Mom Skills

My best friend and fellow blogger, Nadine, had her first baby a few days ago. She ended up having a rather unexpected c-section, so she's been in the hospital since her adorable new daughter's birth. I've made an effort to go see her as often as I can, and on Wednesday night, that meant dragging my own kids along.

The juxtaposition of being a veteran mom crowded in a small space with my own two children and a tiny newborn baby and her newly minted mommy cued me in to a few things I hadn't realized before.

Let's call them mom superpowers. It sounds better than "shit I can do without really thinking about it now that I've been chasing around rugrats for 5 years straight". Here are some skills I didn't realize I had until that day, in that room, with that sweet new baby:

Split-Second Decision Making: I guess I should be more specific. I have in no way mastered the art of making MOST decisions in any sort of highly effective manner. It's really just ONE extremely specific decision that moms with multiple children learn to master. The decision of who to drop (spoiler alert: it's always the bigger one!).

You see, there comes a point when your toddler is in the "reachy, grabby, HOLD ME ALL THE TIME OMG NOW" phase, and it always coincides exactly with your older kid's "who does that bitch think she is, I WAS THE BABY FIRST- HOLD ME" phase. And sure, you try to be fair. You try to hold them both (because obviously this is not an issue of fairly split time. It's about wanting to be held at the exact second your sibling is being held). But there will come a point, dragging your two kids around the house, where one of them starts to slip and you gotta make that decision. Who do you let slide out of your grip and ever-so-gently ... you know, drop on the fucking ground? Anyway, that day with my kids, holding a much tinier baby than my own, Alex got the drop for probably one of the first times in her life. Sorry kid. Maybe you should talk to your sister about your obvious feelings of betrayal.

Mind Reading: There are certain instincts as a parent that you develop about your kids. You become really familiar with their temperments, their personalities, and what you can expect of them in almost any given situation. For example, I fully expected it when Caitlyn started loudly sobbing into the microphone in the KFC drive-thru because her mean, mean mommy was getting chicken for dinner instead of the McDonald's she so desperately wanted and definitely deserved. I might as well have fed her the tears of her baby sister, for the way she reacted to that great injustice.

Anyway, I realized how fine-tuned this skill had become while we visited baby Elizabeth. Everyone knows you have to be really careful when you introduce a toddler to literally anything and everything even slightly more fragile than they are. Toddlers are gods of destruction and they are not to be trusted. That said, to call Alex a bit precocious would be a huge understatement. Alex is well advanced for her age and she can and does understand and follow direction most of the time. So while I was certainly cautious about letting her touch a newborn baby, I also knew I could explain to her that she had to be gentle with her new cousin. And she was. But as it goes with toddlers and impulse control, that did not stop her from getting momentarily distracted and forgetting the rules. It was a split second decision she made, to try to rip the baby's face off, but I saw it coming. My mom Spidey sense perked up and her little hand and inexplicably constantly razor sharp nails hadn't even made it halfway to the baby's delicate face by the time I stopped her.

And I've saved the most important skill for last, of course...

Ability to Tune Out a Screaming Child: In my loud, frantic world, I didn't even realize this was a skill I possessed. I suppose it's one thing to tune out an individual loud noise without it so much as interrupting your conversation. It's a little harder when you're getting it in stereo from two kids, while simultaneously being asked to resolve whatever the fuck is making them screech at each other in the first place. The little one snatches the big one's toy. The big one starts whining and snatches it back. The little one starts crying while the big one gloats at her obvious size advantage in the toy snatching game. The little one starts pawing and grunting at you because she's upset. The big one starts justifying- "but she took it from me first!"... and eventually you tell everyone to shut up and threaten to take all the toys away if they don't both knock it off.

But that's not really my point. In the relative quiet of a hospital room, where the big one was quietly playing with my phone and letting me coo at the new baby and chat with my friend, it was easy to ignore the little one, who was clearly jealous that I was holding another baby and screeching and whining and grabbing at my legs because she wanted me to pick her up instead. I barely even noticed it, until the new baby also started crying and Nadine- who was clearly exhausted, stressed, and trying to get to know her own baby's cues and needs, not to mention recovering from a c-section- gave me her best "please make it stop or I'm kicking your entire family out of my room" look. I picked up Alex and did manage to calm her down. But I couldn't help but think it was a little funny how I barely noticed it, while Nadine had clearly been pushed to the brink of insanity by the two babies crying in stereo. It's an acquired skill, I guess. You spend so much of the first few months of your kids' lives trying to figure out why/stop them from crying that it doesn't even occur to you that sometimes you can just pretend like you don't hear it.

I suppose I'll end on that spectacular piece of parenting advise- "if your kid is screaming, just pretend like you don't hear them".   

 

Baby Bunny: The Many Ways My Second Child Has Made Me Realize I Was Crazy When I Had My First

Baby Alexandra was born on December 3rd.

I have to admit, I wasn't really looking forward to having a newborn again. I know that sounds terrible, but it's true. In part, I blame my sister, whose new baby boy was born at the end of October and whose Facebook feed after his birth was a train wreck of miserable-sounding updates about how whiny and difficult her new baby was.

It got me thinking about Caitlyn's first few months on this Earth. I would never say she was a bad baby, but I do remember feeling overwhelmed by her needs. She seemed to always need something- a bottle, a diaper change, a burp, non-specific comfort. Add to that sleep deprivation and the fact that she wouldn't latch so I was pumping my breastmilk every 2 hours, and it felt like a never-ending cycle where I didn't even have time to take a shower. And I had help back then. Rodolfo and I were living together, and he brought his parents to stay with us for the first month after Caitlyn was born.

So I was thinking of all of this. Of the neediness. Of not having someone always around to help. Of having to do all that newborn baby, needy meatloaf shit while simultaneously taking care of my 3 year old. And I was a little freaked out.

And then my new baby came and I realized all that freaking out was for nothing. She's totally sweet and easy and mellow. Also? I realized that I was kind of a paranoid fucking crazy person when I had my first daughter. Here are some other lessons I learned:

1. Taking a shower isn't negligent parenting. No newborn baby ever died/was ruined for life because they woke up during mommy's 10 minute shower and cried for a few minutes while she was busy washing crusted breastmilk off her nipples and making sure her c-section incision didn't end up infected because she hadn't showered in a week. Also? That hilarious nonsense where I'd put Caitlyn in her bouncy seat and bring it into the bathroom with me just to be sure she didn't smother herself in her crib while I showered? No thanks. She couldn't even fucking move. What did I really expect was going to happen? And another thing about that- if the baby starts crying while I shampoo my hair, I'm not going to stop shampooing my hair out of guilt (and you can only really hear them crying if you bring them in the bathroom with you anyway). Wait 5 minutes kid, I promise you'll survive.

2. Everyone thinks you are a moron when you have a newborn. And I'm not just talking about well-meaning old grannies on the street who want to tell you all the ways in which your baby isn't warm enough. I'm talking about the very first people you encounter after having the baby- the hospital staff. Man, do they ever think you're an idiot. And the first time, they are sorta right. As a first-time mom, I remember listening so intently to every ridiculously obvious piece of advice they gave me at the hospital. Sure, a lot of it seemed like common sense, but in the same way, a lot of it was stuff that never even occurred to me to think about. This time? Did I really need to attend the "mandatory" class the hospital expects you to take before you leave? Thanks, but I already knew that I shouldn't leave my newborn on a counter and walk away. I already knew that I should burp her halfway through a feeding. And, presumably everyone attending this class has been tending to a vagina on a regular basis for a minimum of 15-20 years, right? What grown ass woman needs it explained to her that she should be "wiping front to back" when changing diapers? Because really, that's just a delicate way of saying "you know you shouldn't smear shit into your infant daughter's vagina, right?". WE SHOULD ALL KNOW THIS ALREADY!

