you mean I've had enough? IT STILL HURTS! We wait another hour or so, and my contractions are two minutes apart, lasting a minute and a half each time. What the fuck is taking so long?! I called the nurse in, and told her I felt like I had to poop. She moved me to the bathroom but nothing happened. We danced this dance for about twenty minutes, and I think I moved to the bathroom two or three more times. The nurse finally told me that I must be feeling the urge to push, and she checked me. Yep, still seven centimeters, and she told me not to push. WHAT? What the fuck are we waiting for, a gold-plated baby blanket? A platinum rattle? Get this fucking thing out of me and/or MAKE THE PAIN STOP! I think I yelled that at her. She was not amused. And she outranked me. Yes, the fucking bitch pulled rank and told me to be quiet. While I was in labor! I might have called her a fat cunt, I'm not quite sure. (Ok, yeah, I did.) She was leaving, so maybe she didn't hear me. (Yeah, she did.) Not that I cared at that point. TEN, BITCH! TEN! I thought it didn't go any higher than ten? My aunt lied, this is not fucking bearable!

A little while later, I told my husband to get the nurse. He jumped right up, then asked why. "Don't fucking question me, just go get the Goddamn nurse!"

I could hear them talking outside the door, and I heard my husband say, "I don't know why, she won't tell me."

The nurse came in and asked me what's wrong now. So help me, I'll strangle that bitch if she comes close enough! If I wasn't as big as a house and in excrutiating pain, I'd punch her in her fat cunt mouth! I was moaning during a contraction (because I was already hoarse from screaming) and she told me to be quiet, I was scaring the other patients. "Fuck them, and fuck you!" I'm done with this shit, get this thing out of me now!

She evidently could tell what I was doing. Maybe it was the red face, the blood vessels bursting in my eyes, or the fact that I was grunting like I was taking a humongeous shit (ironic.) Whatever it was, something gave it away: "You can't push, you're only seven centimeters. The anesthesiologist will be here soon. You have to have an emergency C-section because the baby's going into fetal distress and you're not dilating," and she explained that they had called him over two hours ago, but he hadn't responded to his page, and there currently wasn't anyone to knock me out for the surgery, since his assistant couldn't be located either.

I started truly freaking out, and they had to hold me down, while I screamed, "You're not going to cut me open without anesthesia, are you?!" (In retrospect, I shouldn't have called her a bitch. Or a fat cunt. Or Nurse Ratchett. Ok, I didn't regret the 'Nurse Ratchett' thing, she must have been the understudy. Or the inspiration.) In between my shrieks, the doctor assured me that it would be totally unethical to cut me open without anesthesia. "We just have to wait on the anesthesiologist. It'll be ok, he'll be here soon. Just don't push, ok?"

I tried, I realy tried. Oh God, it fucking hurt! I lasted about 20 minutes, and I started pushing again. TWELVE! I think that pain chart is rigged, because I didn't see the face I was making on there anywhere!

My husband told on me: "Nurse, I think she's pushing!" You dirty rat-fink bastard!

She comes in and tells me, "You stop that now! You can't push, you're only seven centimeters. You'll kill your baby!"

But I was too far gone: "I don't fucking care, I'll have more! This baby is coming out now! I'm done!" My husband almost got punched, but he's always been spry. Lucky for him. Move closer, Nurse Ratchett. I just want to say 'hello' to your face with my fists...

They moved me to another room, where I delivered the baby at seven centimeters on an operating table still waiting for the anesthesiologist to arrive, and for the record, I don't recommend it. I went into shock and almost died, but the baby was finally out by that time. In the end, the doctor had to use forceps to get him (and his abnormally large 'alien' head) out. Oh my God, the pain stopped! "Just another push or two for the placenta, then you're done!" Nope, I'm done now, can't you just cut it out or something? It's a rope, right? Just pull the fucking rope! I don't know if I said it or thought it, but eventually the doctor was done. "Ok, that's it!" I heard him say, and that was it for me. I didn't even wait to find out whether it was a boy or girl, I was out. And evidently I tried to kick the doctor while he was sewing me up. Huh, I must have thought it was the nurse! (Hunter green shirt, white pants - seventeen years later, I still remember her name and what she looked like. And I haven't watched One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest since, either - I empathize too much with Jack Nicholson now...)

I woke up an hour and a half later to some woman puking next to my bed and I found out I was in 'recovery.' Fabulous! "Was it a boy?" I asked my husband, and he said yes. "When can I have a shower?" I had him ask the nurse (since they had such a rapport, and I really wanted a shower) but I didn't get one because I passed out again.

There's more to this story, but I'll just hit the highlights:

-How the baby had never been in 'fetal distress' at all, his monitor just kept slipping off his abnormally large, perfectly-rounded, alien basketball-sized head. (Not that it mattered because of the whole 'tore me a new one' thing, but his head was the same circumference as another baby that was a whole pound-and-half larger! We started calling him 'Charlie Brown's Great Pumpkin' right away (later shortened to 'pumpkin') because he had very little hair, and his head was ten times the size of his body. And perfectly round. Well, except where he had two 'U' shaped marks on the side of his head from the forceps.)

-How the anesthesiologist didn't show up until five hours after I delivered. (I talked to him, he seemed to take a personal interest in my cartoon-like alien son. I thought he was just some creepy 'Chester' (as in, "Get that fucking child molester-slash-stranger away from my child!) until the day nurse told me he was the anesthesiologist. He was already gone by the time I found out, or I might have punched him. I already had plans for Nurse Ratchett but I didn't see her again. Lucky break for both of us or I might have ended up with a labotomy.)

-How I was in the hospital for four days because no one told me I had to have a bowel movement before I could go home. (I'd been holding it, so I could 'go' in peace in my own bathroom, while they'd been watching me like a suburban housewife walking her dog, waiting for me to poop. Once they told me what the holdup was, within two hours I was done and on my way home. Well, how in the fuck was I supposed to know?)

-How the water in the hospital only got as hot as 'not-quite-icy' for showers even though it was November. (The nurses thought I was having convulsions, because I was shaking so hard when I showered. That's how I found out about the bowel movements, as in: "What the fuck do I have to do to get out of this Goddamn cuckoo's nest and get a real shower?)

When I went in for my six-week check-up, the same doctor was there. I asked if he remembered me, and he said he didn't. "I'm sure I look different in the face. Maybe you'll recognize your stitch-work. Anyway, I delivered about six weeks ago... at seven centimeters."

He jumped up (from his postion staring at my nether-regions) and said, "Oh my God, that was you?" He turned to the nurse helping him and said, "She saved her baby's life! She had almost 50 stitches, inside and out!" And that's when I found out what had really happened: "You almost died, and the baby too!" (Whaaaat!) "If you'd waited for the C-section, you would've both died! The anesthesiologist showed up several hours after you had already delivered, and he's doing Leavenworth time now. I think he got ten years! And his assistant was dishonorably discharged from active duty. Yours is the worst delivery I have ever seen!" And he shook my hand, saying what a good thing it was that I listened to my instincts. (Huh? Was he talking about the whole, 'Get this fucking thing out of me' instincts or, 'Kick the nurse in the head' instincts?)

I drove home in a daze, and when I got there, I started telling my husband what I had found out, but he already knew: "I had to testify at that anesthesiologist's trial, and his assistant's court-martial. Turns out, they were uh, having sex in her room at the barracks. He left his pager at the hospital and didn't get any of his fifty-plus pages. That nurse got in trouble, too, but just an Article 15."

No shit! Oh. Well. Uhm, I guess I better forgive you for that whole 'tattling to the nurse' thing then, I thought. Especially since you got payback on Nurse Ratchett for me. And I kissed my pumpkin-headed newborn again, and tried to rub the forceps marks out of his 'Charlie Brown' head.

An Offer You Can't Refuse

2011-09-25T01:15:00.004-04:00

My pre-schooler basically told me to, "Go fuck yourself, Mommy." Not with that exact wording, but that's what she meant. It's like the scene from The Godfather when the one guy finds a horse head in his baby's crib: I got home from work today, and found a butter knife in the bathroom. My bathroom. You know, where I get ready for work.

When I had left last night, no butter knife. I get home this morning, voila! A butter knife has magically appeared next to my comb and curling iron. Is she trying to tell me she's planning on cutting my hair, or my throat? Am I supposed to pay her "protection" money now? And if so, what exactly could a 4-year-old spend money on? Coloring books? Dresses? Wait, shoes! She asked me recently, "Did you know that there is a store that sells big girl shoes for ten dollars, mommy? They're really pretty shoes. I wish I had some shoes for ten dollars..." Little did I guess that it was extortion! She's sneaky, I'll give her that. And I made plans to look for her little ponies. In case one or more are missing a head.

I talked to her about the butter knife, and yelled, and told her she was never, ever, never supposed to touch a knife, at least until she turned seven (by that time she'll probably forget. Yes there's a method to my madness.) She told me she hadn't put it in the bathroom, and she didn't know how it got there. I asked if it might have come from her room, and she said yes, so I just knew she had to have put it there.

Then her dad woke up and told me more of The Diary of a Pre-School Diana and I realized she hadn't "made me an offer I couldn't refuse" but instead had been up to her old tricks: last night, he went into their bedroom because the baby was crying. Diana was already asleep, but he found a wet spot in front of their window, and he was worried that the window was leaking. As it turns out, it wasn't their window leaking, it was the bag of fucking peaches she had shoved underneath their dresser! He also told me that he had found the butter knife with the peaches, and might have left it in the bathroom after cleaning up the peach ... juice.

I asked Diana what a mommy needed to do to make sure a little girl understood what the "no-no" things are, and she told me, "I don't know." I then asked if spankings would help her remember, and she wouldn't answer (understandably, since there really isn't a good answer.) Her dad is a list-maker, so perhaps she is, too. We made a list. I have to teach her to be responsible for her actions. Accountability. My mom tried with me when I was about her age: "Honey, I'll give you a nickle every day that you make your bed, ok?"

My response: "I'll give you a dime if you make it for me." I was never good with manual labor, even as a child, but I have always been good with numbers. This isn't about manual labor, though - it's really about responsiblity. Doing what's right, even when you don't want to. The consequences when you don't. And what happens when you tou my stuff! Oh, and knives.

On her crayola board, we wrote the rules: No food in the bedroom, No knives EVER, No potty-ing in pants or dresses (but Pull-ups are ok,) No food out of the kitchen, No silverware out of the kitchen, No touching Mommy's stuff, and No touching Daddy's stuff. After much repetition, she repeated these rules, and I posted them in the living room. I also told her that if she broke these rules, she would get 5 spanks from Mommy and 5 spanks from Daddy, too. "So, what's Diana's punishment for breaking a rule, Diana?"

"Five spanks from Mommy," she tells me.

"And what else?"

"Two spanks from Daddy."

Her dad started laughing, and had to cover his mouth. "No, pumpkin, five spanks from Daddy, not two," I told her.

"But Daddy spanks hard," she told me. "Two spanks from Daddy."

