Non-Maternal Instincts

You know you have a toddler when . . .

His forehead (and elbows, knees, shins, and hands) require you to constantly tell of his most recent tumble simply so that no one suspects you of child abuse.

Your husband comes home from a long day at work and says, "Somebody's been sitting in my chair." (Shh, don't tell.)

You experience a moment of, "Oh Dear Lord, I've lost my child!" only to find him giggling away right under your nose.

You find him watching cartoons from the most unusual of surfaces.

And in the most uncomfortable of positions.

Once again, you think that you have lost him and will surely find him knocked unconscious somewhere in your house only to find that he's wiggled his way onto the back porch and is having the time of his life.

He begins to emulate you. (You might find this to be cute at first, but it soon becomes frightening.)

Your dining room table was last seen in 2008 and can now be found buried underneath this:

You begin to accumulate items such as this:

You often find your dog communicating to you, "it wasn't me this time, I promise."

Your once well-fed dog has given up on eating and drinking for fear of what he might find in his bowl.

So instead, he has retreated to this:

Non-Maternal Instincts

Originally posted in January, 2009



Irony.

I had an epiphany this week.

Motherhood and pregnancy don't mix.

Ironic, dontcha think?

Ironic but oh-so-true.

Here are only a few reasons why motherhood and pregnancy don't mix:

1. At the exact moment when my son is having a complete meltdown, I am also having a complete meltdown. Together we are crying and screaming, "da-da." Usually "da-da" isn't home, so we end up getting funny looks from the dog.
2. Poopy diapers make for a LOT of gagging. At least once a day, I am a reflex away from puking all over my son.
3. Constant hunger means that I am constantly nibbling on devouring my son's food. On the average day I consume a 1/2 box of goldfish, a cup of Cheerios, several packages of fruit snacks, a box of macaroni and cheese, a value-size Hershey's bar (not my son's, but if I pretend that it's my son's, I don't feel so guilty eating it), a couple of Nutri-Grain bars, loads of watermelon-flavored yogurt, animal crackers galore, a value-size Hershey's bar (What? My dad was raised in PA; it's in our blood), and enough cut-up fruit to feed my ever-expanding gut. And that's only what I eat off of my son's plate. That doesn't include the five "real" meals that I eat everyday. As I quickly resemble Violet Beauregarde after she eats the three-course meal chewing gum, my son is beginning to resemble the flytrap plant in Little Shop of Horrors ("feed me").
4. It is not exactly safe to "watch" a child while falling asleep. Let's just say that I spend most of the day attempting to NOT fall asleep. I might have woken up to my son pulling down the blinds yesterday. I'm pretty sure that wasn't a dream (as evidenced by the blinds on my floor).
5. My son has begun this thing where he hits me. Not in a mean way, just in a hey-I-know-how-to-make-noises-when-I-smack-my-hands-against-your-body kind of way. Pregnancy makes my chest tender. Combined with my son's new game, my chest is VERY tender.

Dear Lord of Creation,

I know how much you love irony (Abraham and Sarah, David and Goliath, The Book of Job), but motherhood and pregnancy? Really, God?

Okay, fine, joke's on me. But wouldn't it be cool if pregnancy turned moms into these super-human creatures, like unicorns, who could defeat the monsters under the bed while creating another little monster deep inside their bellies. Wait a minute? That's basically what I am doing. I am a super-hero to one baby (two if you count my husband, and yes, he does count) while miraculously creating another baby (yes, Lord, I know, that's your miracle, not mine. Shout-out to the Big Man).

Okay, fine, I get it.

I am super-human, and there ain't anything ironic about that! {wink}

Non-Maternal Instincts

Originally posted in December, 2008

It only gets worse.

I didn't think that it was possible to toss my maternal instincts aside any farther, but apparently, I was wrong.

No, my son isn't becoming an absolute terror. Yes, he's nearly nine months old which means he's mobile and getting into everything, but surprisingly, I think it's cute (as long as he's not pulling my I-just-spent-an-hour-organizing-these-piles-of-bills-and-mail off of the coffee table. And why would I pile important papers in my son's reach on the coffee table? Because I'm the mom, and I can do whatever I want).

No, my son actually has nothing to do with the complete downward spiral of my sweet and cheery disposition (if only my husband posted comments to this blog; he would most definitely assure you that my disposition is most always sweet and cherry {cough-cough-ahem}).

So why am I going from, "ah, that's my sweet little boy," to, "#@%#*&# just leave me alone!" in 3-2-1? You haven't guessed yet? I'm pregnant.