3. Neediness of the baby variety is significantly less impressive to me this time around. As I said, with Caitlyn, it was a big transition going from doing whatever the fuck I wanted to constantly putting the needs of another person ahead of my own. It was overwhelming. Now? Well, I have to say, the needs of my 3 year old greatly outnumber the needs of my newborn. The baby? Food, sleep, fresh diapers. That is literally it. Sometimes she wants to be held and sometimes she's got a fart stuck in her belly that she's trying to get out, but other than that, she needs very little from me. Caitlyn, on the other hand, needs more than just basic life necessities. So in addition to having to make sure she is fed, clothed, and bathed, there are about a million other needs she has: Every single toy she sees on a commercial, for example (or Bulova watch on a billboard, for that matter. She's in an I-want-literally-everything-I-see phase). A glass of water the exact moment my head hits the pillow to go to sleep. Chocolate milk in her Happy Meal, even though I explicitly asked her multiple times and she insisted she wanted apple juice. And those are just some physical needs. Her emotional needs are endless and I'm expected to solve every existential crisis of her 3 year old life- why is the sky blue, what is that dog doing to that other dog, why can't I have a lollipop before dinner, why do I even have to eat dinner, why can't I look at my vagina in a public place, why does his mommy let him do stuff that my mommy doesn't let me do- WHY ARE YOU SUCH A MEAN MOMMY?? In the end, I'll do anything for my girls. That's what I signed up for when I signed up for being a mom. It's just funny in retrospect to think about how overwhelmed I was by providing only the most basic of needs for a cute, smooshy little meatball that couldn't even move (let alone throw a temper tantrum, or actively disobey me) when I put her down somewhere.

4. Sleep deprivation is another thing that was utterly jarring the first time around. Now? Well kid, I haven't had an uninterrupted night of sleep in 4 years, and you're out cold 20 hours a day. Come at me. I can handle it just fine.

5. They aren't as breakable as you think they are at first. Caitlyn's first few months were smooth sailing. At worst, I think she had a bad rash once or twice. I remember when she was about 6 or 7 months old. I had been clipping her fingernails, but I couldn't find the baby nail clipper, and so I made the poor choice to use a grown up one. You know where this is going. I clipped the tip of one of her fingers. Not like I clipped it off, but I cut it enough that it was bleeding pretty steadily for a solid 10 minutes. I spent those 10 minutes in absolute hysterics, begging Rodolfo to take us to the emergency room. And because I was clutching onto her, sobbing like a lunatic and cursing myself for being the cause of the first real pain she had ever felt- the "worst thing that had ever happened to her" by my own assessment- she was hysterical too. When I called my mom and asked her to please convey the seriousness of the situation to Rodolfo, she told me "maybe you need to calm down and listen to your husband. Because based on what you are telling me, I really doubt that you have to worry about her bleeding to death from the tip of her finger.".

I think back to that, to how laughable her "injury" was and how terrified I was that she wouldn't survive it without medical intervention, and I realize how far I've come. I was never really the hysterical type, and once Caitlyn started walking and injuring herself every 12 seconds or so, I really developed a "shake it off" mentality. In fact, Caitlyn will tell me she's shaking it off now if she gets a little bump or bruise.

I bring this last one up because of what we are going through right now. I don't think I could have handled it if it had happened to Caitlyn. I would have been writing checks to Jesus that my base faith level simply couldn't cash. Baby Alexandra, at 26 days old, got admitted to the hospital for pneumonia. She had some nasal congestion and was sneezing for a couple of days leading up to it, and I had brought her to the pediatrician, who gave me a nebulizer and saline solution to try to break up her congestion. And then a day or so later she spiked a fever and came down with a horrible cough. I followed up with a second visit 2 days after I took her initially, and got sent immediately to the ER. After a chest x-ray, some bloodwork, and a lumbar puncture, it was determined that Alex has RSV- a common respiratory infection that still would have sucked had she been a little older when she got it, but it probably wouldn't have ended up turning into pneumonia over the course of a day or two. So we've been in the hospital, and she was admitted to the pediatric ICU a few days ago, when her breathing got considerably worse and she wasn't able to breathe well enough to even eat. But we've made a lot of progress since then and we hope to be going home in a day or two. She's a tough little cookie, just like her sister, and she's fighting this with everything she's got.

So that's my update. I had that baby I was telling you guys about. What's that? Pictures you say? Why, of course there are pictures.

A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Divorce Court...

Actually, that title is a lie. Of course it didn't really happen on the way to divorce court. That would be just plain tacky. And I like to be enormously tacky.

So here is the thing. Remember how I started dating that guy? Yeah. That guy got me pregnant. And so, while it technically did not happen on the way to divorce court, I was absolutely a proper hoodrat about it and showed up to divorce court pregnant with another man's baby. Not that anyone knew. But I knew, and I felt the ghettoness of my roots in that moment. You can take the girl out of the projects, I suppose...

Anyway. Obviously you have some questions. Questions such as "are you really that stupid?" and "so, I guess you aren't having an abortion then?". Let's get in to that, as I'm going to find a way to blame this all on my ex husband.

As for the question of my intelligence, well, let me assure you, you aren't the first to ask. And rightfully so. I won't get into the messy details, but let's just say I had a lapse in judgment. Let's just say that I was so cocky about my knowledge of my cycles and fertility signs after multiple rounds of IVF and years of tracking and trying to get pregnant, that I simply got cavalier about the whole thing. I simply thought I knew too much to have an accidental pregnancy. So yeah, ok, I guess I'm kind of fucking stupid.

As for the abortion question. I looked to my past, to my struggles to conceive and my loss of a much loved and terribly wanted baby and I could not bring myself to do it. Even if it was the most logical choice. And I assure you, I do realize it was the most logical choice. Even now I sometimes find myself thinking "wow... I wish I could have been a bit more logical when I made this decision". It's not that I regret it, exactly. I just didn't really take as much time as I should have to think it through. Truthfully, I knew I'd never go through with it anyway, no matter how much I may have been able to convince myself that it was the best option.

And so, for the official record, today I am nearly 16 weeks pregnant. The future is murky and scary, but in the end I know I will love this baby no matter what else happens. I know I will find equal parts joy and challenge in being a single mother (and no, that doesn't mean the guy just dropped off the face of the Earth, but my reality is what it is and I have to be prepared for that). I know that when Caitlyn hugs my belly and tells me she wants a baby brother, who shall be named Pocoyo and who she shall paint blue, she will get an immense amount of joy from having a sibling to love. I know that we will be a family, in whatever version works best for us. I know we will carry on and love each other and support each other and be happy. As for everything else? Well, fuck if I know.

The Indignities of Being a Toddler

I think one of the really interesting things about having a kid is that sometimes I find myself having mini-flashbacks to my own childhood. It's always something small that does it. Caitlyn will do something ridiculous and I'll find myself remembering when I would do that as a child. And wondering why children are so utterly fucking spastic.

There are a few things I've noticed recently that cause Caitlyn great pain. These are things that I do as an adult too, simple, everyday things. Things that I do not fear. That are not even remotely painful. And yet, somehow, my toddler finds them absolutely traumatic to the point of running away when I even suggest that they may happen.

At first I couldn't understand it, but when I really thought about it, I can remember these exact things being horrible as a kid. Daily things I had to survive, despite the pain and indignity of the tasks. And when I think of them now, I can't help but realize that maybe my childhood wasn't quite as hard as I imagined it to be.

Are you ready for this? The list of the things Caitlyn finds to be physically and emotionally torturous? Let's get into it then:

Pooping: Do you remember when pooping was difficult? When it hurt to push out your poops? I guess as an adult my butthole is regulation sized now, so I can't understand it anymore. But for Caitlyn? She hates to poop. She whines and complains that her butt hurts. I regularly find her hiding in a corner, crapping her pants, because pooping on the toilet is simply an indignity she refuses to suffer.

Shampoo Eyes: You guys? Why the fuck won't she just close her eyes when I rinse shampoo out of her hair? I've tried to explain it to her so many times- your eyes WON'T FUCKING HURT IF YOU JUST CLOSE THEM, but she seems rather convinced that if she does close her eyes, I'm just going to splash her face with acid or something. I mean, that's basically the equivalent of rinsing shampoo out of her hair anyway, right?

Getting Stuck in Shirts: Every time I put a shirt on Caitlyn, she freaks out for 10 seconds while I try to thread her giant lightbulb head through the neck hole. I can't help but remember the panic I would go into as a kid when my head would get stuck in a shirt. I was always pretty sure I was about to suffocate at any moment, even though I was never stuck for more than 5 seconds. Also, it occurs to me that this many not be a thing that normal people deal with. The giant head thing runs in my family.

Hair Brushing: There is no indignity Caitlyn is less inclined to suffer through than having her hair brushed. There is running away, and crying, and repeated declarations that she doesn't want to brush her hair. And that's just when she SEES the brush. Once I actually sit her down and try to do it? Sobbing, squirming, and begging me to stop. So fucking dramatic about the hair brushing. Just as I was as a kid.

In summation, kids are fucking weirdos, and extremely dramatic. God, that is a shitty closing sentence.

To Be A "Kid Person"

There are two kinds of people in this world: Kid People and Normal People.