What?! She's fucking bargaining? It sounds like she's planning on breaking them already! This isn't a fucking swap meet! "Five spanks from Daddy," I told her firmly, and we went over the rules and consequences again. We both gave her hugs, and then I filled her sippy cup. "What were you laughing about, honey?" I asked after she had made it to her room.

He leaned closer, and said, "THAT is your daughter, through and through! One hundred percent YOU!" and laughed some more. I couldn't really argue. I could totally see it: dimes verses nickles, two spanks verses five. (Can a 'mother's curse' be revoked?)

About a half hour later, she informed us that she had held her potty, but when she stood up, it was too long, and she pottied her pants. I turned to her dad, and said, "I believe this is a T-E-S-T."

He said, "Yep," and we did the dirty deed: we gave her the spankings, and she cried. We talked about going potty as soon as she felt a little like going potty, then we gave her hugs, and had her show us which rule she broke. She pointed right to it. Oh yeah, she knew.

She arrived back in the living room a short while later: "Baby Sisser stinks!" and she pinched her nose together with her fingers. "Oooh, she stinkies bad!"

"Ok, pumpkin, Mommy'll change her."

"Well, I have rules for my room, and Babby Sisser broke one of my kid rules for my room."

"Oh yeah? What rule did she break?" I asked her.

"My rules says she's not allowed to poopie in her diaper."

"Well, if you make that rule, I'm going to expect you to follow it, too. Remember about how you won't get spanked if you potty in your pull-up?"

"Yes, but she's wearing a diaper, not a pull-up," my little loop-hole-finder tells me.

"If you make this rule about diapers, I'm taking out the 'Pull-up' exception. That means if you potty in a pull-up, you'll get spanked. Is that what you want?"

"No," my little tyrant told me.

"So, no spankings for pottying in pull-ups or diapers, right?" and she agreed. "It's really an offer you can't refuse." Mommy 1. Diana 0.

UPDATE: That night, she got up in the middle of the night to potty in the potty chair. She had already gone in the pull-up, so she put another one on to go back to sleep in, so she didn't potty in her pants while she's sleeping. I can only hope that I have finally gotten through to her! (Also, she can't really read yet, she just memorizes the words, so instead of 'things,' she reads 'stuff.')

The Cherry On Top Of A Whipped-Shit Sundae Day

2011-09-22T07:04:00.012-04:00

I've worked night shift for a big portion of each of my kids' young lives, and although getting sleep is always challenging, if I had to work (and I do) at least by working nights, I could still spend a lot of time with my kids during their waking hours. When my boys were little, I got off of work at 6 am, which meant that my (now ex-) husband was getting ready to leave for work, since he had to be there by 7 am.

My tentative schedule went something like this:
6:15 am Arrive at home, change clothes, receive update from their dad
6:30 - 6:45 Wake boys up, change diaper, send oldest two to potty
6:45 - 7:30 Feed them breakfast (maybe I get to eat)
7:30 - 8:00 Get everybody dressed, cleaned from breakfast, teeth brushed
8:00 - 8:15 Take oldest to school (1st grade, all-day)
8:15 - 8:30 Return home, refill sippy cup, change diaper
8:30 - 9:00 Put baby down for morning nap, get middle son invested in TV
8:45 -11:15 Sleep on couch
11:15-11:30 Get baby up, change diapers, have middle son go potty
11:30-11:50 Lunch (I usually ate standing up)
11:50-12:00p Change middle son from lunch, clean up, teeth brushed
12:00-12:15 Take middle son to school (kindergarten, half day)
12:15-12:30 Return home, refill sippy cup, change diaper
12:30- 1:30 Play with baby, clean up house, do some laundry
1:30 - 1:45 Lay baby down for afternoon nap
2:00 - 7:30 Sleep in actual bed

My ex-husband would pick up the boys from school, work on homework, and fix dinner. It sounds kind of frantic and sad when I write it, but it was good because I didn't work every day, so I had many days where I would be up with the kids all day, could cook dinner, and help them with their homework (not exactly a fun thing, but you get the picture.) It's no wonder my ex-husband and I eventually divorced, we barely got to see each other (although in my more retrospective moments, I credit the fact that we barely saw each other as what allowed us to last as long as we did! Oh, the memories... not!)

Ok, I brought up that timeline, so that when I tell you the following story, it would make more sense:

I worked the night before, followed the breakneck-I mean, strict-itinerary of items that had to accomplished: diaper change, clothing change, breakfast, everyone in the car with the oldest son's backpack, dropped my oldest son off at school, came home, and got more drinks. The baby was sleepy (rough night according to his dad) so after getting the middle one busy playing, I laid the baby down early for his morning nap, and laid down myself.

I must have hit the snooze button, because when I got up I was already running late. My middle son was still sleeping, but the baby was awake. He had woken early and found an activy to alleviate the boredom. What initiative! Evidently, he had gotten a nosebleed, and decided that the wall next to his crib would make the best showcase for his Still Life in Blood masterpiece! He had artfully accentuated the mono-chrome abstraction with feces from his own diaper, which he had removed for greater access to his painting materials. Absolutely fucking fabulous!

He was barely one, and didn't know any better, but I am leaving out the total freak-out I had when I saw the blood! It wasn't much, but when you just wake up, your hearts beating because you're already running late, and see blood in your baby's crib, well, it feels like a murder scene with a gallon of blood. So yeah, you could say I had the shit scared out of me. And even then you might be underestimating my response.

After frantically checking him for wounds only to find blood caked in his nose, he received a very quick bath, then diaper change, then new clothes. My middle one woke up during this and cried because he wanted a bath, and it wasn't fair that the baby got to take two baths that day! Cry me a river child, I'm with you on the "not fair" part. I want to yell at my mommy right now too, trust me!

So, after calming down the bath drama, I make the boys lunch and feed them, but instead of eating my lunch, I washed walls, bedding, crib slats, and toys. I did take a quick minute to get something to drink (cherry kool-aid, yum, my favorite) because after freaking out, rushing around, and frantically scrubbing blood and feces I was thirsty. Ok, back to the schedule...

Clean up boys *check,* change middle son into school clothes *check,* change baby into new clothes again, (ketchup, I don't know what I was thinking) *check,* get boys loaded in the car *check,* and take middle son to class *check.* After all of this ... chaos, we were late, so I had to walk him into his class. I talked to his teacher for a few minutes (we weren't super late, just a few minutes) about homework, parent-teacher conferences coming up, and left.

I went to the grocery store and talked to the cashier for a few seconds (I'm a talker, what can I say) about various things - I saw her rather often, our schedules just meshed. I left to go to the gas station, and after pumping the gas, I went inside to get cigarettes. I always bought my cigarettes at the same place, and the owner and I talked for a minute or two as well.

I stopped at the bank to make a deposit (yes, I went inside and talked to the teller) then stopped at McDonald's on the way back, since I hadn't had lunch yet, and I was still thirsty. That kool-aid only went so far, you know.

I drove back home while thinking about how much cleaning was still ahead of me, since I hadn't been able to finish before we had to leave. I parked in the driveway, got the baby out, locked the car, and went to unlock the house ... son of a bitch! I locked the keys in the car! Seriously, could this day get any fucking worse! I had a spare car set, but they were, yep, inside the house, so THAT wouldn't help. If I could get inside to get the keys for the car, I wouldn't need to get in the car to get the house keys!

This was way before cell phones were common, and neither my husband or I had one, and he was at work! What could make this worse? Well, of course, the baby wanted his sippy cup since he's still on schedule, so he started crying and wailing, and I began the "baby dance" to quiet him, while trying to come up with a solution. (The baby dance: the dance that all parents do while holding their cryng children to make them stop crying. After a few kids, when you pick up a baby, you just start moving. I can't explain it, but if you have kids, I don't really need to, do I?)

Well, there's nothing left to do but knock on the neighbor's door. I hadn't really met my neighbors, we had just moved in a couple of months before, and I'm not the most social neighbor anyway, but what else could I do? Surely they wouldn't turn away a young mother with a fussy child.

I knocked several times before she finally answered, and when I asked to use her phone, at first she said no. She didn't have a portable, she said. The baby started screaming in earnest, so that might have changed her mind (she could probably see that I would have stood on her doorstep with a screaming baby until she let me use it) so she capitulated and said that she had a portable in the back of the house and went to get it. When she brought it back, she kept the chain on her door as she gave me the phone to use. WTF? Did I look like a deranged killer? I'm a mom, for Christ's sake! You know what, I am done with this bitch! The next cookout we have, she is definitely NOT invited! I called my husband, who agreed to leave work and let me in. So we waited, the baby and I, for about 20 minutes, swinging on the front porch swing. The baby finally quieted, and I was just ... existing. Oh, what a day!

My husband screeches up, runs up to the front door, and unlocks it (Thank you!) then turns to me and busts out laughing.

"Ha ha, locked the keys in the car, so fucking funny," and I started into the house. He continued to laugh. He was bent double, laughing so hard that he can barely talk. Fuck you, I thought as I headed inside. Whatever, asshole! It's not that funny! He followed me, still laughing.

"Alright, what exactly is so funny, because I'm getting pissed, this had been a super- shitty day so far, and locking my keys in the car absolutely doesn't seem like it's fall down funny to me, so ... What. The. Fuck. Are. You. Laughing. At?!?!?"

"Were you thirsty today, honey?" with more laughing.

"Yeah, I had something to drink when I was feeding the boys lunch, why?"

"Have you looked in a mirror?" he finally got out.

"No.... Again, why?" I asked cautiously, as I headed to the bathroom to find a mirror.

I looked in the mirror. Oh my God! I had a kool-aid smile halfway up my face! I looked like the fucking joker! That's the freakin cherry on top of this "whipped shit sundae" of a day! All those people I talked to.. and no one said a word!

Life Lessons Learned

2011-09-20T03:46:00.002-04:00

Yesterday morning, my little mini-me ALMOST had me convinced she listens to me. I thought that we had come to an understanding, that she had finally started to get our rules, and more importantly, follow them. I thought I had made a breakthrough as a mom, and she had made a breakthrough as a daughter. Looking back, I might have over thought it.

I had to take the boys to school, and it's a long trip. My four-year-old woke up just as I was leaving, and I told her to potty, and I would be back in a little while to feed her breakfast. She started crying, and said she wanted to go with me, and I told her that we were running late, and to wake her dad up if she needed anything.

Almost an hour later, I get home, walk in the kitchen, and see a corn cob sitting on the counter. It was alone, with no plate, but it already had the little corn-cob holders attached. I checked downstairs to see if the honey was awake (nope) then went in search of my oldest double-X-chromosome child, mainly to find out if I had finally lost my mind, or had she gotten a corn cob?

I found her in the living room, digging through her pants, and it distracted me enough that I side-tracked straight into WTF? and I asked her what she was doing. "Well," she whispered, "is Daddy awake?" Daddy is a little more strict about the whole "pottying in her pants" thing than I am. As my mother told me after my first kid, She'll figure it out before she goes to school. (This isn't exactly true, as this "mom-ism" was later disproved by my second son.)

So I whispered back to her, "No, Daddy's sleeping. And why are we whispering?"

