Just call me Mother of the Year

Joseph lulled me into a false sense of security. When he was little I could give him a stack of books and he would be busy for hours stacking them and lining them up. He never got into things he wasn't supposed to. He didn't like the taste or texture of most foods so he never tried to eat anything he wasn't supposed to. I knew this wasn't typical behavior for kids but I guess I never gave a lot of thought to what is typical for kids.

Elle is typical. She likes to explore. She likes to get into things. She like to try new things out. She like to eat. She likes to taste new foods. She can be a little bit sneaky when she's trying to get away with something.

That false sense of security I built up with Joseph came back and bit me in the butt yesterday.

Elle and I were in the backyard. She was playing with a bucket and shovel and I was working in the garden. After a while Elle got bored and asked if she could go in the house to get another toy. Normally I would have gone in with her but I was up to my elbows in dirt and weeds and grass clippings so I decided just that one time to let her do it herself. After all, she's three and a half, it should be ok to let her out of my sight for a couple of minutes in my own house right? Right?

Not more than three minutes after going inside Elle came back out with a couple of toys from her room. She played and we chatted while I finished up my gardening. After about 45 minutes we headed inside and Elle made a bee line for the candy basket. From somewhere inside of it she pulled out a box of chocolate laxatives. I don't know why they were in there, I didn't even know they were in there. I laughed and said "Oh no Elle, that's not candy!"

"Yes it is!" she cheerfully responded. "I eated some already."

I look inside the box and sure enough, an entire bar of laxatives is gone. Elle ate twelve times the adult dose of laxatives then neatly closed up the box and threw the wrapper away. Then she went to her room, grabbed a toy and came outside to where I was gardening. And I didn't even realize she had done it.

Once I realized what she had done my jaw dropped to the floor. She looked so pleased with herself that a tiny part of me wanted to laugh but first I had to be sure she wasn't seconds away from shooting her intestines out at a high rate of speed.

On the back of the box it says "In case of overdose call Poison Control immediately."

A bunch of thoughts ran through my head. If I called would they yell at me for stupidly storing laxatives in a candy basket? I probably deserved it. Would they laugh at me? I probably deserved that too. Would they send someone to my house to take the kids away since I can't supervise them properly? Would this all go on my permanent record?

I put my worries aside and called Poison Control (after looking up the number on-line*) and explained the situation to a very nice man named Dave. Dave didn't yell at me or laugh at me. He was friendly, calm and informative. I was frantic and nearly in tears when I called but Dave put me at ease right away. He told me Elle would be ok but that we would probably want to stock up on Pedialyte and diapers (our precarious potty training situation has been shot to shit by this incident). The main thing though was that he reassured me Elle would be all right.

She has been all right. Oh, don't get me wrong. It's like a poop tsunami around here. Elle seems no worse for the wear though. In fact, she thinks it's just grand that she gets to drink special "teddy bear juice" and have her mama fuss over her. She's happy as a clam.

I feel horrible though. What a stupid, stupid thing to have happen. It goes without saying that the laxatives should not have been in the candy basket. I don't know how they got there but that doesn't make it ok. I shouldn't have let her go into the house alone. I just should have been more careful all around.

Edited to take out some real Debbie Downer stuff. Sorry about that.

It's hard to feel like a successful parent when your kid is sitting on the potty chair and drinking her 4th Pedialyte of the day.

* Toll free at 1-800-222-1222. As for Dave. He's very nice.

Four years ago today Joseph was spooky.

Did I say I didn't want to humilate my kids?

Today when I picked Joseph up from school his teacher walked him out to the car. She said "Joseph wanted me come out here with him so that I could be here when he told you something very important about his day. He was worried you might be upset so he wanted me here to explain things to you if he couldn't."

Of course I was a little worried when I heard that. What could be wrong? Was someone mean to Joseph? Was he mean to someone? Did he get in trouble? What could it be.

I looked at Joseph and he looked at me, his brown eyes as wide as dinner plates. He looked at his teacher and she nodded, encouraging him to speak. "Mommy!" he said very seriously and in a voice loud enough that one might want to use it if one wished to be heard over the sound of an airplane taking off nearby "I had a really bad stomach ache today and so I went to the bathroom and I pooped. And it was a big poop. A very, very big poop. Now I feel better. I just wanted Ms M here so that you wouldn't get too worried."