You see, I kind of object to the idea that anyone would say that they just across-the-board LOVE kids. The self-identifiers. The people who say things like "every child is a precious miracle from God". I mean, really,  you like every kid? Have you never met an asshole kid? Because I have. And I definitely don't like them at all.

I mean, some people are more naturally inclined to caring for children. My mom is one of those people. If you asked her, I think she would absolutely say she's a kid person. And she's the one exception that I will make here. Because as much as my mom has a fantastic nature towards kids and the fact that every single child she encounters loves her immediately, I've also heard her express her distaste for certain children. She won't hesitate to call out an ugly baby (I mean, not to the parents, obviously) or an asshole toddler, or a rude 8 year old. She's not absolutely indiscriminate. And she sure as shit doesn't call every little troll-kid a "miracle". My mom understands that some kids are just not going to mesh with her personality, even if MOST of them do.

I guess the thing that bothers me most about the self-identifiers though, is the pressure it puts on people who don't feel the need to try to superbond with every single kid who crosses their path. When you find yourself in the company of that person who tries so hard to be every kid's favorite, proclaiming their love indiscriminately to every slimy, slobbering little stink beast, I suppose you can't help but wonder if there is some fundamental flaw in your genes, some lack of maternal instinct on your part that is stopping you from wanting to hold every child in your arms and tell them they're special.

Here's the thing about maternal instinct though: it's meant for YOUR kid, not someone else's. Not giving any fucks about other people's kids does not mean you don't have it in you to love your own.

Sometimes though, as a non-self-identifier, you will find that you do bond with someone else's kid. You will find that despite all your notions that you probably don't even like kids that much, you actually enjoy spending time with one of them. And it's not just that you like them. Inexplicably, they like you too! They ask to go to your house. They play play-doh with you and laugh at your jokes and think the sun shines out your ass. They think you are awesome even if you can't seem to figure out why.

My point is that sometimes you need the unfiltered view of a two year old to make you see how awesome you are and that you are more than capable of being a good mom some day.

Hop on Pop

Caitlyn has a bit of a reputation for having the attention span of a marble (or maybe I just have the patience of a bad mom?). She also has a tendency to tune me out. Or it's probably more accurate to say she actively ignores me. I can say her name 15 times and get no response, but if I say the word "cookie" she's suddenly completely aware that she is being spoken to.

It made it hard to teach her things, but I was never particularly concerned. I spent a little time obsessing about it a few months before she turned one, but that was mostly because my niece, who is the same age, was so far advanced and so focused on absorbing absolutely everything around her, that it made me a little paranoid that Caitlyn was behind. She wasn't. Mostly I like to remind myself that every kid is different, and that my kid excels at physical things more so than a lot of kids her age because that is the kind of shit she wants to do, and when she wants to do something, she is absolutely capable of it.

Anyway, now that she has mastered the skills that are really important to her- you know, things like hanging on monkey bars and climbing rock walls at the playground and jumping off the coffee table and doing the Fresh Beat Band dances- she is much more inclined to sit still and pay attention when I'm trying to teach her something. Not that I need to teach her much. My babysitter is like the asshole-toddler whisperer and is fantastic at engaging her in ways I would never even think of. Still, I like to occasionally, you know, teach her shit.

Caitlyn has never had the patience for books. Where as my niece and nephew could quietly sit while being read to (even if not for a whole book- at least a few pages!) at a year or 18 months, Caitlyn decided at an early age that the purpose of books was to cut her teeth on the bindings. And you sort of expect that at a certain age. You expect that, at a year or so old, they may find a book on the floor or in their toy box and their immediate response is to put it in their mouth. I'm not even talking about that. I'm talking about every binding of every book she owns (and our babysitter owns!) being ripped out with her teeth. I'm talking about finding her chewing on cardboard at least once a day. I'm talking about hiding books from her because I knew she would only destroy them.

Finally, though, Caitlyn is interested in the story. She will bring me a book and ask me to read it to her. Whenever I tried to read a book to her in the past, it was met with screeching, squirming and ripping. It's so nice to be able to tell her the story inside the book. I love reading Dr. Seuss to her. I love that she follows along and throws out lines from the book when I prompt her. I love that, when I turn a page, she inevitably turns it back so she can enjoy her favorites parts of the story just a little longer.

Caitlyn's go-to bedtime story right now is Hop on Pop. Reading it with her is awesome and hilarious, because she ad-libs throughout the book. There's an orange dog that is on a lot of pages. He isn't necessarily part of the story on that page, but he's there. Absolutely every time she sees him, she points to him and says "ornage puppy" (and no, that wasn't a typo. She calls it ornage). It doesn't matter what else is happening on that page, she loves that damn ornage puppy. When we get to the page where Mr. Brown and Mr. Black are having a snack, she tells me they are eating sandwiches and drinking milk. She counts the apples and bananas. When we get to the actual "hop on pop" page, she notes that "Daddy is mad", because the pop looks pretty pissed at those two kids jumping on him (I'd venture a guess here and say they fucked his back up. I'm fairly sure of this because my own dad blames me for his back problems. From that time I jumped on his back. When I was 5).

My favorite part though, is the "father, mother, sister, brother" page. That is on the left page. On the right page shows another boy, a baby, with the words "that one is my other brother". For some reason, Caitlyn hates the other brother. She covers him up with her hand and tells me "I don't like another brother" and "no baby!". He's on the following page too, and she covers him then too. I asked her why she doesn't like the baby and she simply tells me "I like THIS one" and points to the other little boy. It's so arbitrary and hilarious. It makes me giggle every night. It also makes me feel a little less guilty about this whole I probably won't be able to give her a sibling thing.

Just in general, I'm finding Caitlyn is more structured and receptive to discipline, too. I think a big part of it is that we are falling into our own routines and not having anyone (coughherdumbdadcough) throw a monkey wrench into it by wanting to do things another way.

Also, seriously, she is fucking hilarious. Her comic timing is genius. Last night, she asked me to put something on TV for her. When I didn't immediately respond, she looked at me, completely straight-faced and said "come on, son". I was sure I misheard her, so I asked her what she had said and she said it again. She also cheerily told me that she had poop in her 'gina last night.

This kid. She is too much.

Stormpacalypse

In case you guys didn't hear, it was all windy and shit this week in Jersey. And by windy, obviously I mean OMGOMGWEAREALLGONNADIIIIIIIE.

Generally speaking, I'm the person who just assumes the weather reports are an exaggeration and rolls my eyes at the people buying 20 gallons of water at the grocery store. Or, more accurately, the people I assume are at the grocery store buying 20 gallons of water because I'm definitely not at the grocery store buying anything. Do you know how crowded the grocery store is before a big storm?

Anyway. Maybe it was the fact that I have another human being to think about besides myself. Or maybe it has to do with being really and truly on my own and not having Rodolfo to depend on to think of the shit I might forget about. In any case, I decided Friday night that I should probably have some sort of non-perishable food in my house besides fun-sized 3 Musketeers and M&Ms and I went grocery shopping.

It would seem that everyone else in the tri-state area had this thought at least a few days before I did. I ended up coming home with some cookies, pre-cooked rice cups, one gallon of water, capri suns and a 12 pack of Pepsi (you know, essentials). I can't even say I worried too much about it. I was honestly more concerned about making my way to the craft store so I could finish up Caitlyn's Halloween costume.

Saturday afternoon, I did make it to AC Moore and picked up some blue duct tape and hot pink felt, like any good mom preparing for a disaster. After I got the IMPORTANT stuff, I strolled over to the candle aisle, you know, just in case, and picked up a few candles too.

As an aside right here, I think it's important to reiterate that I'm recently separated, with a halved income but just as many bills as before. Rodolfo, who makes more money than me, decided that he couldn't afford our 1-bedroom apartment when I moved out and found some random woman who was looking for a roommate, and moved in with her. He won't tell me what he's paying in rent, but I'd venture a guess at about half what I'm paying for my apartment. None of this is particularly relevant right here, but it makes this next part REALLY fucking obnoxious:

Anyway. Saturday afternoon before my trip to the craft store, Rodolfo picked up Caitlyn. He had decided to rent a hotel room, simply for the novelty of using their pool, and took Caitlyn there. Several hours later, I met him there when he wouldn't stop texting me about how cranky she was being (me: it's been 4 hours, have you fed her? him: uh, no.). I got her to eat a little bit and then she told me she had to go to pee. Except instead of pee, she had explosive diarrhea.