"Well, I had an accident, and I need new pants. Those," she whispers back.

"I'll get you some pants," I whispered (why stop now?) and got her the specific pants she wanted (pink with brown leopard spots, because anything other than the pants she wants results in quiet crying. Pick your battles, I tell myself. Often. Especially with pants. And I really think that should probably go on a T-shirt: Pick Your Battles, Especially With Pants! I would so wear that EVERY. SINGLE. FUCKING. DAY!!!

As I gave her the pants, and I asked her whether or not she had gone potty when I told her to, and she told me, "But I did not feel like to go potty!" (Yes, that's what she said, it's not a typo.)

Well, that explains why she had an "accident," - because she didn't go potty when I told her to. "But that's why Mommy tells you to go potty anyway, so that you don't have an "accident" and have to change your pants," I told her, as I mentally screamed at the top of my lungs. Ok, I feel better now. It's the battle cry of every mother: "Why won't you just do what I tell you to do? This could be so much easier!"

After she was dressed, I asked her about the corn cob on the counter, and she said she was hungry, and got it out of the fridge. "But where are the rest of the corn cobs, pumpkin?" I asked her, because the last time I saw the corn cobs in question, there were about seven. I had looked around on the floor and in their room, but I didn't see anything, so you could say I was very curious as to what had happened with the other cobs. Wouldn't you be?

"Well, there was only one," she told me, and I believed her, mainly because I didn't find anything to indicate otherwise, not because she's a truthful child. Trust is earned, not given, and whoever said children are inherently truthful didn't have kids. Or perspective. And was full of shit up to their eyeballs.

The honey must have made them for dinner last night, and left one in the fridge for me. So, I told her I was not happy that she got food out of the fridge, but I was very happy she ate it in the kitchen. I finished changing/filling various items (diapers/pants/sippy cups,) and told my mini-me that she could have corn on the cob for breakfast. She acted like it was the best thing since sliced bread. "Are you upset, Mommy?" she asked me.

"No, pumpkin, I'm just glad you didn't take food out of the kitchen. By the way, did you put these holders here?"

"Yes, didn't I do a good job?" she asked, preening. I asked her to show me how she put them in. "I just put it in this side, and that side, and it was done!" Fucking fabulous! I thought. I can barely get those things in the cob.

"Ok, well, be careful, honey. Next time, how about you not use the corn holders, alright?" She agreed, and although I wasn't happy about her having corn on the cob for breakfast, I had to reward the fact that she had followed the rules, or at least THE rule, the MAIN rule, about not taking food out of the kitchen. Color me content! We have turned a corner, I told myself. She understands rules, and maybe now she won't get into my make-up! Or the rest of my shit. Hey, a girl can dream, right?

Daddy fed them lunch a few hours later, and I laid down for some sleep since I had to work last night. My alarm woke me at 4:30 pm, and I hit the snooze. Yes, I hit the snooze. It's a 7-minute snooze FCS! Seven minutes isn't going to make or break dinner. I thought I saw my little munchkin dash around the couch, but I listened, and didn't hear anything, so I laid down for seven more minutes. When it goes off (seven minutes later) I jump up, and hear a crash from the kitchen. I leaned around, and took a look into the kitchen - where the crash came from - and there was my four-year-old under the table, with the peanut butter container out on top of the table, spoons scattered everywhere. Motherfucker!

"What exactly are you doing, child?" I ask her. "And why are you under the table?" as I'm rubbing sleep out of my eyes, trying to find my glasses, and wishing I had gotten up SEVEN FUCKING MINUTES EARLIER! Stupid snooze button!

"Well," my little demon-o-mischief tells me, "I was hungry, and the doggies were hungry, so I fed us peanut butter!"

"What?" I'm awake, damn it, I'm awake! "The dogs have food of their own, why would you ... What are you ... When ..." OK, stop a second and take deep breaths, I told myself. This isn't helping anything! "Diana, why do you have six spoons ... Why are you under ... The gate isn't even closed ..." Ok, more breaths required. "I'll be right back," I told her, and I went to the bathroom (after securing the gate, of course.)

After I had refreshed myself (AKA peed, brushed my teeth, and splashed some water on my face) I felt better, and I went back to the kitchen. "OK honey, listen: I'm glad you ate in the kitchen, that's a very good thing. But you don't feed doggies people food unless Mommy says it's ok. They have their own food already out, and they have plenty! And why do you have so many spoons out?"

As it turns out, she got a new spoon with each spoonful of peanut butter. Great, psychotic AND OCD! This child will be fucked up before she's 10! So one by one, I went through the remaining questions on my list satisfactorily, and just decided to fix them dinner. Because what was the point of stressing? At least she didn't take the food into her bedroom.

They had peanut butter for dinner, because there was only a tiny bit left in the container, just enough for a half a sandwich, which is (coincidentally) how much the baby eats of her main course. I made my four-year-old eat what was left on the spoons (catch that, s-p-o-o-n-s, plural, as in more than one spoon?) and she sounded delighted. (At least until the fourth spoon) Regardless, she ate them. And I thought (while she was licking her third spoon) of how nice it was going to be soon, because she would stop taking food in her room. Maybe this was the harbinger of things to come, and she would stop getting into "no-no" things entirely. I can't remember when my older ones stopped getting into stuff, but by God, this day would live in memory (mine) of a Life Lesson learned. I have taught my child SOMETHING!

After dinner, I went to the bathroom again.

I'm not sure how I missed could have missed them before, except that I wasn't quite awake, and I didn't have my glasses on. I suppose I could make all the excuses in the world, but regardless, I happened to check under the counter next to my scales, and there I found them. I think I heard my heart break.

I was so sure I had finally gotten through to her! Alas, there were three more spoons with peanut butter on them. @#$%^&*() And next to the spoons, a candy wrapper. Double-fuck! She had to have taken them in the bathroom when my first alarm went off. No wonder she took off like a bat out of hell!

A life lesson learned, indeed. It's just not her learning it, it's me! I learned that it isn't over until it's over. All I can do now is protect my make-up!

Lies Mommies Tell

2011-09-18T06:44:00.006-04:00

Do you ever wonder how many times over the length of your childrens' lives you will lie to them? I started thinking about this after the last post, and I wondered how bad of a mom was I that I lied to my kids. But then I finished thinking: I know I've lied to my kids several times (Yes, Mommy does have eyes in the back of her head, that's how I knew you were grabbing that cookie, honey!) but mostly about totally inconsequential things or, conversely, things that may have great impact in their lives if they make the wrong decision.

I made a rule to tell them the truth about important things, like morals (that truth is better than dishonesty, and yes, irony is also important) and personal beliefs. If I lie, it's usually about small stuff when they're young, and usually only to dodge a totally unwarranted argument: No that was the last cookie, there are no more, and four cookies is enough for anyone. Well, and about having kids. Seriously, who tells their kids that having kids sometimes sucks? No one, that who!

Some lies are necessary, and some aren't, but I think all parents lie at some point:

1) Eat your vegetables, otherwise you'll become a girl when you grow up. Yes, that's what happened to Mommy, I was a little boy who didn't eat his vegetables. (What? I told this to my middle son and he believed me! Then I was insulted. I only told this lie ONCE, because this one bit me in the ass big-time!)

2) You can't have children until you're thirty, it's against the law. (Well, it should be a law, in my opinion. If I had a dollar for all the things I learned between child #1 and child #5, I wouldn't have to work. I've told this to ALL of my boys. Y'know, just in case... and on a related note, someone (either their dad or step-mom) told my two oldest (16-almost-17, and 15) they couldn't buy condoms until they were 18, which I quickly told them wasn't true. And a side note to my ex-husband, should you ever read this: Are you fucking nuts?!?! Do you want grandchildren that badly, you moron! Keeping them from condoms will not keep them from having sex, only keep them from having safe sex! ARGH!

3) No, the skin's the best part of the apple, honey. It makes your hair beautiful. Don't you want beautiful hair? (This one was to my vain oldest daughter. And under the same heading, sandwich crusts make you prettier. Doesn't everyone know that? I just figured everyone knew that. What?)

4) Everyone has to go to college, it's the law. (I've told this one to ALL of my school-age kids once they've gotten over the first rosy blush of I-love-school and asked that eternal question, "When are you done going to school?" I remember an article or story about a family who had three kids and all of them attended college. When asked how they did it, the parents stated that they just always led their children to believe that they would go to college from the time they were small children. I believe it works, because the three oldest (boys) have plans to attend college.)

5) Mommy can tell when you're lying, so don't even bother. (Yep, the four oldest have all gotten this speech from me. Now that the boys play poker, I explained about 'tells' but I still don't tell them what their individual tells are. That would be stupid of me, now wouldn't it? Otherwise, they might win at poker, and take more of my money. Or lie with impunity.)

6) Grandma's birthday is today and we need to wish her a happy 60th birthday! Oh, and she'll try to tell you she's only 50, but that's because she's nervous that she's getting older. You should tell her that she isn't old at all, ok? (That was for a joke, and it was freakin hilarious! It took my mother three weeks to convince them she wasn't 60! This one doesn't fall into the two aforementioned categories, but TOTALLY ok for the joke value, right?)

7) I have eyes in the back of my head, so that I can watch you when my back's turned. (This one only works until they figure out what mirrors are, or learn to make less sound. I personally wish this one lasted longer.)

8) It's not going to hurt hardly at all. (A mixed lie, mostly used for Band-Aids. And before some judgemental mom tells me that I should tell her the truth, I'll say this: Why don't you try to catch her! She's a fast little shit and I'm out of practice.)

9) Black holes are not going to swallow the earth. (No one else ever got this one, you say? Odd, I've gotten this from two kids. Life isn't fair sometimes...)

This one may be the truth, it may be a lie, but regardless, I will share this little pearl of wisdom: If you happen to work nights, catching sleep as you can on the couch in the living room, and usually choose the Science Channel to fall asleep to, don't let your 4-year-old lie down with you and watch TV, because evidently the guy who explains science and shit explains physics and other "scientific-topics-that-would-scare-a-preschooler" (let's just bring up for instance, BLACK HOLES!) so completely that even a fucking four-year-old can understand it! Ain't that a kick in the shorts! Here I've finally gotten her mostly over her nightmares about zombies, and now she has nightmares about black fucking holes!

And here's a fucked up side effect: I'm not sure if I should be proud that she can explain that a black hole is a star like our sun (only bigger) that grew old and collapsed, or upset that I not only have to calm her normal childhood fears, but EOTWAWKI fears, too! WTF? Damnit Diana, I'm a mommy, not a physicist!

Which reminds me, I also probably shouldn't let her watch Star Trek anymore either ... Not for a few years yet I guess, or until her "black hole fears" are forgotten with new issues. Well, shit! There goes our "Mommy-and-Me" time. I wonder if TruTV has good morning shows...