I glanced at his teacher and she was nodding as though she agreed that this was a very serious issue. She has been a teacher for a long time and has apparently perfected the skill of looking very serious when presented with something very ridiculous. I have only been a mom for eight years and and I have not perfected this skill.

So I stood there and I tried my best not to laugh. I tried, I really did. I'm sorry, he was so worried about the size of his poop upsetting me that he had to bring his teacher out for moral support? How do you keep a straight face when that happens? Thank goodness Joseph is not really very good at picking up on subtle facial expressions and I don't think he notices that I was milliseconds away from bursting out into hysterical laughter. I waved him into the car and then stood there on the sidewalk and giggled for a moment.

Then I got in the car and drove home. All along the way I kept glancing in the rear view mirror and smiling at my sweet, sweet boy. My darling boy who worried that a story about poop might upset me and who wanted to protect me getting upset. That kid is something else.

One year ago today Elle was cute and her hair was really short.
Four years ago today I had fun in the ER with two hot doctors. I had also not yet discovered spell check.

She's got a point

Yesterday Elle was kind of whiny and crabby and when I asked her what was wrong she said "My poopy has points in it and it pokes me when I sit down."

I guess that would make me crabby too.

One year ago today Joseph was a heathen.
Two years ago today I thought fruit murder was funny.
Three years ago today Joseph was spooky and I wanted him to kick someone.

Will poop for painkillers

When I was a kid I knew that telling my mom that there was something wrong with me was always going to get the same reaction from from her. It didn't matter what the complaint was - stomach ache, headache, nosebleed, ear infection - the response was static. She would lean in close, get a serious look on her face and in a low voice ask "Do you have to go to the bathroom?"

I don't why this was her go-to question. Maybe it's something she heard as a kid*. Maybe she once had an ear infection caused by constipation and she was worried that someday the same thing would happen to me. All I know is that I was asked this same question well beyond the age when anyone should have been asking me that. When I was in middle school I brought home a note from the school nurse stating that I had scoliosis and needed to be seen by a doctor. My mother read that note, eyed me suspiciously and then said "Do you need to go to the ba-"

"No!" I cut her off. "I've pretty much got a handle on this toileting thing now and anyway I'm pretty sure no one has ever been so plugged up that it caused their spine to curve."

Once I grew up and got married I figured I would never again be asked about my bowel movements. Especially since I married a man that thought I never pooped. Once, few months into our marriage I went into the bathroom to do what you do in the bathroom and I guess I was in there a little too long. After a couple of minutes Jesse came knocking on the door to see if I was all right. I wish I was exaggerating. I don't know if her knew before that day that everybody poops.

When I recently went to the ER because my post-op pain was so bad I got an x-ray to check and make sure nothing was amiss internally. The doctor reviewed it and then came to talk to me. "Well" he said with a very serious look on his face "There's some stool visible in the x-ray."

I considered pointing out to him that wasn't possible since I was laying on a table when they took the x-ray and not sitting on a stool. Before the words could make their way out of my mouth though I realized he was talking about the other kind of stool. (Is there a grosser euphemism for "poop" than "stool"? I think not.) "We'll give you more painkillers" he promised "but first we're going to give you an enema."

I felt like I was a kid again. Was my mother working in the ER? Certainly they were not suggesting that I was in the much pain because I had to poop. They couldn't think I was that out of touch my body, right? I mean, I knew that the pain I was feeling was less a "I have to poop" pain and more of a "someone made four incisions into my body and cut part of me out" pain. But the lure of more painkillers made me agree to the enema.

A little while later a woman in lime green scrubs and cat's eye glasses wandered into the room. She had the device in her hands. "Roll on your side" she said brightly "and we'll get this thing going!"

I'll spare you the details of what happened next. I will tell you though that at one point she patted my shoulder and said "You're doing just great!" I thought about saying that my ability to get an enema was one of the first things my husband liked about me when we met but then I worried that she would think I was serious and then she might think weird things about me and I didn't really feel like taking the time to explain that it was all just a joke. After she was done she left with the instructions to hold it as long as I could but to roll from side to side as much as I could. Since rolling back and forth hurt so much Jesse came and stood by my bed to help me. He helped me roll my bloated, sloshing body to one side and then would count down the seconds until it was time to roll back the other way. That man must really love me.