We (and when I say "we", I mean myself and my awesome babysitter) have been working on potty training Caitlyn. She has been doing pretty well, and she's been mostly in underwear (with just a few accidents) for the last 2 weeks or so. With explosive diarrhea added to the mix, though, I felt like I should go to the store to pick up some diapers (we won't even get into the discussion I had with Rodolfo after that, when he told me he was keeping an entire box of diapers at his house "just in case") and pedialyte. Luckily, the store had been somewhat restocked, so I was also able to get bread, chips, crackers and a few other non-perishable snacky foods too.

I spent Sunday toiling away on a Halloween costume that wouldn't even be worn (at least not on actual Halloween) and feeling pretty sure that I wouldn't have work the next day. On Monday, the storm came through. I had power most of the day, but by late afternoon, I had a few instances of losing my power, either partially or for just a few minutes at a time. Then, around 6pm, all the power went out for good.

Caitlyn had been handling the power outage remarkably well. She was fascinated by the candles I'd lit- she bounced back and forth, room to room, first repeating my warning that candles are "VERY DANGEROUS!" and then declaring how much she loved candles as she stopped at each one- "another candle in the bathroom! Another candle in the living room! ANOTHER CANDLE IN THE KITCHEN!".

Then, she very suddenly stopped running. She stood at the coffee table in our living room and declared "I pooped, mommy" and started sobbing. It wasn't just that she pooped her pants. It was that she had one of those exploding, watery poops again. And in case you don't already know this, having your mom clean diarrhea out of the folds of your lady business by candlelight is possible the most horrific, embarrassing, traumatic experience a child can ever have.

After several smelly, screeching minutes, I felt I had made my absolute best effort in cleaning her up. I no longer had hot water, so I couldn't even throw her in the bathtub. I just had to resign myself to the fact there might be some poop in her vagina. I decided that a little poop in her vagina was better than the possibility of her describing this scene to her therapist 20 years down the road if I kept trying to pry her legs apart to clean her up. Her underwear went straight to the garbage and within 5 minutes, she went back to running around declaring her love for candles. And, as luck would have it, the shit monster did not return.

After a VERY long, boring night, we packed up in the morning and headed off to Grandma's house, where there was power, hot food, and a super fun playmate for Caitlyn. I managed to convince Rodolfo to stop in and feed/walk my dog (he did so begrudgingly, and felt the need to prove that fact by sending me a picture of the dog's shit), so I was able to stay until Wednesday afternoon. It was a relief. A big part of the decision to pick up and head off to Grandma's was the fact that I had not only no signal on my cell phone, but no service on my house phone either. The stress of the "what-if" was too much with a sicky little toddler, and so we took off for the day. Caitlyn played with her cousin all day, and my mom made us a yummy dinner. It was a huge help.

Yesterday we went home, and I was really hoping I would have my power back. I did not. I totally had a bunch of dog shit on my floor though (also fun to clean up by candlelight, in case you were wondering). I fed my pets and walked my dog and cleaned up the filth and grabbed some pillows so we could crash at April's house for the night. She was the only person in the area who had any power, and she and my brother-in-law were nice enough to open their home to everyone they knew in need of a place to stay (this included myself and Caitlyn, her best friend, bestie's boyfriend and her 4 year old daughter, as well as my 13 year old nephew- with my sister, her husband and their son, that was 5 adults, 3 toddlers and 1 teenaged boy all crammed into their 2 bedroom apartment.).

Today I had to drag my ass to work, but shortly after I arrived, I got word that my power was back on. We were lucky, I know we were. There were people who lost their homes and cars and loved ones. And then there were thousands more who simply survived without power or hot food or showers. Some of them even had toddlers, I bet. As much as it was scary, and a true inconvenience, I have family and friends that I know I can always count on . Even the ones who drive me fucking insane sometimes.

On days when I'm feeling stressed or annoyed or sorry for my shitty situation, I'll think of those who were on their own. I'll try to remember that, while my situation is admittedly stressful and difficult at times, I do truly have a great support system, and unfortuantely, that isn't something everyone can say for themselves.

Anyway. I hope everyone is doing well and that no one else had a literal shit storm like I did.

Dora and Diego are Pathological Liars. There, I Said It

Here is the problem. I usually blog at work, and work has been extremely busy. Even if you don't figure for the fact that my office moved last week and I've spent the last 6 work days inhaling paint fumes and cancer dust (because no one seemed to think finishing construction prior to our move was important), I've taken on a bunch of new responsibilities too. Responsibilities I'm currently ignoring so I can blog.

The thing is, I would theoretically blog from home. I've even tried it a few times. The way it usually plays out is that I get an idea, sit down at my computer and try to focus just enough so that it's mildly coherent. And then Caitlyn decides she wants to sit on my lap. I can handle that one of two ways: I can ignore her. This always ends with her pawing at me and whining and making me feel like an asshole because GOD, she just wants to sit on her mommy's lap, you fucking monster. And so I always arrive at option two within about 30 seconds, and I put her on my lap. She will then bang on the keyboard, insist we watch Youtube videos of Elmo or decide "I needa PAINT" (because my dad showed her how to use a paint document. And also because she never wants anything anymore. She always "needa".) and screech color choices at me until her masterpiece is complete.

Basically what I'm saying is that unless you want all my blog posts to be paint documents, I can't blog from home (what about when her dad takes her, you might ask next. Yeah. I wonder about that too. I'll let you know when it happens!).

Today I realized that it's been over a month since I posted anything, and yet, I still don't have more than 15 minutes to bang out a real post. It's annoying, actually, because I really do have a backlog of posts in my head. Anyway, consider this a fake post. Leave me lots of comments so I know you haven't all abandoned me.

The other night, a few of my Facebook friends and I decided to call out children's programming for all the lies they are telling our kids. We established the following creepy, weird or just plain outlandish lies our kids may believe based on what Dora and company are telling them (these aren't all me, so thanks to my lovely, funny friends, AKD, Mandy and Jessica):

• It isn't weird at all when inanimate objects talk
• 25 year old adults should still be attending school
• A co-ed group of 25 year old adults can share an apartment and no one is ever going to fuck anyone else (or get drunk)
• Baby jaguars make GREAT pets and definitely will not maul you at all
• Salt and pepper shakers are French, and produce cinnamon offspring
• There's nothing wrong with letting a 6 year old girl wander around completely unsupervised. Even when she's too dumb to get anywhere without a map
• 6 year olds can read maps
• All Latino parents don't pay any attention to their children and let them wander through alligator swamps and creepy forests with only a monkey for supervision
• Chinese children are raised by their grandparents, presumably because their parents are in a factory making Nikes 18 hours a day
• Little snotty bitch pigs are apparently endearing (there may have also been suggestions about making Olivia in bacon)
• EVERYONE WANTS YOU TO TALK ABOUT YOUR FEELINGS ALL THE TIME! EVERYTHING IS ABOUT YOU!
• All animals speak English and Spanish, regardless of what country or even CONTINENT they are on.
• "Gazelles are afraid of lions!" (No, gazelles don't want to get their throats ripped out. They  have absolutely no worries that the lion might jump out and say BOO)
• Medieval knights are selfish and whiny until their pet dragons remind them not to steal things
• Dino Dan "isn't" a paranoid schizophrenic
• Captain Hook is a little selfish about treasure, but if you ask nicely, he will totally share it with you. And he gets super butt-hurt if you don't invite him to your parties and shit
• If you are being mugged, saying the mugger's name 3 times and telling him no will make him snap his fingers and run away
• David Arquette makes a great parrot, and his career is doing JUST FINE
• If you put the absolute minimum amount of effort into finding something that has been deliberately taken/hidden from you, it will magically appear in the most obvious place ever
• Orange backpacks can bend physics and become anything you need them to be
• And purple backpacks contain anything you could ever need
• Your friends will just laugh at your whimsy if you have the most retarded ideas on the planet, EVERY SINGLE DAY
• You need a song for EVERYTHING
• People won't send you to a special school if you are mildly retarded and constantly step in buckets
• It's not even a little weird to wear the exact same clothes EVERY SINGLE DAY
• Or to dress your blue dog in pajamas, and to keep the same pedophilic haircut for 6 years
• Lance Bass didn't try hard enough to go into space. Pocoyo does that shit all the fucking time and he doesn't have astronaut training OR several million dollars
• Your friends won't make fun of you for trying and failing miserably
• Phineas and Ferb are independently wealthy children, or else their parents conveniently ignore the massive credit card debt they accumulate each day
• "Come inside, it's fun inside" doesn't sound sexual at all, Mickey Mouse
• Neither does "A bunch of bones inside me" (which I was pretty convinced was "I want your bones inside me" until my sister informed me otherwise... either way, really)
• Wonder Pets shouldn't die in a fire (really, we couldn't even say anything about how awful they are besides "should die in a fire", which, apparently children don't agree with).
• Uniqua is a name
• Uniqua and Tyrone would run with the same... let's say "group of friends" as Pablo
• UNDERWATER AIRPLANES
• You can only stalk someone and get away with it if you're voiced by Ashley Tisdale
• It is both completely normal to have a platypus as a pet and to lose him all the time
• Three kids on an island can play with child molester-esque men and there are no authority figures except a parrot
• Toot and Puddle is somehow not scat porn
• Your toys live inside your boombox, and come alive when you sprinkle magic on them (that's called an acid trip, DJ Lance)
• Orange spandex onesies are appropriate attire
• Trains with shifty, haunted painting eyes aren't creepy at all
• You should totally trust and be friends with people who look like giant butt plugs and dildos
• You can buy a new car for the bargain price of FREE, as long as you are willing to sing a song while you assemble it (and you can get 50 people to help as long as you give them a ride to the smoothie stand, which is exactly 50 feet away)
• All the pizza and smoothies are free, and somehow they are both thriving businesses (not to mention the fact that the pizza place is run by someone dumber than Twist)
• Siblings mostly get along except for minor annoyances
• Monsters are adorable, fuzzy creatures
• If someone is bullying you and you tell them they've hurt your feelings, they will be instantly remorseful and apologize
• You should reiterate absolutely every single thing you say at least 3 times (Seriously, kid. I'm not you. I don't have the attention span of a marble. I got it the FIRST time)
• Everyone will want to hug and be best buds after every disagreement. No hard feelings EVER
• Mommies and Daddies are always of the same race and the opposite sex. And happily married, of course