It's All Fun And Games

2011-09-16T19:14:00.002-04:00

My four-year old daughter is once again on her way to see her cousin. I'm glad that her grandparents take her when they go to visit, since it 1) gives me an opportunity to have special time with the youngest, 2) gets Diana out of my hair, 3) brings her closer to the cousin that lives farthest away, and 4) gets Diana out of my hair. Did I mention that once already? Oh, well, it's such a fabulous thought it bears repeating. So, the first day she's gone, their dad cleans the shit out of their room, to find a half-eaten sandwich! No one knows how or when she made the sandwich, but I personally suspect she has figured out the gate to the kitchen. I'm still not sure what was in the sandwich, though, since she's gone and I can't ask, because she's out of town! If I didn't know better, I'd think she planned it that way. I can trace her activities using the items in her room, which tells me that by the time she's a teenager, I might as well open a private investigative agency!

So, the items: the make-up was from last week, when she got into my make-up while conducting the heist of the century (multi-tasking, from a woman's basic toolbox) the string from one of her hair ribbons, that I had taken away from her several weeks ago and hid (which can only mean she has found my hiding place) and the stuffing, well the STUFFING was from their beds! As it turns out, my darlings have been systematically tearing apart their beds and hiding the "spoils" from their "stuffing party" (much as I used to do as a teenager with my liquor bottles.) Their dad took the beds and put sleeping bags in their room to sleep in. I guess it'll be that way until I can get their new twin mattress, or until one of them figures out how to take the sleeping bags apart at the seems. With my little destructo-children, anything's possible. That four-year-old can get into some shit, let me tell you!

The baby, however, is another story. That child is willful, determined, and creative, with a healthy splash of meanness thrown in for spice. Truthfully, she's probably at least half-responsible for the demolition of their room, to include the destruction of their toddler mattresses. I'm not sure, but I think she figured out that her sister ends up taking the rap for her misdeeds. Strange as it seems, I also believe that she doesn't care. I love spending time with just the baby. She's my youngest, my last, my little pumpkin, and they way her mind works... Well, I'm sure when she grows up, she'll have a super-villian nick name.

She does finally understand what sippy cups are (and more importantly, that if she wants a drink, she better bring it with her when she comes out of her room.) I have been trying to get her to talk more, by naming things as she touches them, and sometimes she cooperates and tries to say whatever I've named. I noticed that about two syllables is her limit. I didn't really go through this with my pre-schooler, because she was at Nana's house so much, (which is better than any pre-school, let me tell you!) but the baby is another story. Since she can already say her ABC's and count 1-12, I figured we'd better teach her to actually communicate. It might come in handy at some point. You never know.

The minute the her sister left, I figured she'd crawl so far up our asses that if I farted, she'd have shit on her nose, but I am consistently surprised by how happy she is while her sister's gone, and it made me realize: she likes playing by herself. Really, really, likes being alone. She does occasionally come out to "socialize" with the rest of us, but her goal seems to be destroying her room and having as much fun as possible while doing it! And I thought the four-year-old was bad. Since her older sister is gone though, she sings, she dances, she talks (sort of) and generally has a fabulous time. It's starting to make me wonder if she has an imaginary friend. I guess there really is at least three people who are happy when Diana is gone. Little does the toddler know, I plan to work on potty-training her while her older sister isn't here. Fun times with the pre-schooler gone, right? Well, it's all fun and games until someone loses an eye! Wait a minute, maybe I should put the toddler in glasses...

The Birds, The Bees, and The Ugly

2011-09-09T07:35:00.004-04:00

When my boys were young, I agonized about how to explain the 'facts of life,' and my ex-husband told me at the time that he would "take care of it." I was relieved, in a cowardly and non-me-like way. When the time came, however, my ex-husband was nowhere near close enough to save me from this gaping, giant, black hole that swallowed my integrity in silence.

I was driving to pick up my middle son from his tutor with my oldest and youngest already in the car. It was a McDonald's night, oh, how I remember it well. It was the best of times. It was the worst of times... "Mom, how did you and Dad have me?" This question, seemingly our of no-where, was asked by none other than my precocious 8 year old.

"Um, do you mean how you did you get out of my tummy?" I asked him with a boat-load of hope in my voice. His youngest brother was three, and he probably vaguely remembered me pregnant... Yeah, that had to be it.

"No, how did you and Dad put me into your tummy?" Ok, evidently that wasn't 'it.' What do I do, what do I say? kept repeating itself in my head. Say something, stupid! My subconscious sometimes doesn't know when to shut up. Or do something.

I froze. "Um... Well.... Um..." and I had about 30 seconds to figure out where I wanted this to go. I was eight when I learned about the birds and bees. I guess it's only natural that he would ask. What are the important parts? "Well, first we got married..." Shit, I didn't mean to start with a lie! Fuck!Too late now, just go with it, you moron! I think to myself. Stupid subconscious!

"Then what?" he asked.

Another minute went by while I tried to make other words come out. I sounded like I'd recently been hit in the head with a hammer. Or with an epiphany. In a bad way. A very bad way. And I suddenly realized something: I couldn't do it. My brain would not allow my mouth to work.

"Then what, Mom?" I am so screwed!

I chickened out, I caved, I cracked under pressure. Whatever you want to call it, I just couldn't do it. This was my oldest, my first baby. He was everything that was right in my life, innocent and sweet. I just... couldn't. "You need to talk to your dad, honey. He's a boy, and you're a boy... Sometimes it's just best if you ask your dad this question, okay?"

"Okay." and he sounded fine with it. But later, I spoke with my (soon-to-be ex) husband to prepare him, and he never asked his dad. A stupid fucking missed opportunity! That was my first ulcer. (From my firstborn, so I guess it's fitting.) I had cravenly dodged the procreation question, and lied to my son to boot. I guess I could start World War Three as an encore, but first I had to get my son to open up to me again.

A year or so later, he learned about 'it' in health class, and we had the condom talk, etc. I kinda thought maybe he forgot about that earlier disaster of a "cabbage patch-slash-stork-slash-marriage" talk. Nope, I was not to be that lucky.

When my oldest son was twelve I had my fourth child, a girl, with my boyfriend of three years. And no, we have never married. There has never been a need - we know we'll be together until 'death do us part,' but one shit-storm a life is all I allow myself. My daughter was (and is) my late-in-life joy, the daughter I had always wanted (but never gotten) and after three previous "tries" with my ex, I had actually given up hope that I could bear a "girl-child" from my loins. (And yes, this is probably why she's spoiled rotten. Deal with it. Or don't. Whatever.)

When she was about a year old, the boys and I were sitting at the kitchen table waiting on their father to pick them up. My youngest son (8 at the time) asked, "When is Dad going to get to take the baby to his house?"

"What?!" I gasped, after choking on my coffee and getting slapped on the back to recover. "Um, how about 'never.' Why would she go to your dad's house?" I asked him, frantically trying to figure out what might have transpired to put that idea in his head. That's it! No one from here on out is allowed to turn eight! It's a fucked up year, and nine is better anyway!

He became defensive. On his dad's behalf! "Well, he's her dad too! Doesn't he get to see her?" he said, in a tone only the righteous indignant can pull off. Too bad he was way off base!

Wait, WHAT THE FUCK?!?!?!?! How in the hell did they get that fucking idea? I wondered if their dad was making waves again. I'm ashamed to say that while I didn't actually verbalize the horrible things that were running through my mind, the look on my face probably scarred them for life. "No, he's not her dad. The baby is your half-sister, which means in this case you guys and her have the same mom, but different dads."

"But who's her dad, then?" my littlest son asked, evidently very, very confounded by this turn of events. Seriously?

I looked at my honey, who was covering his face with the baby. I suspected that he was laughing, because his shoulders were shaking and he was making wheezing sounds... I'm glad he found this funny, because I sure-as-shit didn't! I pointed right at my honey, like I was identifying the defendant in a TV crime drama. "There's Diana's father!" That's him, your honor! He knocked me up! Off with his head! Too 'Queen of Hearts?' Yeah, you're probably right.

"But how can he be her dad when you guys aren't married?" my youngest son asked. And he actually sounded confused. I suspected that their dad had his hand in this somewhere, all right. Prick!

"Yeah, Mom, you said you had to be married to have kids," my oldest said, while trying to hide a smile. Et tu, Brute? He's twelve, and way past his first procreation talk. You little shit-stirrer, you! I brought you into this world, child, maybe I should be the one to take you out .... It would serve him right if I go into the 'discussion' right now!

"Um... Well... Um," I stuttered. And suddenly, I've flashed back to the car, when my oldest first cornered my with this innocent-sounded question, but now I'm searching for the right words that would be appropriate for an eight-year-old, an eleven-year-old, and a twelve-year old. Putting off an answer only compounded the problem! Maybe I can redeem myself and not blurt out a lie, or some outrageous... "Well, you only have to get married once, then you can have babies with anyone." Yes, that actually came out of my mouth. Well, there goes that whole redeeming thing down the crapper!

"Oh, okay," my trusting little child told me. "Dad's here, we gotta go. Love you Mom!" and they kissed me and ran out the door. Yeah, I'm sure this one will bite me in the ass, too, but for now, I consider it another bullet dodged.

And then my honey looked at me, smirked, and asked, "Anything I should know, darling?"

"Yeah, you're a collosal ass for laughing, dear," I told him.

"Is that the story you'll tell our daughter?" he asked.

Well, shit! I thought to myself, I'm going to bave to do this again in a few years with my daughter! That was my second ulcer...

A Beautiful Mind

2011-09-07T07:18:00.002-04:00

Tonight I went through my normal routine for work - I showered, washed my hair (and everything else,) wrapped up in a towel, and put my contacts in. I was running late, so I quickly plugged my curling iron in and the hairdryer (all kept in a special place in the bathroom where prying toddler fingers hopefully won't mess with them) and pulled out my make-up to put it on while the curling iron heated up.

And that's when I found out what my darling mini-me had done: She got into my make-up again! It's gone, all gone! My eye shadow ($5) my lip stain (all six of them = about $55) my super-duper-wrinkle-cover-up set ($30) my Kabuki brush ($4) my eyeliners (~$15) and my lip liners ($5 for both.) Other various make-up items are also missing, including tweezers and lip gloss, and I suddenly understood why child abuse is legal in third world countries - it's for the make-up, right?

I knew I had taken my contacts out that morning around 10 or so and the make-up had still been there (next to where I keep my glasses, FYI) so she had to have gotten the crap after I went to sleep, but before I started getting ready for work. I yelled for my honey (who was assigned to Gestapo-slash-babysitting duty while I was sleeping today. Hello, I work nights, remember?) and for Diana. The little minx was hiding, and I had her dad come out and take care of her and find my make-up, because God help her if I got a hold of her right now. Sometimes the hardest part about being a parent is NOT spanking. Am I right or am I right?

He was one room away the entire time I was sleeping, so from whom did my daughter get her ninja stealth skills? And I had just seen her when I woke up around 6, tickled her belly, grabbed her nose (making her cry-go figure!) She didn't act like she had a "make-up surprise" planned in her room (or look like it, either, since she wasn't covered in tell-tale slashes of lip stain.) Yet when her dad got my make-up back and I looked at her, sure enough she had a streak of Mulberry lip stain across her upper lip! So she had the make-up all day, but ... didn't use it until after it was bedtime? Huh, that's strange, almost like she ... nah, she's only four.