Fifteen minutes later I shuffled across the hall into the bathroom to do what you do when you have an enema. Jesse wanted to come in with me but I believe that the secret to a good marriage is a little mystery so I made him wait in the hall. When all was said and done I didn't feel any better. In fact I felt much worse but at least then I got another shot of painkiller.

After the enema failed to make me feel any better the doctor threw up his hands and said "You shouldn't be having this much pain! You might as well go home because there's nothing else we can do for you!" (Yes, that's really what he said.) The hospital's mission statement is "We improve the health and quality of life for the people we serve in a manner that reflects the healing mission of Jesus." I think they should change it to "Jesus! That's a lot of stool you've got there! We'll help you poop it out but if that doesn't work then we're fresh out of ideas."

I left the hospital that day a little wiser, a little emptier and a lot more certain that if I ever again have to go the ER, I'm going to poop at home first.

*I'm betting this is the cause. There seems to be a family history of poop fascination. When I was a kid I loved to look through my grandma's recipe box. Stuck right there in the middle of recipes for Glorified Rice and Jell-O Salad was a recipe marked "diarrhea". Every time I would find it I would laugh and laugh and laugh. My grandma would always get mad and yell "It's not a recipe for diarrhea! It's a cure for it!" but I wouldn't care because when you're ten years old there's nothing funnier than finding the word "diarrhea" in an old lady's recipe box.

Ho ho holy crap!

Elle would not nap today. I put her down in her crib when she was very, very nearly asleep. Just like clockwork I heard her chatting and throwing her babies out of her crib 5 minutes later. I had promised Joseph that I would play a computer game with him while Elle was napping though so I figured she could just have some "quiet time" in her crib while Joseph and I played together.

Half an hour later Elle is still chirping happily away. I decide to go up and get her and oh, what a wonderous sight was there for me to behold. Elle was minus her pants and her diaper. She waved to me cheerfuly and oh my god, what was that all over her hands? And what was that smell? And why was there a SMUSHED POOPY LAYING ON THE FLOOR?!?!?!

Children, the gift that keeps on giving.

Like a rhinestone cowgirl

Several days ago Elle ate a rhinestone off of one of her little girly hair bows.

I found it this morning.

I wish I could say that I just threw that diaper away without a second thought but that's not the way it went. I debated long and hard about taking a picture of that bejeweled poop. You know what made me decided not to do it? Not good taste or common sense or a sense of respect for my daughter's privacy. It was that I knew I wouldn't be able to get a good picture of it with my current digital camera.

I've added a new camera to my wishlist down there on the left. I'm sure that very soon all my regular readers (all 2 of you) will be chipping in to get me that new camera so that I can start bringing you more high quality, high class pictures. Yes, I expect that you'll be getting right on that.

Anal retentive blogging

I've gone back and cataloged all my posts. Now if you read a post of mine about poop (for example) and you find yourself wondering what else I have to say about poop you can just click on the little "tag" at the end of the post and it will take you to a list of all my poop posts. It was kind of fun to do. I re-read pretty much my entire blog. I realized that my kids and are sick a lot, that I don't talk about Jesse much unless I'm complaining about him, that I say my kids are cute really often and that I talk a lot more about Raven Symone than I thought I did.

Busy days

Man, between Joseph's birthday festivities and 4th of July stuff I feel like we've hardly even been home the past 4 days. Some highlights included:
- Joseph getting so overwhelmed with opening all his presents that he had to whisper "Focus, Joseph. Focus!" to himself over and over.
- Joseph getting so overwhelmed by everyone being at his party that he had to run around and give everyone a hug and a kiss. This included Becky's boyfriend who he had never even met before.
- Joseph getting so overhwhelmed by the whole party experience that he had to gush "Thank you for coming everyone! You have no idea how much this means to me!".
- Joseph and Elle falling asleep during the 4th of July fireworks.
- Finding out that I did not lose my camera.
- Seeing Elle and Caden attack a plate of orange Jello.

All in all it's been a fun few days. It's nice to have nothing to do today though. We're all just going to take it easy this afternoon. I've got to go though now because Elle is sitting in her high chair and shooting me looks that say "Are you ever going to notice that I'm stinky?"

Different day, same old....

We need to move. I'm so tired of people in this neighborhood thinking it's ok to let their dogs shit on the sidewalk in front of my house and then just leave it there. Fricken lowlifes.