So, what did we miss? What lies are your kids learning?

Asshole, Dick, Fuck. In That Order.

Sometimes I get a little off-track with this blog. Half my posts of late have just been rants and ramblings that have absolutely nothing to do with parenting, and it seems like it's been a while since I actually wrote a post about the shit my kid is doing now. And there is so much shit she is doing now, I can hardly keep up. In fact, I wrote out a checklist of shit-she-is-doing points to hit in this post, so I don't forget anything.

Overall, I'd say the biggest change I've seen in Caitlyn over the past few months (besides, you know, the fact that she never shuts up, ever ever) is how she wants to do everything I do. I mean, obviously this isn't brand new or anything... pretty much everything babies and toddlers do is mocking on some level. The difference now is that she's not just mirroring me when I prompt her to anymore. She's started doing these things of her own accord.

The mirroring thing had hit a high point a few months ago, when she would try to do things like shave her legs in the shower when I did. That kind of mirroring is fucking adorable (you know, except for the part where she thinks she can play with my razor). Recently though, her attempts at being just like mommy have been slightly less adorable. For example, while we were on vacation, I was vacation-eating and it gave me the shits because my body had gotten used to me being pretty healthy of late. One afternoon I spent a solid 30 minutes in the bathroom with diarrhea (I know how you love these kinds of stories- you're welcome!). And in those 30 minutes, Caitlyn walked into the bathroom, oh, I don't know, let's go with 700 times. Shortly after the entire contents of my digestive tract had been forcibly removed, Caitlyn decided she wanted to use the potty.

This has actually also been a big milestone for us of late. It's certainly not consistent yet, but she pees on the potty at least once a day now. Which isn't my point at all. My point is that when Caitlyn says she needs to go potty, I immediately and enthusiastically encourage her. So was the case on the day I got the shits.

She finds it pretty novel, using the big girl toilet, so I never quite know what to expect when she says she has to go. Sometimes she pees almost immediately. Sometimes she insists on getting on and off the toilet 10 times. Sometimes she sits there for 2 seconds, declares she's "all done", then flushes the toilet 4 times. Sometimes she mostly just unravels the toilet paper. Her newest thing is the take the toilet cleaner brush out of the holder and dunk it into the toilet the moment she gets up. On that day though, her mission was clear. She was going to make fun of me. She climbed up onto the toilet (because GOD FORBID I help her up) and immediately scrunched up her face and made some fake straining noises. She then hopped right back down and said "mommy's turn!". Uncool, kid.

Since we are on the subject, though, I should say that during our vacation, and in the week since we've come home, there has been a great increase in using the potty. Two nights ago, Caitlyn peed on the potty 3 separate times. Then she pooped on there too. I've never been so excited about another person's bowel movements in my life. I'm hoping we can move on to underwear in a couple more months.

There is another area where Caitlyn is starting to hit her stride though, no longer just taking cues from mommy, but really owning it as her own. Cursing.

As you may remember, Caitlyn's first bad word was asshole. She was mistakenly under the impression that this was the dog's name, though, so I couldn't really hold it against her. After that she started saying dick. I will take 100% responsibility on that one, because it's not just that I said it to her once and she repeated it, it's the fact that after she repeated it I started laughing hysterically. And really, who wouldn't? When you are mad at your tiny 18 month old for some random act of attitude and she responds by beaming her best smile at you and confidentally, comically declaring "DICK!", well, just, how DON'T you laugh at that? You can't. It's physically impossible. I mean, you know, until the 30th time or so. Now I can actually hold a straight face long enough to tell her it isn't a nice word and that she shouldn't say it. And mostly she doesn't anymore, save for a rare occasion when she knows she's in a lot of trouble and she thinks her comic relief will save her from time outs (or beatings. I mean, probably beatings. I try to use a 70/30 beating to time out ratio).

The problem now, though, is that she isn't just using these words because she knows they will make me laugh. She's using them in context. Actually, "them" is inaccurate. "It" is more appropriate. Because there is only one bad word she regularly uses now. She doesn't use it in anger. This is not a tantrum kind of thing. She's absolutely not trying to get a reaction out of me.

The first time she said it, I hardly noticed. I sort of just glanced at Rodolfo, eyebrows raised, as if to say "did you hear that too?". He wasn't sure either, so we assumed it was some sort of toddler jibberish word that just sounded like the word we, as adults, would automatically hear. After that I started to notice a pattern though. She would always say it after some mild inconvenience. She would drop something on the floor or the dog would steal her last goldfish cracker, something like that. Nothing she would actually be that upset about. And it was always muttered under her breath. Not because she thought she might get in trouble, but because when I say it in the context she was using for it, I'd mutter it under MY breath. Then, at some point (that point being when she started lovingly embracing Swiper the Fox's catchphrase "oh, man!"), she started adding "man!" to the mix.

It went something like this: mild inconvenience, then exasperated sigh, followed by "man... fuck".

We are going to have to get that shit cleared up before she goes to Kindergarten.

I think I'll split this into two posts. More Caitlyn updates tomorrow-ish.

Tales From Vacation- Snack Attack (Which is Admittedly Weird, Especially Since There Was an Alligator)

Yesterday afternoon I got home after a week in Florida with my family. We had a great time and it was mostly drama-free, with a few noted exceptions. The first was car trouble. My youngest sister blew two tires on the highway on the way down, then inexplicably had a dead battery (not left-the-lights-on dead. Dead-dead. Needed a new battery dead) a couple of days later. She ended up shelling out nearly $400 in car repairs. Then Rodolfo's water pump died on his car when we were on our way back, an hour from home. That was also $400. So much for saving money by driving. The second mini-drama was related to my apparently calling my 2 year old niece morbidly obese or something and/or telling a grown man to stop calling a 13 year old boy a douche bag. Those blew over pretty quickly though.

The other little drama was snack-related. I'm sorry, did that last sentence sound as ridiculous to you as it did in my head? SNACK-RELATED DRAMA, you guys. Seriously. Let me take it from the beginning:

As I said, we were driving down. Myself, Caitlyn and Rodolfo in his car (yes, we are still separated, in case you were wondering), my mom, step-dad and oldest nephew in her car, our middle sister, her husband and their son in his car and my youngest sister, her boyfriend and their daughter in his car. 4 cars and 3 toddlers. So I decided to make little snack packs for all the kids. I bought ziploc bags and separated portions of goldfish, crackers, and veggie chips for each kid, then threw in a few packs of gummy snacks and juice boxes for everyone. I even made up a ziploc bag for each of them filled with some crayons and folded up paper so they would all have one more thing to keep them occupied for the long trip.

I'd thought of everything. The drinks were boxed, so no one needed to try to pour juice into a sippy cup in a moving car. The snacks were the least messy I could think of. I even provided activities! I was feeling very smug about the whole thing when I texted my mom and sisters to let them know that I'd provided snacks for all the kids, so they needn't worry about it. Obviously they were all grateful. Who wouldn't be?