Yes, it's the little dime-sized creature living deep inside my lady parts that is driving me to locking myself in the bathroom - for months.

As my most adorable growing baby boy hits milestone after milestone (Did he just sit himself up? Wowsers! Is that another tooth? Yowzers! Could that be "da-da?" Woot!), the mere bean of a being that is only going to make me fat (don't even get me started) wrecks havoc in my lower abdomen causing me to react quite unusually (Oh, great, he's sitting up? Better build a cage. Oh, dang-it, another tooth? I've had enough of this drool bucket! Oh, cute, "da-da"? Who birthed this child? And all I'm hearing is the name of the person who doesn't have the first clue what it's like to be nauseous and fat and bloated and BLAH!)

So just when I thought I'd turned a corner (Christmas is only days away! I should be full of good cheer and well wishes), I learn that my body is yet again being taken over for the sake of another so-called blessing. Bah-humbug.

Dear Lord who only asked one thing of Eve (DON'T EAT THE APPLE!),

I would really like to speak to her, if I may, "Girlfriend, what were you thinking? Because of your stupid fall-into-temptation, us uterus-bearing wo-men are stuck feeling like absolute crap! One stinkin' apple? Was it worth it? Was it the best-dang-tastin' apple you've ever bitten into? Because I'd kill to enjoy a bite of anything right now without having to make a run for the bathroom. Instead of enjoying the vibrant life cruisin' around my living room, I'm spending my days teaching him to hold back my hair as I hug onto oval-shaped porcelain. Thanks a lot."

But Lord, honestly, I am thankful to have another baby growing inside of me. I'm trying my darndest to remember to be grateful in all things. But would you forgive me if just this time I gave thanks only after I flush my lunch down the toilet, because it is in those few moments that I actually feel human again, at least until the next wave of I-think-I'm-gonna-blow hits.

Non-Maternal Instincts

Originally published in December, 2008

Cherries, cats, or penicillin?

Thursday night, as I was lifting my son, I noticed a blemish under his shirt. Not thinking much of it, I lifted up my son's shirt, and HOLY CROW! What is this? What in God's name is going on here?

My son's usually smooth and pale-peach belly was covered in dots! He was spotted! My baby boy's spots were bright pink, round, and most importantly, there were hundreds of them!

I rolled up his pant legs, and spots! I scrunched up his sleeves, and spots! I pulled down the neck of his shirt - spots! Spots! Spots! Everywhere!

They were overtaking him. And I had no idea why.

Fever - nope. Was he itchy - nada. Respiratory symptoms – nothin’. Just stinkin' dots everywhere.

So naturally I freaked out. And then I checked his temp again (no fever). So I freaked out some more.

And amidst all the freakin’ out, I managed to narrow down the causes of the mystery dots to three things: cherries, cats, and penicillin.

He had cherries for the first time on Thursday. He pet a cat for the first time on Thursday. And just a couple days prior to Thursday, he was on a penicillin-laced antibiotic.

But after speaking with everyone and their mother (and my mother, and my husband’s mother), I (we) decided that the most likely cause of the mystery spots was the antibiotic.

But, crap. That’s scary, right? Because after the hives comes shortness of breath and then comes wheezing and then comes anaphylactic shock and then, AHHHH! This is scary stuff.

Not to mention my son’s belly looks like a fourteen-year-old boy’s face during wrestling season. Minus the pus. Thank God there’s no pus.

But he’s spotted. Very spotted. And I want my smooth, pale peach baby back.

Dear Lord of all things pure,

HELP! My baby boy is covered in spots! Have you seen him? It’s bad, no? And please don’t tell me it’s not, because I don’t want to turn into one of those moms who freaks out about the littlest thing and all her friends roll their eyes because, “oh, here she goes again, freakin’ out because the baby sneezed.” Too late, you say? Darn.

But this is worth freakin’ out about. Did you ever find Baby Jesus covered in spots? Can you ask Mary? What did she do? Because her baby was perfect. I mean, my baby is perfect. But her baby was perfect-perfect. So was she freakin’?

The nice lady at the pharmacy recommended an oatmeal bath to soothe my baby's spotted skin, but I’m leaning toward holy water – got some you can sprinkle across his belly? Thanks, that’d be great.

Oh, and before I forget. Thanks for holding off on the pus. Which reminds me, is it to early to start praying that my son never comes home with any of that?