I got a very nice call from the good folks at Red Lobster today. They wanted to be sure I was ok after the little bout of food poisoning I got there yesterday. Also, they asked me about a million questions to get all the info they could in case I decided to sue them after their shrimp scampi caused my internal organs to liquify and come shooting out of me at a high rate of speed. You know, now that I think about it I bet they didn't even really care how I was feeling after all. Bastards.

It's been a day

You know the kind of day where your 6 month old poops so much that it comes out the top of her diaper and as you're trying to take her shirt off she wiggles around and the poop ends up in her hair? Then she grabs your hair and she has poop on her hands so then you have poop in your hair too? Then as you're cleaning her off she poops even more? Then, when you think she's all clean you realize she has poop in her ear?

How about one of those days where after the poop fiasco your 5 year old sits on the porch and dumps an entire new bottle of bubbles all over himself? Then, as you strip him down to his underwear every person in town walks by and he keeps screaming "I'm a bad person!"? Then, you go to put the bubble soaked clothes with the dirty laundry and you hear your kid on the porch singing only when you get closer you realize that he's not singing, that he's really standing on the porch in his underwear yelling "penis" as loud as he can over and over?

You know those kind of days? You ever have one? Someone please tell me that they've had this kind of day before. Please.

What a day

Elle was sitting on my lap today wearing just a diaper and she had the cutest little toot ever. Before I could even think "That was the cutest little toot ever" I felt somethng warm on my legs. I lfted her up and there was poop all over my lap. It was everywhere, running down my legs even. How in the world?!?! I looked at her and she just smiled happily and chewed on her hand.

As I'm cleaning her up Joseph yells from downstairs "Agh! I dropped my juice box and juice sprayed all over!" The joys of children.

Letters to......

An open letter to fans of Raven Symone;
You are spelling her name wrong. I spelled it wrong when I bitched about how she was helping to ruin Disney and now you're finding my blog by spelling it wrong when you search for her. If you're one of the 5 people or so a day who comes to my blog via a search for Raven Symone then let me answer any questions you may have. No, I do not know if "Raven Symone is coming to Canada". I don't have any "Raven Symone baby pictures". If you're one of the people who came here looking for "naked Raven Symone pictures" then you are a pervert and you need to have your head examined.
Thank you

antipodean,
G'day mate! Is that how you say it? I should come to visit you, I already speak the language. Aussie Aussie Aussie, oy oy oy! I bet you never get tired of that!
Cheers!

FuriousRose,
Fear of pooping while giving birth, bringing cool people together since the beginning of time!
Rock on my friend

Tom Cruise,
Shut it dude. No one cares about your stupid theories on depression and doctors or anything else. If post-partum depression could be cured by vitamins don't you think a real doctor would have figured that out by now? And it's gross the way you tell the press that you've "tucked away" you child bride so that no one can "get at her" before she gives birth. In a darkened room. With no pain medicine. Without being allowed to make a sound. Nice life asshole. You're as bad as Sean Penn but at least he can act.

Rusty Yates,
There is no punishment harsh enough for what your wife did but if I had my way you would be right there with her in jail. At least she had the excuse of being mentally ill, what's your excuse? Here's a tip: If your wife has a complete and total mental breakdown, the thing to do is get her some help, not take her for a walk on the beach. (You could have at least had Tom Cruise over to give her some vitamins!) If your wife is recovering from severe psychosis caused by PPD it is not a good idea to decide to have a 5th child. Just for future referrance.

To the general public,
If you value your health then don't come near me. I have pink eye for the second time in 2 weeks. I've had this same cold for about 3 weeks. This morning I coughed up something that looked like a piece of lung. I'm a walking health hazzard and the 100 times a day that I wash my hands does not seem to be helping. I'm a modern day Typhoid Mary only less deadly and I wear jeans.

Odds and ends

Let's see, what's new?

When Elle was born they did a hearing screening on her and she failed in her left ear. We went in Thursday to have it redone and she passed in both ears this time. She didn't like the test at all though. The way it worked is they stuck this probe in her ear and it made an echo and then the echo showed up on a chart on a computer screen. I was wondering how they were going to to that. I pictured her sitting in a little booth raising her hand whenever she heard a tone.

Elle had a doctors appointment a couple days ago. She weighs 12 pounds now. She's in the 95th % for her age. Funny, since Joseph was probably in the 5th % when he was her age. Anyway, the doctor says she looks good and she's obviously "thriving". I love the code words that they come up with for "fat" when it comes to babies. From now on when I look in the mirror and start to feel bad I'm just going to tell myself I'm "thriving".