I grabbed my make-up (muttering things that would have curled her hair the whole time,) cleaned it up as best as possible, and tried to finish getting ready for work. Well, the Mulberry lip stain doesn't look too bad, I said to myself, maybe if I just wipe the applicator.... Then I put the applicator back in, pulled it out, and got a huge clump of hair. OMG, DID SHE PUT IT IN HER HAIR?! I could feel my blood pressure rising quickly... What does an aneurysm feel like? I think I'm popping a blood vessel just remembering it!

I asked her dad to find out when she did it, and it turns out she got into it right after I fell asleep, but before lunch. Hmm, that's strange, because right before I went to sleep, she's the one who reminded me to put my glasses on when I "changed my eyeballs" as she puts it, which is what she calls it when I take out my contact lenses. I wonder ... could she have been thinking about getting into my make-up when she told me that... no, she's only four, there's no way... is there? Because seriously, if that's the case, it would mean that she has the capability to plan something, execute the plan, and then hide her criminal actions ... Now wait just a fucking minute! She did plan this! Oh no! And a criminal mastermind is born.

I Wish I Could...

2011-09-05T07:15:00.002-04:00

My four-year-old has started the most annoying fucking habit ever in the history of 4-year-olds - instead of actually asking for something (e.g. "Mommy, may I have a cookie please?") or asking-as-a-statement (e.g. "Mother Dearest, I would like to have a cookie.") I get a wistful, wishy-washy, frustrated, bourgeoisie-esque wishful statement: "I wish I had a cookie..." while sighing sadly and looking far off into distant lands, as though someday her hero would come and bring her a fucking cookie!

Well, fuck that! I've told her over and over, one (as in any-fucking-normal-person) doesn't simply wish for something, then wait for it to fall in one's lap like manna from heaven. "If you want something pumpkin, ask. Maybe you'll get it, maybe you won't, but in this house, we have a strict 'no-free-lunch-also-known-as-no-wish-fulfillment' policy. If you don't ask for it, you don't get it."

In my more tired moments, I even repeat that memorable phrase, "Wish in one hand and shit in the other, see which one fills up quickest," before I kind of wake up and realize exactly who I'm talking to. She doesn't get it though anyway - What did you say, Mommy? as I quickly say, Never mind, sweetie! To me, she has stumbled almost entirely on accident on the easiest way to irritate the piss out of me in a heartbeat. What kind of daughter am I raising when she WISHES FOR COOKIES?!?!?! I am woman, hear me .... wish for a fucking cookie and wait for someone else to provide it? NOW would take my membership card (not that I have one. Anymore, that is.)

And she says it for eh-ver-ee-thing! "I wish I could go outside...." as I take the dogs out to pee. "I wish I could play on your screen (iPad) ...." as I'm blogging. (Ok, reading. Whatever! It's mine, and I don't like to share, ok?) "I wish I had a tomato...." as I'm biting into a juicy tomato after feeding her a 3-course meal! Really? When I asked you if you wanted some tomatos with dinner, you said no, but now that I'm enjoying my dinner, you "wish" you had one? REALLY?

"I wish I could play the Wii...." (You wish that? Well, you know what? Go do it! You know how to turn it on AND set it up - everything! If you "wish" to play, fucking go play it! and this is followed by a mental scream AAAHHHRRRRGGGGG!!!! because there is no way I can say any of this out loud and not emotionally scar her for life. Well, not yet anyway.)

"I wish I could wear a dress...." Yeah, well, I wish you you wouldn't potty in your pants, then your favorite dress wouldn't need washed. Also not said for fear of membership in the "emotionally scarred for life" club.

HUUUGEEE sigh, "I wish I could go to Nana and Poppa's house......" Well, you just came home, and Mommy missed you. You'll have the rest of your adult life to run to Nana bitching about me, so let me enjoy the relatively stress-free times for now.

"I wish I could sit on your lap...." Awwwwe!

Well, shit. She got me. "Ok, honey, climb on up." I wish I could teach her to be a stronger woman...

Fall Blues

2011-09-04T07:59:00.000-04:00

I hate August. And September. October just better not piss on my boots, or I'll lump it in with August and September, and July - well fuck you July. Not just for the heat, and the end of summer (y'know, the normal reasons people hate August, September, October. And July) but because it's allergy season. I've always had horrible allergic reactions to various things, and August... well, August just isn't my month. Matter of fact, my mom told me once that for three years in a row when I was a child, she refilled my allergy medicine on August 24th. Great! Glad I could be so predictable, Mom.

I'm allergic to tons of stuff, too, which means I spray my bathroom down religiously, and also no cats where I sleep. (We don't have a cat anyway, but I could have one in theory as long as it slept somewhere else, washed my hands a lot, and took shit-tons of allergy medicine to make me not care that I had cats. Or allergies for that matter - My youngest son is also allergic, and no one knows exactly how bad his allergies are yet, so I don't want to risk it.) it's made me into the dog-person I am today!

When I was young, I was taken to an allergy specialist who did a shit-ton of tests. (Lots of earwax? A possible sign of allergies! I learned things I never knew before.) We found out that I was allergic to, among other things, myself. And cat dander. And mold. And dust mites. And did I mention myself? (I wonder if I could've added "sports" into my medical records - nah, someone would probably catch it, especially in the military. Anyway...) Yep. No matter what my mother did, I would always be allergic to myself. I was told to stay in air conditioning as much as possible, to mitigate my inhaled allergies. And I probably would have grown up in a bubble with a pocket protector, a scientific calculator, and a PhD in chemistry if not for one thing - I got weekly shots.

Now, when I tell people (mainly my friends and family doctor) that I had allergy shots, most of the time they tell me they have never even heard of shots for allergies. My current family doctor told me that de-sensitizing shots for allergies is a relatively new thing, and not yet generally accepted, so he was curious as to how I had taken them as a child (we'll just say it was about 30-ish years ago and not mention ages, shall we?) when they were recent additions to allergy treatment. And he asked me, "Were you part of a drug trial?" I told him I didn't think so, but it made me curious enough to actually make a mental note to ask my mom. The doctor asked if they worked, and I told him it did.

So the next time I saw my mom, I asked her. "Hey Mom, you remember when I was about 8 and had to go the emergency room?" I have vague memories of waking up, walking out to the living room where my mom and step-dad were, and telling them I didn't feel good. And then going to the hospital, jumping on the bed (after several Adrenalin shots, according to my mom) and no memories of coming home (after a Benadryl shot, also according to my mom) And then came the "cat less times." (Bye, Patches, I miss you! *sniff* *sniff* She went back to my Grandma's house.)

"You were seven, and yes, I remember rushing you to the hospital and thinking you would stop breathing before we got there." My mother practices "extreme panicking" in normal-to-somewhat-stressful situations, so I imagine her reaction to her 7-year-old (me) almost dying was bad. "Why?" she asked me while she shuddered. Mumble-mumble-odd years later and she still has a freaked reaction! It must have been a traumatic event. For her, of course. I barely remember it.

"Well, I remember getting shots for my allergies every week sometime after that. Do you remember if I had shots?"

"After the whites of your eyes swelled up and they had to be drained so that your eyeballs didn't burst, the doctor we were seeing at the time suggested it. Your allergies were so severe we had to carry an epi-pen with us everywhere we went, so you didn't die and all, so the doctor set it up."

"Was it a drug trial?"

She kind of gave me a strange and shocked look. "You know, now that you ask, it might have been. When we moved to different city, the doctor was somewhat upset and said we couldn't stop, so we had to go to a special clinic to have it done. I had to sign a lot of papers. I guess I never thought of it, but it makes sense now that you say it. It was free, the doctor said it might help you lead a normal life, so we did it. Why do you ask?"

"I participated in a drug trial? I never even knew!" And I was shocked. I guess it really made me think. As scary as having kids is, the thought that my kids would have to participate in a drug trial scares me more, and I empathized with my mom for just a second - 24 years old with a sick kid who could die from not showering 3 times a day if she didn't get these shots. I just really couldn't imagine having a child that was so sick that experimental drug testing or therapy sounds good. Nowadays, it just wouldn't happen because testing kids is really really frowned upon, if not outright banned. But at that particular point in time, Fire Starter hadn't come out yet. (By the way, fire starting would have been a useful talent. Shit, another opportunity missed!)

I'm just glad I've not yet been put in that position with my kids. I wonder what I'd do? If it's fall, it might take a bit for me to notice through all the allergy meds. Unless they got fire-starting abilities, I would probably notice that!

Things My Mother Said

2011-08-26T06:51:00.003-04:00

My mom is going to hate this post, but it's ok, I think I'll live. She has a tendency to freak me out, then go on as if it's business as usual. I totally hate that, so I tend to get even.

First story: I'm pregnant for my first child. She called me to see how I'm doing, and I told her I'm finally holding down food and not barfing as much, and my premature labor seemed to have slowed down, and my ankles weren't as swollen as they had been the first six months. She brings up someone I went to high school with: "Do you remember such-and-such?" After telling her I didn't, she asks if I know who he married, and I of course didn't. "Well, they just got married last year, and she was pregnant with their first child. She went into premature labor in her seventh month from pre-eclampsia, and they couldn't stop the labor."

"Oh my God, what happened?" I ask. I was in my seventh month... And my ankles had been awfully swollen lately....

"She had a heart attack, and died on the operating table!"

Ack! "Did the baby survive?" I asked her, after I had stopped choking on my drink, that is!

"Yes, but that poor boy is only 21, and now he's a widower raising a small child all by himself..." I hurredly got off the phone and made a will. Just in case, you know?

Next story: When my oldest son was about 8 months old, he was visiting Grandma (three states and 8 hours away!) and I got a frantic phone call: "He's choking on a hot dog, what do I do?!"

"Mom, do the Baby Heimlich," I screeched (and yes, I began running around in circles, on the phone, three states away. I remember wondering if I could make it there by car in time to save his life. It probably wouldn't have been a good time to tell me it wasn't possible.)

"What?" she said.

"Baby Heimlich, Mom! Do you know it?"

"No, and don't start throwing made-up words at me, now is not the time!"

*facepalm. "Mom, turn him upside down and pat his back very, very firmly!"

"He spit it out. Oh, thank God! Ok, I'll call you tomorrow," and she hangs up. Yes. She. Hung. Up. Sonofabitch! Well of course I called her right back, and she was a little snippy with me, like I was disrupting her day. Well, excuse the fuck out of me! I was just worried about my son. I talked to him on the phone so that I would be able to sleep that night. He didn't talk back (those were the days!) because he was only eight months old. But I felt better.

Next story: My oldest is (again) at Grandma and Grandpa's house. By this time, he's about 2, and has a younger brother. I'm at work, and I get a phone call: "His foot is caught in the chair, and I can't get it out! The chair won't break, and he's screaming!" I believe her, the screaming is so loud I can hear it over the phone.

"What kind of chair?" Armchair, dining room chair, electric chair, WTF? No, I don't really know why it mattered, it just did, ok?