The ensuing drama had nothing to do with the car snacks, honestly. Everyone loved my awesome car snacks. I only brought it up so you all know how incredibly efficient I am. Okay. Not really (maybe a little though). My point is that I had provided snacks, and I made everyone aware of that fact beforehand (a full 24 hours in advance, even, which is like an eternity in my procrastinatey family). That being said, when you have a toddler, you tend to plan for every scenario. I fully expected that my sisters would also bring snacks along, because what if my nephew decided he hated everything I brought? What if my niece... I don't know, fed all her snacks to an alligator or something (we actually had an alligator in our backyard and an old man standing at the edge of the swamp/lake just begging to be eaten)?

Anyway. We arrived Monday night and went grocery shopping for the week. It was just us girls at the store, and we decided to give Sammi a break, since she had all the car trouble, and split the bill between myself, my mom and my other sister, April (yeah. I'm just gonna use her name now. NO1CURR). So we went about finding what we thought we would need for the week.

Everyone had certain special things they wanted. I picked up some Kashi cereal bars I like, frozen smoothie mix for Rodolfo, and pickles for my burgers. Sammi wanted Fruit Loops and Ramen noodles. My mom... I don't even know, but I'm sure she picked up one certain thing that wouldn't have necessarily been on anyone else's list. Then there was April. Here is the list of things April needed specifically for herself and her family (I should emphasize that she did share if anyone wanted anything. It's not that she was being selfish in that way. She was just being selfish in the way that she made the rest of us split the cost of her excess):

Double-Stuff Oreos
Family Sized bag of M&Ms
Cheerios
Cinnamon Chex ("I need variety, Jaclyn", she responded pissily when I asked if we really needed 3 different kinds of cereal- "besides, I don't eat Fruit Loops")
Apples and Grapes
Coffeemate
2 boxes of frozen mini-pancakes (because despite the fact that we bought pancake mix, she insisted that her son would only eat the frozen mini ones)
Lysol Wipes (she insisted these were "for the house", even though everyone else thought paper towels were perfectly fine)

My mom and Sammi and I were annoyed, especially since Sammi, despite already being out $280 in car repairs at this point, had to practically be bound and gagged before she would let us pay for her fucking Fruit Loops and Ramen noodles. But it was April's vacation too. We all sort of rolled our eyes and moved on.

This is the point where you understand why I mentioned the car snacks I brought. Because when we got back and unpacked our groceries, everyone also started unpacking their personal stuff too. This is when we saw the stash of snacks that April had brought from home (please note that I don't mean she brought a few of anything. These were all regular sizes boxes of shit):

EL Fudge cookies
Chewy Chips Ahoy cookies
Teddy Grahams- vanilla
Teddy Grahams- chocolate
Wheat Thins
Assorted bag of Starbursts and Skittles (you know, those giant bags you buy to distribute for Halloween)

A full day passed before April became displeased with the "variety" of snacks available to her. I woke up Wednesday morning to see her returning from Target, where she bought:

Target bakery sugar cookies
Target bakery chocolate chip cookies
2 boxes of chocolate chip granola bars
2 family sized boxes of Pop-Tarts
Milano cookies
A giant bag of popcorn
A box of microwave popcorn
5 candy bars (these, she informed everyone, were just for her though- no sharing!)
a cheesecake
3 bags of assorted varieties of potato chips (family sized, of course)

If we had planned to stay for a month, this would still be an absolutely ridiculous amount of snacks. And we did actually buy food too! And soda. Seemingly gallons of it disappeared while we were there. I won't say I didn't eat any snacks or drink any soda. I certainly did, but if I'd had my way, I wouldn't have had all this shit sitting there for me to eat in the first place!

I guess my point is that I hope my sister doesn't get diabetes? Also, my mom reads this blog, so she can confirm that this is absolutely not an exaggeration. I actually wrote down the list of snacks because it was so ridiculous to me that I knew it would be a blog post on the very first night.

Anyway. There's lots of other stuff. I promise some pictures of me swimming with a dolphin and also another post about all the ways in which my dad fails at life (he watched my dog while I was away. Stop thinking "well, that was nice of him"- you haven't heard the story yet).

Badassery

There's so much going on right now. Where to start? I should probably start with the important stuff, but fuck that. Let's start with some fun shit:

Caitlyn is a bad ass. This is a known fact. Still, sometimes she surprises me with the level of badassery she exhibits. Saturday was one such day.

Rodolfo and I, in the spirit of keeping Caitlyn's life as normal as possible, have been continuing to do family outings with her. Saturday we took her to The Land of Make Believe. It was supposed to be 100 degrees out and LOMB has a water park and a regular park. Also, it's not at the fucking Jersey Shore, which means we wouldn't have to spend 4 hours sitting in traffic on the way there.

We started at the water park, and I've got to say, it was perfect for young kids. In general, it seemed like the entire park was created by someone with a gaggle of toddlers. The park was on the small side, in a good way. There was no dragging of a toddler half a mile to the next thing. There was no burning of toddler feet as we walked from the lockers where we left out flip-flops to the water. You know why? Because the water's edge was roughly 8 steps away from the lockers.

It was fantastic. There was a huge pool area that was, at its deepest, only 18 inches, so Caitlyn could walk around in it without ever being deeper than waist high. There was a pirate ship with slides coming out of every side, and a half dozen other slides spread around the kiddie pool. And at the bottom of those slides? Fucking PADDED landing platforms. Because, awesome, that's why. Then there was a bridge to cross to get to the side for bigger kids, that had a lazy river and what was essentially a huge jungle gym with water squirting out of it from every angle. We spent the majority of the day hopping back and forth between the two sections of the water park area, but eventually we moved on to the dry park.

The dry park had about a dozen or so rides, a little farm and a train ride around the park. The park is clearly meant for smaller kids, so the rides were carnival-type rides. They were smaller, so they could also be closer together, which made it easy to hop from ride to ride without anyone getting tired or cranky. And because a lot of people were still at the water park, we never waited more than 2 minutes to get on a ride. Caitlyn, naturally, wanted to ride all the rides.

We started at the carousel. She enjoyed that, as she always does. Then we went to a mini-version of the swinging pirate ship ride. You know the one I'm talking about? Anyway, this was a smaller version and the ship swung around in a circle instead of just going back and forth. I was not anticipating this ride to be scary or fast at all. That's the thing about rides though- they always feel much faster than they look! Caitlyn was sandwiched between us, but not even remotely held in by the bar across our lap- the one that was a solid 8 inches above her lap. A few seconds into this ride and I began to panic. This was not what I expected and Caitlyn was going to freak out. She was absolutely going to cry. Except she didn't. She smiled and laughed and LOVED it.

After that we jumped on a bunch of other rides. Spinning dinosaurs, flying hot-air balloons, and a tilt-a-whirl. There was even a canoe ride that she would need to ride alone. I was tentative. I wondered if she would try to stand up mid-ride and fall out. I explained to her, sort of hoping she would decide to skip it, that mommy and daddy could not ride with her. There would be no skipping of rides that day. Caitlyn went it alone. She did fantastically well and my fear of an emergency stop while she tumbled out did not even come close to happening.

Then we saw the roller coaster. Surely she was too small for it. Roller coasters ALWAYS feel faster than they look. Still, she ran into the line and we waited our turn. With every other ride, there was a minimum height for kids to ride alone, but this was the first we came across where there was an actual minimum for kids to ride at all. It was 33 inches. I quietly hoped that she was too small. A roller coaster? Really kid? This was going to end in tears, I was sure of it.

Apparently Caitlyn has had a growth spurt since her 2 year check-up. She cleared that 33 inch mark by at least an inch or two. I sat on the inside seat, since that was the side that curved in when the roller coaster went around the first sharp turn, and prepared to spend half the ride convincing my toddler that I wouldn't let her fall out. I was fully prepared for sobbing and terror. Really. Especially around that first turn. The ride started.

Caitlyn did not respond to that first turn with the fear I'd anticipated. She responded with squeals of joy. She loved it. In fact, she loved it so much that when she filed out in front of me after the ride was over, she tried to get back in to the car directly behind ours. There was a man waiting in line with his kids, his mouth agape as she tried to get back on the ride. Apparently, he couldn't believe how much my tiny little toddler obviously enjoyed herself. I don't blame him. What two year old likes fucking roller coasters?

We rode one more ride after the roller coaster, one that was right next to it, and when we finished, Caitlyn ran back over and got right back in line for the roller coaster again. Yes. She made us ride it twice.

In summation, jeez my kid is a fucking bad ass.