Non-Maternal Instincts

Originally published in December, 2008



The very heavy cost of leaving the house (if you dare)

I'm not one of those sit-around-my-house-and-watch-soap-operas kind of moms. Nothing against you Susan Lucci followers, but that's just not my thing. I need, I mean really NEED, to get out of the house everyday, at least once. It's my sanity, plain and simple. And because I have a seven month old, he tags along.

When we I leave the house (let's be honest, my son is merely being lifted from point A to point B - I'm the one trying to catch some fresh air), I resemble one of those street performers who balances a truckload of items on his head, hands, and feet while dancing a jig. Except I don't have a tip jar in front of me. I should work on that.

Getting out of the house isn't what is used to be. Before the baby, if I wanted to run out for a frozen slushy, I could be in my car, down the street, and slurpin' away in a speedy eight minutes.

But venturing out with my twenty pound companion ain't what I thought it'd be. Because venturing out with a twenty pound baby actually requires venturing out with an additional fifty pounds of crap very important and delicate baby things.

Like at the airport, there should be a weight limit to what my son can take with him on our little outings. If he goes over, than he must sacrifice something. The problem is, how do I make my son sacrifice necessities like food and hygiene? It's not like when I go over the 50lb. suitcase limit and have to find a creative way to carry-on eight pairs of but-I-must-take-these-with-me designer shoes (BIG joke - designer shoes are a thing of the past, back when I was running out for slushies, you know, the good 'ol days). Not to mention, getting out of the house with this twenty-pound dumbbell now requires as many trips to the car as I take to the bathroom in a day (It's important to note that I have a small bladder).

And it's inevitable that I'll forget something. Actually, several things. Have you ever forgotten an extra set of clothes and wound up on the other side of town with a baby who, um, had an explosion and is now wearing an overflowing diaper with poo down his legs and up his back? Yeah, that's fun. That's called learning a lesson. A major lesson.

So I suggest creating a checklist. Type it out, copy it a few dozen times, and have it handy the next time you are crazy enough to leave the house.

Heck, don't create a checklist. Let me do it for ya!

Here's the how-to-survive-an-afternoon-out-of-the-comforts-of-home checklist (I'm starting to think staying at home watching Days of Our Lives is a much better alternative after all):

• Diapers. Lots of diapers.
• Booty wipes. Just keep a stash in the car. I use booty wipes for a lot of non-booty issues.
• Booty cream. Butt paste. Whatever you call it.
• Purell. Keep this in your pocket at all times. And if you don't have a pocket, stuff it in your bra. You never know when one of those strange smelling old biddies is going to insist on touching your child.
• Pacifiers. Yes, I mean multiple pacifiers. You will drop one, and you will lose one. It's universal law.
• A baby bottle. Unless, of course, your baby is breast-feeding. I lasted four months. I tried to last longer, I really did.
• Baby formula. Again, unless your baby is breast-feeding. And PLEASE, if you are a member of the La Leche League, I don't want to hear it.
• Snacks. Lots of snacks. Snacks for baby and mommy, because snacks make baby and mommy very happy.
• At least one extra baby outfit, but why not pack two while you're at it?
• Baby blankie. Because babies need blankies. They just do.
• Sling for wearing your baby. Unlike what the Motrin Ad proclaims, we momma's wear our babies out of necessity, not fashion (okay, and for bonding, but let's be real, being able to "hold" baby while hands-free is a Godsend).
• Stroller. For strollin'.
• Lovey or soothie or whatever it is that your child MUST have OR ELSE . . !
• Tylenol. You will get a headache. That's part of motherhood. Deal with it.

This certainly is not an exhaustive list. So then why am I so exhausted?

Dear Lord of all things primitive,

How did we go from simplistic cave dwellers to stuff-infested creatures of stuff, stuff, and more stuff? How did we go from Baby Moses floating across the river in a basket to Baby-give-me-more floating across the sea of junk apparently required for baby's survival?

I sure have no idea.

Actually, I do have an idea. Remember the time you turned that fish into a meal of plenty? Let's try that again, but instead of a fish, I'll bring one baby item and you can turn it into everything baby needs in that moment. Wouldn't that be fun? Because not only would it make my job as a mother more efficient, but it would really save me a trip to the chiropractor's office.

But if I must lug around 20lbs of baby plus 50lbs of his junk everyday, can't I at least lose a pound or two. I mean, would it be so terrible if I actually used this baby lugging as a form of exercise so that I could stop feeling guilty about the dust accumulating on my treadmill? Okay, fine, I lied. I don't have a treadmill, but you aren't going to hold that against me, are you?

Ah, forget it. At this point, what's a bit of junk in my trunk on top of all this baby junk?

Non-Maternal Instincts

BMB - Parenting skillz that will save your life.