"The kitchen chairs! I dragged him and the chair to the phone to call you... Oh, Grandpa's home," and she hangs up on me! Motherfucker!

Yes, I call her back: "Mom, what's going on?"

"Dad has the 'saws-all' out, I've got to go," and she hangs up again.

I pace for a minute, and call back again. My step-dad answers the phone, "Everything's fine, the slats have more room at the top, he slid his foot right out. I didn't even have to cut the chair up!" Fabulous. Now if my heart rate would return to normal, everything will be fine!

Now, don't get me wrong, I've gotten my own back at her. Many, many, many times. When Susan Smith drowned her boys in the lake, it was big news. I was in the military at the time, and I didn't really watch the news, since I might have ended up part of it, and I didn't really want to know that ahead of time. My two boys were about the same age as that crazy lady's kids, and I was having it hard, what with divorcing their dad and all. But there's my mom, the bearer of good news, calling me. Crying. "Just promise me if it ever gets too much for you, you'll call me!" she sobs.

"What? Mom, what are you talking about? If what gets to be too much?"

"I just want you to know, anytime you need a break, just call me! I'll come and get the boys, no questions asked! Just promise me you won't drown the boys!"

WHAT?! "What the fuck are you talking about?" I get the whole story out of her about Susan Smith driving into a lake with her boys strapped to car seats because she was divorcing and her new boyfriend didn't like her kids, and I am horrified! Both by the fact that it happened, and by the fact that my mother thinks for even a fleeting moment that I am capable of this! Ok, then I go from 'horrified' to 'pissed' in about 2 seconds, and I decide to get even. "No, mom, I would never do that. But I've got to go, the boys and I are going driving by a nearby lake."

"That's not funny!"

"Oh, yes it is! I can't believe you would think I would ever consider that! Have you lost your fucking mind?"

"Well, no, I don't think you would ever do that, but I just had to make sure you knew I would take the boys in a heartbeat if you need a break." Ok, there are better ways of asking to keep the boys for a while. Right?

She also called me when Andrea Yates drowned her kids in the bathtub. I had the three boys by that time (my youngest was one year old, my oldest was six) and she started out with a discussion about Post-Partum Depression. "No, I'm fine, Mom, what's up?" and she tells me. Again with this shit! I need to start watching the news so I'm prepared when major news involving children is unearthed. That way, when she calls, I've got my answers prepared. "No, everything here is fine, I was just gettting ready to give the boys a bath," would have had so much impact at that point, rather than asking what was up. Dammit! Another opportunity missed! But I'm sure there'll be another. I wonder what's happening in the news... -A

List of Toddler 'Tells'

2011-08-24T10:38:00.003-04:00

Tonight my youngest daughter (2 ½) decided that it was time her opinions and attitudes were taken into account. They have two large toy boxes in their room that she dumps out, turns on its side, and jumps on it like a trampoline. I don't have to tell you how dangerous that is, and since taking the toy boxes out would result in mass toy hysteria, cats and dogs living together, instead I have to try to get the concept of 'No!' across to her. This is important, she could get hurt, and anything that could hurt her qualifies her for spankings in my book.

I set this up with my older daughter, using the time-tested and true method of 'tattle-tale-ness' to find out what she's doing, and when she's doing it. My 4 year old took to this like a duck to water, since most of the time she's tattling on her sister anyway: "Mommy, Baby Sisser took my toy out of my hand!" or "Mommy, Baby Sisser is drinking from my sippy cup!" or even "Mommy, Baby Sisser took off her shirt!" (That one may come in handy later, that's something I definitely will want to know when she's 14 or so.) I heard her yell from her bedroom, "Mommy, Baby Sisser is jumping on the toy box again!" no less than 10 times.

Each time I ran in, and if she was just dumping the box, I gave her my stern face (what I call the 'frowny' face) and told her, "No, Daphne! Don't mess with that toy box!" And if she was actively jumping on it, I spanked her bottom. I probably spanked her 4 out of the 10 times. Here's the kicker - each time she laughed. She laughed. She fucking laughed! At me! I know she has a diaper on, but still, it had to at least startle her. Most times when toddlers wearing diapers are spanked, they cry out of surprise. Not this little shit, she laughed!

The last time I went in, she was climbing on the toy box, and when she saw me, she started to climb down. You absolutely can not tell me she didn't understand! She knew all right, or she wouldn't have tried to get down. That is number three of the six signs of toddler guilt right there, which proves to me she knew I would not want her doing it! So I popped her on the butt, moved the toy box back, and told her (with my angry face on) "No!"

Do you know what she did? This little... child started dancing! Standing right in front of me, she started fucking dancing, swinging her hips, and laughing - the whole nine yards! @!#$%^&!!! I just stare at her, while trying to maintain the mean-mugging face, and she reached up, grabbed the sides of my face, and kissed me! Then she laughed again, and kissed me again. Un-fucking-believe-able!

That was it! I had to leave the room, because after she laughed at me all evening, I was not going to let that 2 year old get the better of me by smiling myself! You may have won this skirmish, child, but I will win this war! I will burn those toy boxes if I have to, she is not, absolutely not, winning this! I have to get a better game face going though! I think it's time to potty train her....

Now, for those of you un-versed in toddler wiles, here you go:

Your Toddler Understands "No" When He/She:

1) Attempts to discard the evidence, such as throwing the remote to the floor when she is not supposed to be chewing on it. This also includes placing the object or items in question in her mouth to hide it and/or eat it when you walk in the room, and when she hides her hands behind her back when you walk into a room (If you ask her what she has, and she can talk, she'll say, "Nothing."

2) Hides behind the couch/beside the bed/under the table, and they were not playing 'Hide and Seek.' This is also one of the signs a toddler is ready for potty training, specifially when they keep getting placed on the toilet / potty chair to "do their business" but don't actually potty or poo, and then go and hide in a corner somewhere and squat. If she's hiding, she knows she has done something she was not supposed to do.

3) Stops doing the No-No action as soon as she sees you. This means that she wouldn't have done it in front of you, because she knows she's not supposed to do it.

4) Waits until your back is turned, and immediately touches whatever-it-is. Sometimes you just need to do a "Crazy Ivan." (If you don't know what that is, check Wikipedia. I'm not a fucking encyclopedia, there are computers for that.) Toddlers hate "Crazy Ivans."

5) Starts crying as soon as you say, "No," rather than after you have physically removed the forbidden object from him. This actually means he was directly ignoring your no-no rules and took the shit anyway!

6) Runs out of any room you walk into. That means he's got something he's not supposed to have. (Unless you're a jackass and beat the child senseless on a semi-regular basis. If that's the case, then he'll probably run regardless and this rule for guilt is null/void.)

Dieting (AKA Food Management)

2011-08-22T15:46:00.000-04:00

So we're in week two of 'The Diet' and strangely enough, I feel both hungry and full at the same time, which, if you think of it, is quite an oxymoron! (Dr. Poole is right, you're an ox, and a moron! That movie rocks! So many big-name stars!) Small meals (well, small to me is normal To everyone else, right?) and small snacks every 2-3 hours. I have never eaten so much! And yet, conversely, been hungry at the same time. Weird, huh?

Let me back up a bit, we decided (meaning I decided - yep, I'll say it!) to go on a diet. The honey and I are between 30-80 lbs overweight (and you had just better not be thinking I'm at the top of that weight range estimate, thank-you-very-much!) I've been a little chubby many years of my life (five kids can kinda do that) but in between kids, I've had bouts of svelt-ness. I want that back! I want my beach body, skinnier and lighter, where heads turn and best friends walk by and stop, grabbing your arm to feel for fat: "My god! You're so skinny! Are you puking?" (No, I wasn't, and yes, she really asked me. BFFs tend to ask the uncomfortable questions, that's one of her charms.) Anyway, I want my body back! And by god if I have to eat 9 times a day to get it, I will! It's called a 'Food Lover's Diet' but I guess familiarity does breed contempt. I'm finding out I didn't love food after all, it must have been just a passing fancy. Puppy love, if you will, and I'm really effing sick of eating!

So, we stocked the fridge with healthy food, and planned meals, and ... snack often. I have hypoglycemia, and this diet is playing havoc with my sugar. I think it works well with diabetics, but with hypoglycemics, not so much. My blood sugar drops at least three times a day, requiring me to eat again to get my blood sugar up. It's a vicious cycle, and I'm just not a snacker. I'm going to check into alternative snacks, and what exactly I can eat that will make it so I'm not shaky after an hour. I hate healthy food, it fucks me every time.

My honey was 'bigger' when we started dating, what with him being a weight-lifter type who eats like a gazillion calories a day! And yes, I'm so jealous! He physically works hard, unlike my job, which is mostly cerebral, but nevertheless, both of us can afford to lose a few pounds. He was not enthusiastic aout dieting, but I told him I would quit smoking if I lost 50 pounds. (And for those of you who pay attention, my goal is 30 pounds. Sneaky, huh?) He has a degree in physical therapy, and he sugar-coats it by calling it "food-mangement." Whatever you call it, it's making me nuts! (mmm, nuts, it must be time to snack again....) The difference between dieting and 'food-management' appears to be length of time, with dieting as a short-term solution, and food management as a long-term solution. I prefer the shorter term solution of dieting.

My honey tells me that his pants are falling off, and he's going to have to add couple of notches to his belt. I on the other hand have lost 3 or 4 pounds. (OK, 3. It's three, dammit, are you happy now? See, this diet makes me angry!) That's it! I am waiting for my svelt-tivity (svelt-ness, svelt-ivity. Whatever. Anyway) to return, and I want results. (The 3-4 el-bees don't really count since when we started the diet, I was 'bloated' but became ... 'unbloated' after a few days, and I think that's where the weight went. But I'm sticking through it, trying to become more by becoming less (catchy, it might go on a T-shirt! Hopefully, a smaller T-shirt...)

I guess I'm more of an 'immediate results' person, and this losing weight slowly by eating shit-loads of broccoli (pun intended) is wearing on my nerves. Oh, and part of this diet is supposed to involve working out, and the honey and I both agreed we're just not that into it. So, food-management for life, right? I started this for him dammit! I don't want to diet forever!

High Maintenance vs Princess-ness

2011-08-20T09:55:00.000-04:00

My daughter walks up while I'm watching History Channel and asks me how fish die. "Well, fish can die if they don't get water, because they breathe water, so if they stay in air, they die. And if you're fishing...well fish can die in other ways, too." I ended lamely. I am not talking about cutting off fish heads to my four-year-old, but sometmes my mouth goes faster than my brain.

"And fish can die if they don't have any food," she tells me.

"Well, yeah..." as I'm picturing emmanciated fish in my head. Gross and creepy, a two-fer.

"I want to have a fish in a bowl," she said. Don't we have enough pets? Where does she get this shit? Oh yeah, I remember where...

"Were you watching a TV show that had fish in a bowl?" I asked her.