Also? A bad ass who has peed on the potty 3 times this week. It makes sense, I guess. Who wears a diaper on a roller coaster anyway?

This is getting a bit long, so I'll save the marital drama for another day. You're welcome.

Adventures in Shitting

I live in Northern New Jersey. It is not even remotely an exaggeration to say that I live within 10 miles of at least 4 different malls (and if we were to add another 10 miles, I could probably double the number of malls). I'm not a big fan of malls, generally, but sometimes I have to drag myself to one of them.

Any time I have to make a trip to the mall, I weigh the pros and cons and decide which one will get me in and out the fastest. When you spent 4 years of your life working in a mall, let me assure you that you don't spend a single second longer than absolutely necessary inside one of those motherfuckers. Let me break down the choices:

1. The Closest Mall: Also the rich people mall with the good movie theater that I will only go to on Sundays (when the rest of the mall is closed) because otherwise it takes half an hour to find parking. I generally avoid this mall like the plague, because I can't stand the traffic and the rich-bitch stores.

2. The Second Closest Mall: AKA the mall in the same town as the first mall, like 3 miles down the highway. A nicer mall, with less traffic, easier parking and significantly less hoodrats bussed in from the nearby ghettos. A fat girl store, which is convenient and Old Navy and Children's Place, so I can get inexpensive clothes for Caitlyn, that I will be less annoyed about when she stains them after wearing something for less than 5 minutes. Also, a little carousel that never has a line. This is my mall of preference.

3. The Third Mall in the Same Town: I'm not even kidding: This is an outlet mall with a Target attached. I only ever go here if I need something from Target, but I make an effort to steer clear of it because I don't need fucking discounted, outlet store Nikes, so it's basically a waste of my time.

4. The Mall Where I Used to Work: It's the ghetto mall of the 4, but I know the good spots to park and where all the stores are, so I never have to look for anything. There is also a Dairy (Diarrhea? What?) Queen and the place where I get my hair cut. Pretty much I go here to get my hair cut and never ever set foot in the store where I used to work, lest I have to waste 20 minutes talking to my ex-coworkers and pretending like I care about their lives.

So. I needed to go to the mall last week (At first I wrote "weekend" and then I realized that no, you literally could not pay me to go there on a Saturday). We ended up at mall #1. The snooty douche, traffic clusterfuck mall. I can't remember exactly why I chose that mall on that day, but it was, in fact, a weekday, so it was slightly less enraging than usual.

We did our shopping. I found a really cute dress to wear out for my birthday celebration this weekend. After that, we stopped by the food court and grabbed some dinner. Then I realized that Caitlyn needed a diaper change.

If there is one thing I will absolutely give this mall all the props for, it is that is has the nicest family bathroom I've ever seen. Actually, let me clarify. It's not just a bathroom. It's a family "lounge". There are curtained off areas for breastfeeding, a tv playing cartoons and toys and sinks and counter space galore. It's truly fancy. Adjacent to the family lounge is the actual family bathroom. And even that is cool. There's a regular sized toilet and a toddler sized one. They've truly thought of everything.

Anyway, Caitlyn needed a new diaper. And mommy had to take a shit. Off to the family bathroom we went! The changing tables are in the lounge area, so I decided to go to the actual bathroom first and take care of my needs first, for once. I locked the door behind me and sat down.

After a moment of trying to prematurely flush my toilet, Caitlyn noticed the little kid toilet. She's a pro at taking off her diaper anyway, so obviously she wasn't going to wait for me to be done to try this thing out. So she took off her shorts. And her diaper.

I'm wondering at this point, if I've mentioned Caitlyn's tendency to want to be completely naked while she lounges (please note that I did not say "uses") on her potty? The fact that we were in a public restroom did nothing to stop her determination to get naked for potty time. Once that diaper was off, she pulled off her shirt, then sat down on the floor next to me to pull of her shoes and socks. I mean, who PEES ON THE POTTY while wearing shoes and socks? Me, actually. I pointed this out to her while she stripped down, trying to reason with my 2 year old, who was now sitting bare-assed on the floor of a public fucking restroom. Did I mention that I was taking a shit? Yeah. There was nothing more I could do.

Just then, the door of the bathroom burst open. There I was, sitting on the toilet taking a shit, my naked kid sitting on the floor next to me, presumably contracting Public Restroom Floor Syphilis, in the fancy mall with the snooty people and the broken fucking locks. It was a middle-aged man and his probably 8ish-year-old son. Of course. Neither of them felt the need to close the door after realizing I was in there, in case you were wondering. Nothing makes a trip to the mall complete quite like having to lean over mid-dump to reclose the door of a room that smells like your ass in front of a couple of strangers who have absolutely no courtesy whatsoever.

Anyway. Caitlyn decided after that to spend 5 or so seconds sitting on the kid toilet, very blatantly NOT actually going to the bathroom, before she milled around naked while I finished my shit, and one other person (who DID close the door behind her, at least) walked in on us.

At that point, I wanted nothing more than to get some clothes on my kid and high-tail it the hell out of there. So I grabbed her, COMPLETELY NAKED, and walked into the lounge area with the necessary counter space to get her off the damn floor, trying to explain to the other families, including the second person who walked in on us, that I was not, in fact, a total weirdo who lets her kid wander around mall bathrooms naked.

I think we need to stick to the ghetto mall, where the bathrooms are just bathrooms, and no one is hanging around directly outside the door to witness your naked toddler/taking a shit shame.

The Grandma Chronicles- Part 2

A while back, I promised you funny stories about my mom. Since I can't seem to write in the present tense in a way that doesn't make people want to jump off buildings, I think now is the time for another mom story. I also feel I should remind you that mom stories are the most politically incorrect stories ever. You may not want to read this if you are easily offended. Seriously:

I must have been about 14 years old. It was Christmas time. At 14, I was clearly old enough to know that Santa did not exist, or more accurately, that my mom is Santa (please note that I said IS and not WAS. I don't know that I will ever think of myself as Santa, even for Caitlyn. My mom is the best Santa ever, and she proves that point every Christmas).

Anyway. The point is that I was old enough to go Christmas shopping with my mom for Sammi, who obviously still did believe in Santa. She was 7 or 8, I think, and very into Barbie dolls.

Because we were Christmas shopping, the store was very busy and the aisles were crowded with people searching for gifts (apparently procrastination is genetic, because every single member of my family waits until the last minute to buy gifts. My sister didn't even hesitate to call me the night before Caitlyn's birthday party to ask what she should get her. She knows I wouldn't be offended that she waited until the last minute. Because she knows I do exactly the same thing). What happened next did not happen privately and I remember getting many disapproving looks from horrified strangers.

I can't remember if there was one Barbie in particular Sammi wanted. I simply remember roaming the Barbie aisles with my mom, looking for something. This was quite a few years ago, before stores needed entire toy aisles dedicated to Leap Frog ipads and "things that never shut the fuck up, OMG PLEASE LET IT AT LEAST PLAY THE WHOLE GODDAMN SONG AND STOP PRESSING THE BUTTON 5 SECONDS IN SO I HAVE TO KEEP HEARING THE FIRST 5 SECONDS OVER AND OVER AND OVER AGAIN", so there was more than one aisle of Barbie toys.

I left the aisle I was in to find my mom and see if she'd found what we were looking for. As I turned the corner, I saw her halfway down the next aisle, doubled-over and giggling like a maniac. When I asked her what was so funny, she only laughed harder. She laughed so hard that she could not speak, she could barely breathe.

I walked over, confused, to see what had struck her so hilariously funny. And then I saw it.

"Look, Jac", she gasped through her hysteria... "this Barbie....hahahahaha". "Oh my god. This Barbie is in a.... haaaaaaaahahahaha".... "WHEELCHAIR". Tears now rolling down her cheeks from laughing so hard, she loudly christened the doll "CRIPPLE BARBIE".

Moments later, she informed me that we would need to go home. She had now peed her pants from laughing so hard at the misfortune of Cripple Barbie.

We may or may not be going straight to hell. If God's a big Special Olympics fan, we are pretty much fucked.

Judgy Playground Moms Can Lick My Scrotum. Yes. Scrotum.

My parenting was judged by a complete stranger.

I know. You've all been there too. No pity party for Jaclyn today. Let me start with what happened earlier in the week:

Rodolfo and I needed a new mattress. We've been putting it off... oh, let's say 3 years, and so when we saw Sears was having a sale, we decided to finally suck it up and spend the money so we could stop waking up with backaches every morning.