I'm not above bribery. I'm not above manipulation. And I'm certainly not above blackmail.

I'm a mother and a wife. Aren't these the skills that mothers and wives have learned (out of necessity, of course) to do frighteningly well?

Before you judge me, take this quiz.

1. Have you ever said to your child, "If you eat the disgusting dinner I nuked in the microwave nutritious meal I graciously prepared, then you can have a scoop of the ice cream that I bought (only because I had a coupon - do you really think this green momma would buy her children ice cream just because? Okay, yes she would; she's not above that either)?
   
2. Have you ever said to your husband, "Wow, you really are getting stronger. Is that definition that I see penetrating your beer belly flat abdomen? Oh, by the way, I spent $65 on shampoo, but like I was saying, you are looking so buff these days." (But in my defense, I get my hair done for pennies because my sister is a stylist, so I can splurge on fancy shampoo, dang-it)?
3. Have you ever said to the members of your household, "If you dare tell a soul about Mommy's little chin hair problem, I will post these pictures across the Internets like nobody's business" {flashes pictures of the boys playing with sister's Barbies}?

If you answered yes to these questions, and you know you did, then you, like me, use bribery, manipulation, and blackmail as a means to always getting your way lifesaving parenting tools. 

So the other day, when my son was a bit fussier than I wanted to deal with, I pulled out a special treat that some might argue is inappropriate for a young child of his age (and they call themselves experts; what do they know).

A bright blue sugar ball on a stick (also known as a sucker).

And boy, did it work!

"Look, Mom, I'm happy now."

You know it's good when you drool blue.

"See, Mom, sugar and sharp sticks in the mouth make everything better."

"That was delicious, can I have another?"

"What do you mean it's all gone???"

"No more? Say it ain't so."

So what I didn't prepare for was the even fussier baby I would have after the sucker was all sucked away. 

I never said that bribery, manipulation, and blackmail never backfire. 

But what I am learning is that when my mad parenting skillz do backfire {swallowing pride}, I simply need to be prepared with another equally deceptive brilliant form of BMB (bribery, manipulation, blackmail). 

Caffeine-laden, cotton-candy-filled chocolate marshmallows, anyone? 

Non-Maternal Instincts

Originally posted in November, 2008

Sleepless in Columbus

I'm about to lose my mind. Actually, I lost my mind. It is {poof} gone. Please let me know if you find it. I need it back.

I have now lost track of how many nights in a row that I slept like ___ (the word I want to use here is not appropriate. Forgive me, Lord).

Okay, so I'm not sleeping well. I have a sick baby who wakes up needing tlc in the worst way, and I am sick which means I hack and I sniff and I hack and I don't sleep. And my hubby is sick, which is a curse because on a healthy night, he snores HEAVILY. Throw in a stuffy nose and chest congestion - oh my good golly! There aren't words to describe the noises that come from him as he sleeps. If you were to peek in our windows at night, you would find me in bed with my mouth half-open (because I can't breath out of my nose because I have kleenex shoved up my nostrils) and drool running down the side of my mouth. And before you could even spot my hubby - you would hear the horn of a semi-truck blowing in your ear, but it wouldn't be a semi, it would be my hubby snoring.

And how is it possible for a baby to wake up three times during the night and still not sleep-in the next morning? If I slept like absolute crap you would have to blast a blowhorn in my ear to ever wake me up. But not my kid. During the night, he wakes up every other hour, yet he is still bright-eyed and babblin' at the crack-o-dawn. The problem is that I am a walking zombie. This morning when I made his bottle, I dumped the entire scoop of formula on the floor because I missed the bottle by six inches. I'm not joking. Ask my husband. He found formula dust all over the ground where I tried to mop it up with my sock because I was too exhausted to clean it up properly.

And instead of calmly going down for his morning nap, my baby fusses and screams and arches his back and shoots snot rockets out of his nose for what seems like HOURS until his snotty-faced-rosy-cheeked head nearly pops off and he collapses because he has no more energy left to continue his fit.

In fact, as I type this he is screaming in his crib although I am sure that I will check on him soon because listening to him scream is adding to my desire to leave this place and find a fancy, expensive hotel bed with 1000 thread count sheets {falls into a daydream consisting of a fancy hotel bed, a deep tissue massage, a warm bubble bath, and hot chocolate via room service} {Bbwwwaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhh - nevermind, daydream OVER}.