Sometimes she comes up with weird ideas on her own, and when I ask her what she saw that made her think that, she tells me she just 'thought of it in her head.' But most of the time, she's seen something that makes her think of it, like last week when she told her dad she was 'high-maintenance' and I asked her where she got that word. "I just though of it in my head," she told me. Right! Because little girls just 'think' of words like that. Either 1) she's somehow plugged in to the 'conscious collective' or 2) She heard someone say that word. Like maybe to or about her. "High-maintenance" is a 'male' word, and not usually a compliment, and this makes me wonder where she actually heard it. Her brothers are going to be in some deep shit when I get ahold of them!

When I asked her what it meant, she said she didn't know, and I told her she wasn't high-maintenance just Mommy and Daddy's princess. "I like being a Princess," she told me, and I told her that I knew that! (She has never seen Inspector Clousseau in action, but her Dad has, and he laughed. Good enough!) Don't worry, I'll deal with her brothers later, but for now, back to the fish.

"Yeah and there was a fish, and water, and a bowl," she told me. When I asked which show she was watching, she hopped up and down on the couch and said, "Blue has a fish in a bowl, and she feeds it so that it doesn't die. Can I have a fish in a bowl?" She is then climbed on my lap after she asked me, and gave me 'huggies and kisses.' High-maintenance, indeed! Fucking Blues Clues! I used to like that show (for her, not me. Ok, for me too) but it seems it just gives her fodder for asking me weird questions at inconvenient times. Blue's Clues should be renamed to What Strange questions Will This Bring Up And Make Mommy And Daddy Answer. Too long for a title? Well, one can hope. Again, back to the fish.

"We'll see, I'll. Talk to Daddy about it and get back to you."

"Ok, can I have a drink?" as I get more huggies and kisses.

"Ok, honey," and I got her a drink. Hmm, does anyone know how to undo high maintenance?

Blame Game

2011-08-17T06:40:00.005-04:00

My youngest son is eleven, and has a bit of a weight problem. He has a perfectly legitimate reason in my eyes - he's allergic to cats, his step-mom has cats and refuses to get rid of them, so he's on an inhaled steroid and a daily allergy pill to control his allergies. You know, so he doesn't die or anything. (Bitch! Scream it at the screen with me. Have your toast handy a la Rocky Horror Picture Show.) Anyway, re-cap: 1) Steroids can make you gain weight, 2) he takes a steroid daily, so 3) he might end up a little chubby, with boy-boobs and a spare tire. I get it, and I don't let his brothers tease him about his weight, but I can tell it gets to him. He no longer swims without a T-shirt because he's self-conscious.

While he's at my house, I don't necessarily limit his calories, so if he wants cookies after dinner, he gets them. Not the whole package mind you, but if the child wants cookies, he can have cookies, and no skinny bitch is going to tell me otherwise! He's eleven, for Christ's sake, give the kid a break!

Now, if I've told my kids once, I've told them a thousand times, they can eat whatever catches their eye as long as it's not dinner time, but they had better eat it in the kitchen. My kids have heard it, my boyfriend has heard it, my family has heard it, hell, my neighbors probably think twice before taking food out of the kitchen - yeah, you could say my voice carries. And this is an issue I mention. Often. Well, everytime I find food in their rooms anyway.

My son, however, has gotten into the habit of hoarding food. And I hate it! But I'm in a bit of a pickle because although I don't want to hound him about food and food intake, I also don't want fucking ants in my house either (and he's been sneaking my frozen Snickers bars, which are mine and mine alone! I pity the fool who takes my last bit of chocolate when I want some! I am Mommy, hear me roar! And stay out of my shit!)

So, the boys are eating lunch, and I'm bitching about not having any chocolate, and my oldest son mentions (casually, in an aside, not like he's totally narc-ing out his brother or anything) that he found cookies in his brother's room. I flip my head around and ask my son, "Do you have food in your room, son?"

He gets this 'deer in headlights' look, and starts stuttering: "Uh... Well... Uh..."

"That's enough! I can tell by your reaction that you do. Let me put this very, very simply: you had better get every crumb of food out of your room right now because I am going in there in one minute, and if I find one single, solitary, food .... piece, I'm taking everything in your room that runs on electricity or batteries!" He's getting this Oh, Shit! look on his face that tells me I'm right, so I hammer the point home with, "That means your laptop, your TV, your Wii, everything! Now, move!"

He takes off, and comes back a few minutes later with cookies hidden behind his back. "Uh, Mom, where do you want me to put these?"

I get him a plastic container, and he puts them away, and I go into my diatribe about food staying the kitchen, and he says, "Well, Chris takes food upstairs all the time." I'm getting whiplash from this shit! I turn my head around to look at my oldest son, who chokes on his lunch, and starts glaring at his little brother. That little shit! Tattling on his little brother for what they're both doing! The rat!

He starts stammering now. "Well, I uh, occasionally take Ramen noodles upstairs, but, uh, I always bring all the dishes back downstairs, and uh, I never leave food ..."

I cut him off - "The same rule applies to you, Mister! Food gets eaten in the kitchen, not your rooms! This isn't the fucking Hilton, we don't have room service!" I am just too pissed by now to bitch at anyone, so I continue this ass-chewing mentally. Goddammit, I've got to put ant traps on the grocery list, this is ridiculous. One simple rule. Can they follow it? No! Sheesh!

My oldest son sees my middle son (15) walk into the kitchen, and throws heat his way: "Well, Greg's been looking at porn again on his PSP!"

"What?!"

My middle son (who has just woken up) stops in the middle of the room, and now he's got the 'Oh shit!' face going, complete with the 'I'm awake now, jackass!' look chaser. This is way better than reality TV! See, this is one of the reasons they can't hide anything from me! Thank God for the 'Blame Game' or I might never find out what they're up to! He says, "What the fuck, Chris!" and just waits to see what I'll do. He's always been a smart one.

"Chris, throwing blame at your other brother isn't going to get you out of hot water, buddy. You're still on my shit list! And Greg, was it pictures of girls or pictures of boys?"

"Moooomm!" he wails, "it was girls, okaaay!" and now he's pissed, and goes after his brother. I snag him before he can throw a punch and move him to a corner, dinging a mental bell. I swear, some days it's like herding cats!

But this one's easily dealt with: "If you have any questions about penises or vaginas, come ask me, don't look it up on the internet. Do we need to have the discussion about the birds and the bees?"

Sufficiently embarrassed and sulky, he sits down to eat breakfast. Life is back to normal when they're sulky. "No!"

"Well, if I catch you looking at porn I'm going to assume you have questions, and we'll be discussing sex, babies, childbirth, and condoms! And whether or not you have a girlfriend. If you don't want to have that discussion, I suggest you stay away from porn sites. Got it?"

"Got it," he tells me.

You just gotta love the blame game!

Pribacy, Please!

2011-08-15T08:26:00.002-04:00

This morning, "Crazy" (AKA Diana, 4 years old) and I had a discussion. Now, I understand that having a discussion with a four year old is kind of like arguing with a mirror, or talking to an Echo (she moves her head like me, she puts her hand on her hip like me, she repeats the last word of every sentence I utter. I'm telling you, those Greek story-tellers were talking about a toddler when they passed on the tale about Narcissus and Echo, I just know it!)

"Listen, Pumpkin, why don't you find your sippy cups?"I tell her as she walks in just as I sit down on the toilet. It's time she learns a little respect for the closed door. I mean seriously, nothing says, Mommy needs her MF Mommy Time! like That Time of the Month. I really cannot get into this discussion with her at 4 years old. Just ... no, absolutely not, no way. My luck, she's going to wonder where my 'owie' is and ... Just no.

"I already looked, and looked, and looked. I looked everywhere, but no sippy cup! I'm gonna need your help, Mommy!" ( We gotta find a pawprint, that's the first clue...) She gets this freaky shit from her kids shows. If I had a dick, I would tell Steve to suck it! I used to admire these shows, now they're just super-fucking-annoying! Bite me Blue! Here's a clue for you... Sorry. Anyway.

"Well, why don't you go see if Daddy can help you?" I ask as I desperately try to ensure my derriere is covering up the entire toilet opening - and she's trying to look in! (WHY?! I HAVE ABSOLUTELY NO FRICKIN' IDEA!)

"I need your help, Mommy! This is serious, you have to help me!" (Wonder pets, wonder pets, we're on our way...)

OK, now you've pissed me off! I am making plans as we speak to feed those Wonder Pets to the dogs! "Honey, just go in your bedroom and look for it. Mommy'll be out in a minute, and then I'll help you find your sippy cups, OK?"

And I swear I saw her ears perk up. Wait a minute, I've seen that look before - it's the one that says, Mommy is hiding something. Like cats, dogs, and probably every small animal on this earth, she senses weakness and calculates her best possible zone of attack. She is Riki-Tiki-Tavi, just waiting for her moment to strike. And ... Yep, it's now - "What are you doing, Mommy?" she asks, still trying to look in the commode behind me. Do you know how uncomfortable it is to sit where you cover the entire toilet bowl? And how in the fuck did she get it that fast? Am I that obvious? Or is she just that smart? I know which I hope, but I just don't think I'm that lucky.

"I'm going potty, sweetie," I answer.

"But why do I need to leave?" she asks me, which proves that she is smarter than she lets on.

"Mommy needs privacy for just a little bit, then I'll come in and help find your sippy cup, OK? I just want privacy for few minutes," I tell her, a little desperately. Why didn't I lock that GD door when I closed it? This whole fiasco could've been avoided entirely if I'd just locked the stupid door.

"Pribacy?" she asks. "What's 'pribacy' Mommy?"

"People who want pri-va-cy want to be alone for a while, that's all."

"But, why does peoples want to be alone?"

"Well, sometimes, when peoples -I mean people- are going potty, they want to be alone. Don't you want to go potty by yourself?"

"No, I don't want pribacy, I want you with me, Mommy, so that you can wipe my butt." Why did I have kids again? Oh yeah, as my mother told me once when I was complaining to her - It's the fucking you get for the fucking you got. Get used to it. I know, poetic, right?

Back to our regularly scheduled program: "Well, the boys need privacy, I need privacy, Daddy needs privacy. You don't come in when Daddy goes potty, right?"

"No..." She knows somehow she's losing this fight, she just can't quite see it yet.

"Well, Mommies need privacy too sometimes when they potty. And Mommy really really wants privacy right now. So go on outside and close the door." She walks out crying a quiet little whine, closes the door, and stands right behind the door, crying just loud enough for me to hear. The Whole. Frickin. Time. When I'm done, she comes back in, stops crying, and it's like nothing every happened. Un-fricken-believable, she can turn the tears off at will!

Later that evening, her Dad and I are verbally bouncing her back and forth (Why don't you go ask Daddy to get you a drink? Why don't you see if Mommy will let you play on her scream? [AKA iPad]) and I come up with a brilliant move: "Tell Daddy what 'privacy' means."

"Pribacy is when peoples want to be alone!"

"Yes, but it's pri-va-cy, not pri-ba-cy."

"Pri-ba-cy."

"Pri-va-va-va-va-cy. Vee vee vee vee."

"Pri-va-cy."

"Right!"

There's got to be a children's show about 'privacy,' right?