I had a meeting with Joseph's teacher today. She said they really enjoy having him in the class and that he's a "delight". She also said (much to my joy) that he seems to be making friends. She said he gets along well with everyone in the class. She said he seeks out kids who are more verbal but that he plays just as well with other kids too. She said there is one little boy in the class who has some developmental delays and Joseph has taken a real interest in him. Not suprising since Paula (Joseph's teacher last year) always said he took on the caretaker role in class. Today as we were out driving Joseph started to talk about the little boy that his teacher had told me about. He said "[Little boy who's name I forgot] is a good listener now. At first he wasn't but now he is. He was just a little fussy before." I thought it was interesting that he was interested in how the other kids in his class were behaving.

He's such a nut though. The other day he brought home a piece of paper that said "Joseph" and "Jaiden" on it. When I asked him what it was he told me "My freind Ashely helpled me make that. It means we're married now." Today he was talking about Jaiden again and I asked him why he wanted to marry he. He told me it was because he was in love with her. Silly question I guess. I asked if she loved him too and he said "Well, she smiled at me one time ..... I think that means she's in love with me."

Oh yeah, one more Elle story before I forget. I was nursing her and she made a couple of small tooting noises. When she was done eating I noticed a little damp spot on her outfit. I assumed it was just a little bit of pee that leaked out so I went to change her. As soon as I started to unbutton her one-piece outfit I could see that there was something horribly wrong. She had poop from her armpits to her knees. I don't know how it happened but she was just coated in the stuff. I seriously just wanted to button her outfit back up and pretend I hadn't seen anything. Ah, kids are fun.

Good point .... or is it?

Gwen pointed out that Charmin wet wipes are a good thing because they help you get clean. As she put it "If you got poop on your hand you wouldn't wipe it with a dry tissue would you?" Good point. Or is it? The problem with that is that I don't do things like prepare food with my butt. I mean, not unless it's a special occasion.

The straight poop

Early on in my blog I talked about how my biggest fear about giving birth was that I would poop on the table. Ok, so here's the thing about all that. I can honestly say that after about 3 times pushing I stopped caring if I pooped or not. By the way, if you are one of the few people in the world who knows if I did or not, please never, ever, ever tell me. To be perfectly crass, I didn't care if poop or diamonds came out of me as long as it would hurry things along.

Anyway, the important thing here is that I learned a really valuable lesson in all this. The fear I had of pooping while giving birth would end up being nothing ...... compared to the fear I would develope of pooping after giving birth.

Happy Easter!

I hope everyone had a good Easter! Joseph had us up at 7 for the Easter egg hunt. He had a good time, it was lots of fun to watch him.

I have to return to the subject of poop again for a minute. My mom told me that she knew someone who was giving birth and her husband was really into the whole thing, pushing along with her. He pushed so much that he pooped his pants. Haha! I guess there are worse things than pooping on the table after all. Man, that makes me laugh.

The dreaded poop talk

Ok, so a few weeks ago I was blissfuly unaware that many women, err, went while giving birth. Then I saw it mentioned in a magazine article. Then I read about it in some information that they gave me at the doctors office. Then I read a whole essay about it in a book Becky got me. Why did no one tell me this before? I suspect that if more women knew this there would be a lot fewer people around.

This has become my biggest fear about giving birth. Squeeze an entire person out of my body? Sure, no problem! Expose myself to an entire room of strangers? Bring it on! Just please, please don't let me poop while giving birth.

I have a plan though! I am going to stop eating sometime during my 37th week of pregnancy. Sure, I may get a little woozy but at least I'll be worry free during the delivery.

Ok, now that's off my chest and I can move onto nicer things. Not a touch of morning sickness today and I ate a piece of chocolate and it actually tasted good. Maybe that's a sign that things are returning to normal. The bad news is that I have such a craving for cheese wizz and double stuff Oreos (not together) that I can hardly stand it. I'm also craving pot stickers with spicy broth from Animal Kingdom. Too bad I don't know anyone who works at Disney World and might be able to track down the recipe for me.......

Blech

The morning sickness appears to be back with a vengance. I seem to be falling into a pattern of feeling pretty good for a day or two and then just getting knocked on my butt.

There was some stuff I wanted to talk about including my recently acquirred knowledege that half the women giving birth poop on the table while doing so but I'll save that for another time. Be warned! The poop talk is coming.