And I cannot sit another day in a house that is a disaster. I just can't seem to work the vacuum as I am wheezing and hacking and sticking tissues up my nose. But if I could only find the energy and ability to lift a dustrag or just any old rag {hey, what about that sock I used to wipe up the baby formula?} then maybe I'd find my mind that's lost in this mess.

Dear Father of the Heavens {ahh, Heaven, that sounds, well, heavenly},

How did it get like this? One minute I was writing with my pink, sparkly pen in my flower-scented journal about the wonders of being a girl and falling in love and having a jet-setting life, and then BAM! I'm surrounded by poopie diapers and snotty noses and sleepless nights and, well, I've lost it. Can you help? Please? I need my sanity back. I'm sure you know where it is. Can you just give me one little hint? Is it here, under this pile of dirty laundry {peeyou - what's that smell} or maybe over here behind this stack of loud and obnoxious light-up toys {Motrin, please?}. Maybe, just maybe, you could give me that special "snap" like Mary Poppins has so that I could clean this place up in a jiffy and my family could all take a spoonful of sugar and we'd be happy and healthy and clean and sane once again.

Non-Maternal Instincts

To all the parents who have ever said, "you better like it or else."

Shortly before the birth of our son, my husband got on a bike "kick". Thank the good Lord that it wasn't a motor-bike kick; hubs simply became obsessed with buying a good old-fashioned manual bicycle. He had wanted a mountain bike for some time, and when a friend of a friend of a friend was able to score him a deal on a Trek, my husband got all goofy and started researching bikes and talkin' suspension and motion control.

To my amazement, the friend of a friend of a friend pulled through, and my husband became the proud owner of a fancy Trek mountain bike.

Side note: We live hundreds of miles away from any mountains, I'm just sayin'.

And because I feared that our now newborn baby might take a back seat to my husband's latest obsession, we started talking about literally making the baby back seat to the bike.

It must have been meant to be, because only weeks after the baby was born, I found a you-won't-believe-it deal on a bike trailer at a baby sale. It was insane - I spent $40 on a gently used bike trailer that retailed for well over $200. Ching!

But the deal-of-a-century was soon subjected to a year of collecting dust in our overstuffed garage as our little man was too tiny for his pumpkin carriage.

Until now.

Last weekend my husband strapped on the trailer, mounted the Trek, and explored the Central Ohio landscape with his mini-me in tow.

Well, not exactly.

Actually, this is what ensued when our now big-enough baby boy was placed in the $200+ mint condition you-better-like-it-or-else bike trolley:

So much for "Weeee, isn't this fun?"

But because we are horribly cruel parents, we tightened the harness and slammed the hatch gently closed the see-through plastic covering. My husband wasn't about to let a few baby wails stop him from an adventure that he'd been dreaming about since I came home with the $40 steal.

And guess what? After the initial shock and trauma subsided, our little fusspot was calmin' down. Heck, he was even starting to act as if he was enjoying it.

Could it be? Could he really have taken to the box on wheels so quickly?

Yeah right. It looks like the trauma shocked him right to sleep. Oh well. This kid's got all summer to get used to it. Or else . . .

Non-Maternal Instincts

A picture's worth a thousand screams.

Recently my lil' dude and I gathered with seven of my girlfriends and their equally small children (12 collectively; the oldest three; the youngest three weeks) to permanently dye babies and destroy boiled eggs decorate Easter eggs.

Have you ever been in a room with 12 children ages three and under?

I'm not talking about in a calm and controlled daycare setting. No, I'm talking about mommy-is-having-adult-conversation-and-interaction-for-the-first-time-in-days-so-leave-me-alone-and-go-play as we shamelessly turn our heads when we glimpse our 12 small children picking each other's noses and cramming each other's heads through the stairway rails.

If you've been there, then you know what it's like to be trapped in a cage with feral monkeys, flying feces and all.

So when someone announced, "Let's get a picture of all the kids together," I immediately thought, five-months-pregnant or not, where's the booze?

Not to mention, said photo session was to take place AFTER we dyed our children orange, fed them sugar-stuffed sugar cups, and let them rip each other's hair out. Oh, and did I mention it was naptime?

So a shot of Easter juice later, I placed my darling-beyond-belief 12-month old on the couch among the 11 others.

Have you heard the phrase, shoot hit the fan (or something like that)? Well, shoot hit the fan. But the instigator wasn't the colicky newborn or the feisty diva, it wasn't the fussy two-year old or vomiting infant, it was:

MY Mister beautiful smile, happy-go-lucky, life is jolly, baby boy.

Go figure.

So as I scooped up Mister Nightmare, all I could do was shrug my shoulders and say, "more Easter juice, please!"