Boobies Act II

2011-08-03T07:30:00.002-04:00

My honey and I are thinking about a going on a diet. Actually, he's thinking he'll change my mind, and I'm thinking this time next year, I'll be pre-babies-body. We'll see. We've tabled the discussion for now, but in another week I'll bring it up again. And again. And again. Weight loss through Chinese Water Torture might just work. So, we're sitting in the living room in between 'discussions' when my little intuitive (or lucky) child popped in with her opinion:

"We only show our boobies to boys."

This statement, coming out of the blue as it did, kind of took me by surprise, and it ... took me a second to process. Then I swallowed my drink before I could spit it back out again. "What?! No, honey, we don't show our boobies to boys. At all. Never. Ever." She had just got back from an extended stay at Nana's, and I really hope boobies were not the main topic of conversation, because her mixing this shit up will get me some strange looks from my mother-in-law. "Boys can't see boobies. Especially your boobies. Got it?"

"But my brudders see my boobies!" she tells me with absolute seriousness. And I know exactly what she's talking about because the other day when we were in a hurry to get ready and drop the girls at Nana's, I changed her in the living room. Even though the boys were in the kitchen, it evidently made my mini-me nervous. That's a good thing, right?

"Well, but they're you're brothers, and brothers don't really count," I say. Changing her shirt in the living room might not have been the best decision, in retrospect. Note to self: start making her change in the bathroom - if she's old enough to object, she's old enough to change clothes by herself, even though if I'm not right there she'll take a freaking half-hour to change her shorts. *sigh* One more milestone passed on the road to adulthood - self-consciousness. "Just remember, girls don't show boobies." A life lesson to live by, one that I might enforce with death. Oh, not her death, no! I'm not a monster. Yet. "That's why we wear shirts," I tell her.

"But Daddy has boobies," my little shit-stirrer tells me as Daddy is walking by without his shirt. "And peoples see Daddy's boobies." DOH!

So Daddy jumps into the conversation with, "Daddies don't have boobies, only girls, honey." He sounds a little miffed, and I can tell that by the look on his face that it'll be a while before he goes without his shirt, because she's looking at him with a are-you-really-trying-to-sell-me-that-shit look, since we can both clearly see some 'boobage' on Daddy...Oh yeah, we are so starting that diet next week!

"Okay," she tells me, with doubt in her voice.

"And pants, too. Girls always wear pants," Daddy adds for good measure. Quick thinking, Daddy.

"Yes pumpkin, that's why Mommy always wears a shirt and pants," I say. Anything to end this conversation! Where is that proverbial hole in the floor, I need to rest.

"Not always, Mommy. I see your boobies."

"What? When?" I say, thinking frantically, Shit! I thought they were sleeping...you know, I'm reasonably certain this is how Genesis got started. With discovering nudity. And apples.

"In the shower, Mommy."

"Oh, honey," Whew! "Well, showers are to get clean, and clothes get in the way, so everyone showers without clothes."

"Okay. Can I go brush my teeth?"

"Fabulous idea, pumpkin, go ahead!' And as I look at her dad (unobtrusively looking at his 'manboobs' and trying not to get caught) I ask, "You don't think she told your mother that do you?"

"I guess we'll hear about it if she did," he tells me, and goes to get a shirt. Yep, perhaps we should both go on a diet starting to tomorrow... Nothing like getting called out by a 4-year old to jump start your weight-loss regime! Bam!

Poo Et Al

2011-07-31T09:24:00.000-04:00

This next subject is a little ... strange.

Toddler poop habits. Yes, toddler poo. Maybe I'm strange, but with each of my kids, I have never been able to avoid noticing their poo as I change their diapers, and remarking on abnormities. I picked up this habit when my youngest son was in diapers, because he bit a toy, got a hunk off of it, and we had to watch his diapers for about a week to make sure he passed it. (Yes, the 'old wives' tale' about being able to pass a LEGO is true. As is the one about DUPLO's, FYI.)

That's when I discovered that my boy was like the goose who shit the golden egg! I found all kinds of change (dimes, quarters, pennies) when I changed his diaper because he was sticking them down his diaper! (In case you were wondering: dimes, yes, pennies, sometimes, quarters, no.) See, somewhere in his toddler brain, he had decided that since I was looking for something, and appeared disappointed when I didn't find whatever I was looking for, he would help me out. So he stuck toys, change, and other "found objects" down his pants, which I then 'discovered' in his diaper and made lots of noise! Don't ask. Really. I'm just glad he was too young to understand swear words, or repeat them at inoppotune times. Incidentally, I found out he was allergic to red dye #5 this way when I changed his diaper and there was RED POO all through his pants! I thought he might be bleeding internally, but when I rushed him to the doctor, he said no, not blood. He just wasn't digesting red dye #5. Phew! Same thing with blue and/or green poo, no blue or green dyes, respectively. Did you know that if you don't digest red dye, your shit turns the color of arterial spray? I didn't either. So yeah, I'm a poo-watcher for good reason. My heart rate did eventually return to normal.

"What did you feed this baby for lunch?" I asked last week, as I'm gagging on the putrefied smell of evil emanating from a small package. The diaper, not the baby. "How does all this shit come from such a small package?" Seriously, I think she swallowed a Bag of Holding, and is slowly emptying it in her diaper. No one believes me, though.

"Grapes and the normal stuff, why?"

"No reason, just wondering." Woo, that's a stinker. Note to self, find other fruit that doesn't smell like rotten death after it's gone through the digestive tract. Next time, I'm setting her sippy cup next to Daddy, so when she reaches for it, he thinks she wants picked up. (Our little game, which we lovingly call, Who touched her last? is what we use to determine who gets to change her diaper, since he always beats me at rock-paper-scissors, which is a fucking game of chance! I should win at least half of the time! As it turns out, babies (and anything associated with babies) don't understand statistics, and evidently know nothing of odds. Stupid statistics! Hmm. I have to teach her to play odds, too! It figures. Does nothing come naturally to babies anymore?

In this game, though, I have an advantage, because she absolutely adores Daddy and he's always her first choice to climb up on. Bonus! "You touched her last, you get the diaper!" I cackle happily, which means that I refill sippy cups, not suffocate on the smell of rancidness. Yes, CPS-judgmental-person, I had to make a game of it, because after 5 kids, no thinking person describes diaper-changing as "fun" in any way, shape or form. Well, not a sane thinking person, at least, and I still sort of call myself "sane." For now. Only history will bear out whether or not I'm correct. But I digress...

I've even got my honey's mom to play the What the fuck does yellow shit mean? game, too. For a while, back when her Grandma was watching her every day, her bowel movements were a source of concern, since she only shit once every other day or so (oh, I so miss the days when not all baby formula was iron-enriched!) and the best the doctor could tell me to use was prune juice, which cleared it right up (as long as she would drink it) so that problem was solved, but now that she's not on formula, her daily hide-in-a-corner-and-grunt times have increased gradually to 3 (or more) times per day.

So now, I have to ask: how many times a day should a toddler go "two-sies" and completely saturate her diaper to the point where the diaper is just begging to burst at the slightest touch? Can her 3 times a day be healthy? I know kids in general can get dehydrated from diarrhea, so I tend to count her poo-filled diapers, looking for a tell-tale liquidity. I know, I've heard the statistics (from her dad): that a person with healthy bowels should go after each meal, but seriously, who shits that much?! I angst daily over bowel movements, so I must be neurotic, right? Too much, too little, too often, to seldom... when does it end? Or does it?

My honey told me not to worry, he goes at least 3 times a day. What?! "Well," I tell him, dangling her sippy cup over his shoulder, "we know where she gets her shit from then, don't we?" She runs to his arms to reach for the sippy cup, and he picks her up.

"You touched her last!" I yell as I dart away. If I'm too slow, he tricks me when she reaches for me. I'm a sucker for Hol' me, hol' me hol' me! spoken in a toddler voice, it fucks me every time, and I get the rancid-baby-byproducts. Not today, though, HA! I have outsmarted them both, so there!

"Oh, and I fed her bananas, pickles, and yogurt for lunch today. Have fun with that! How 'bout some prune juice, pumpkin?"

Potty Training

2011-07-28T08:19:00.002-04:00

My 4-year-old child is mostly potty trained (and in my head, I hear Billy Crystal from The Princess Bride.) 'Mostly potty-trained' equals 'mostly trying.' If someone asks her if she has to go potty, she'll go in the bathroom and go potty, than call, "Mommy, I need you!" which translates into, "Mommy, come wipe my ass!" This is my life, ass-wiper extraordinaire. Yay. (And by the way, even 'number ones' require my butt-wiping expertise, because if I don't she'll use a whole damn roll to wipe some pee off her ... female parts. Side note: I agonized for over a year over what to call her female parts. I polled my friends and colleagues on what 'that area' was to be called, since I didn't want to use 'twat' or 'va-jay-jay' to my first little mini-me. I actually waited so long that she ended up calling it her 'front' because she just didn't have any frame of reference to call it. We/I settled on 'crevice' as in 'cracks and crevices.' How sick is that?)

So, morning routine: I get home, let each dog out (separately,) make coffee, change clothes, and go to the bathroom all by myself (because God only knows when I'll get to go into the bathroom alone again! Bullets would probably be easier to dodge than my children.) By this time, the munchkins are awake, so I find their sippy cups (windowsill and toybox usually) change the baby's diaper, and get her breakfast around. Then I go back in the girls' room and tell Diana to stop pretending she's asleep. "Where are your pants, child?" As if I didn't see them lying on the floor next to her bed.

"Is Daddy here?" she asks me, still huddled under the covers. Daddy yells at her when she potties in her pants, especially if she took off her Pull-up in the middle of the night.

"No, Daddy already left to go to work."

"I had an accident, Mommy," she whispers at me. Like this doesn't happen every day! (And I'm thinking in my head, An accident is something that happens while you're sleeping, and taking off your Pull-up means you thought about going potty enough to remove the Pull-up, then stand in front of the toy box and pee yourself. How is that an accident? That's sounds like 'intent' to me! But I don't say it, I'm pretty cranky in the mornings.)

And I tell her the same thing every morning, "Well, go in the bathroom, go potty in the potty chair, and put your dirty clothes in the laundry chute. Don't forget to throw your Pull-up away, and then we'll get you some new pants."

She also has to announce her potty-chair needs, ("I feel like I have to go potty!" she'll sing out from her bedroom.) Then wait for a response ("Then go potty!" her dad and I yell in unison) before she acts on them, ("Mommy, I need you!") which seriously delays her 'potty-training achievements.' "You know, pumpkin, you don't have to tell us each time you have to go potty, just go ahead and go."

"Ok, Mommy," she tells me. But each time, she yells out, "I feel like I have to go potty!" and each time, we yell back, "Then go potty!"

Lately though she's actually been going potty when she wakes up, instead of waiting to let us know. And her pull-up is dry. Amazing! Maybe she is getting closer to actually being potty-trained, and not 'mostly' potty-trained.

"Mommy, I need you!"

Well, 'mostly' potty trained is mostly good. Right?