We were in the store, setting up delivery for our new bed when Caitlyn just full-on melted down. I've said it before, she has her asshole moments, but nothing like this. This wasn't a minute or two of whining over a toy or because I wouldn't let her ride the escalator for the 10th time or because I made her wear shoes; this was a full-blown, middle of a store where we were in the middle of a large transaction and therefore javascript:void(0)could not just walk out, hissy fit.

The funniest part is that there was no real catalyst for it. I think she may be getting another set of molars, because she hasn't been eating or sleeping much, so I can only attribute it to that. She simply decided after 20 minutes or so of wandering around, riding the escalator and carrying around the Dora purse I was planning to buy her, that she was done with Sears. DONE. She melted first into sobs, then angry, irrational rage when I tried to pick her up off the floor (because obviously you don't stand up for a meltdown. You must be face down on the floor).

I tried, you guys. I tried to calm her down, to distract her. I went so far as to try to get her to jump on the beds because she loves to do that at home. No. A resounding and resentful no (followed by another dramatic, face-down flop onto the ground). When she reached for the last trick in her bag, full-blown screaming, I told Rodolfo I'd wait for him in the mall. At least then people would only be passing by as they gave me dirty looks.

To my utter relief, as I walked out of Sears, I noticed the mall had installed one of those indoor, toddler playgrounds right at the Sears entrance. Yes. I could sit, she could play and shut the fuck up and stop screaming in my face. Except, of course, it didn't quite go down like that.

Caitlyn was still mad. I coaxed her onto the slide once, and then she gave up. She collapsed onto the rug of the play area and sobbed for no reason in particular. And you know what? I let her. A few times I made the obligatory amount of effort by asking if she was ready to play yet. She scowled and answered NO each time. So I let her cry it out for the next 15 minutes or so.

You are probably thinking this is where the judgment happened, but actually the other moms and dads were fucking fantastic. This particular play area was very clearly intended for toddlers, so I'm sure they all felt my pain. And not a single one of them gave me the "control your asshole kid" glare that I was expecting. In fact, they joked around with me about Caitlyn's tantrum. Commiserated.

A funny thing happened after that. Caitlyn realized that I wasn't responding to her shitty attitude. It took a while, but eventually she picked herself up off the floor, ran over and gave me a hug. Then she started playing with another little girl until Rodolfo showed up. She started to melt down again when it was time to leave, which only got worse when we refused to reward her bad behavior and walked right past the carousel that she loves and rides every time we visit the mall. Still, I felt like I won that night.

In any case, it's kind of funny how that worked out. I was completely expecting judgment and dirty looks because my kid was flat-out acting like a dick, but I got nothing but sympathy. I guess I was feeling a certain solidarity with other moms this week because of it, so it definitely threw me off when I was told about the random stranger who judged me to my babysitter today at the park.

My babysitter has a 3 year old son and when she took our kids to the park, another mom asked her if they were both her children. She clarified that the boy was hers, but that she is Caitlyn's babysitter.

The other, random stranger mom who has never even met me, decided that I was a shitty mom right then and there. "Oh", she said "How sad. You have her all day?". Then she went on to ask if I "really have to work" and said that "people should plan if they want to have kids". Plan to marry a rich man, apparently.

My babysitter, being the fantastic badass that she is, responded with something along the lines of "you're right. Only rich people should be allowed to have kids, so they can stay home and let their nannies raise them". The woman went on to say that her husband doesn't let her work, to which my new hero very effectively ended the conversation by saying she had "to go to work. And besides, you probably have to go home and wash your husband's feet or something".

Have I mentioned how much I love this woman? She told me she thinks the woman was trying to pay her some sort of backwards compliment for being a stay-at-home mom, without having even a drop of actual information about her life and circumstances. Which led to a whole other conversation about the assumptions people make.

You see, my babysitter is biracial. It's something I immediately loved about her because our family is also biracial and so I knew there were certain things she would get about us right away. The conflicts of culture when raising a child by parents of different races can be really annoying. With Rodolfo and I in particular, we are both extremely stubborn. Extremely. So, while we usually do just fine sorting out the little stuff, when we have a major conflict of ideals about an aspect of child-rearing, neither of us is particularly inclined to fold.

Our babysitter gets this. She realizes that sometimes I'm going to tell her one thing and Rodolfo is going to tell her the complete opposite. She knows how to find the right balance, to respect both of our wishes and find a middle ground. Come to think of it, should we ever need the services of a marriage counselor, we might do well to ask her opinion first.

In any case, when we were talking about the fact that this random, judgy bitch at the park felt like she had some sort of solidarity with her because they were both at home with their children, it made me think of something else. White people.

I'm curious if it's just me. You see, it's happened to me on MANY occasions. It would seem that some of the other white people, the ones who don't particularly like blacks and Hispanics, seem to think we are on the same team in that respect (or lack thereof). They think they can whisper in my ear about "all the blacks" or how "no one in this store speaks English- they should go back to their country!", simply because we are both white.

My favorite response is always to mention the fact that English isn't my husband's first language, that some of his family members living in this country don't speak English at all (before you get all annoyed about that one, I'd like to point out that they live in a primarily Hispanic community and get along just fine without it. I suppose though, you could also react the way my dad does and point out that "we" are "catering to them" and that "the Italians had to learn English!". I know I've mentioned that he's an asshole. Let me just reiterate that now.) and that our daughter, despite appearing to be white, is both biracial and bilingual.

Does this happen to you other white people? Can we get the word out that not all of us (despite our frequent inappropriate jokes on our blog) are racist?

Anyway, that was all very off-topic. In any case, my babysitter is the fucking shit and defended me to some random, bitchy stranger and put her in her place. It's always frustrating to think someone is judging you because you have to go to work. I don't think it's quite the "mommy wars" situation it can get made out to be. I just think some people are assholes.

In any case, its nice to know the person watching my kid has my back, understands why I'm leaving my kid with her and respects that choice and expects anyone who thinks they are allowed to assert their opinion on it respects it too. If ever I questioned my choice to go back to work after Caitlyn was born, this made me sure I made the right choice. Because I'm not the only one teaching Caitlyn to be a super awesome badass who stands up for herself.

I Know How Much You Love My Posts About Bodily Fluids

Back when I had my baby shower, I received a metric butt-load of stuff. I don't think I bought a diaper until Caitlyn was a month old. And she's always been on the small side, so the variety of smaller sized clothes I received lasted until she was nearly a year old.

There was one thing, though, that I didn't understand. Washcloths. I got so many fucking washclothes. Literally at least a hundred. And bibs too. Between the two, I had nearly 200 6-8 inch squares of fabric. The bibs were cute, so I tried to use them all at least a few times. But the washcloths, my god; I couldn't use all those things if my life depended on it.

I don't think Caitlyn was any less messy than any other baby. I had use for some of these things (though, admittedly I haven't used a bib in at least a year- she just rips them off and laughs at me), but I just couldn't understand the sheer volume in which I received them.

It was my experience that the gifts I received from other moms always had at least one thing that I didn't think I'd need at the time. Then Caitlyn would hit a particular stage and I'd realize that those moms really did know exactly what I needed. They were just thinking a little bit further ahead than I was.

But even two years later, I still couldn't make sense of all those washcloths. How often are these people bathing their children? Three, four times a day? So I started using them for other things: Wiping up spills when I ran out of paper towels, cleaning off the filthy high chair, substituting them for wipes if Caitlyn had a rash. And you don't want to use it for bath time after using it for any of those things, so the alternate-use washcloths usually went straight to the garbage.

Then last night, I was looking for a fucking washcloth and couldn't find one. In case you are wondering, it's REALLY hard to not get vomit on the rug when someone pukes on your foot. Touche, experienced moms, you got me again.

Asshole Time 2.0

Back when Caitlyn was an infant, before I started this blog even, she had something Rodolfo and I referred to as Asshole Time.

Generally, we were very lucky. She was an easygoing, happy baby. But every night between 6-9pm, Caitlyn would be an asshole. She would cry despite not being hungry or wet or uncomfortable. Rocking her didn't help. Nothing helped. She would just spend at least an hour or two every night screaming inconsolably and we could never figure out why.

Asshole Time was fleeting. I'd say it lasted from the time she was a few weeks old until she hit 3 months or so. If you figure she hardly ever cried besides that, I probably dealt with a lot less crying than most new moms.

At the time though, it was very frustrating. I couldn't figure out what it was that was upsetting her. I couldn't make her happy. On days when Rodolfo was at work during Asshole Time and I was alone with Caitlyn, I would find myself at the very end of my patience. I would say things that you shouldn't really say to your infant. Things like "WHAT IS YOUR PROBLEM?" and "THERE'S NOTHING WRONG WITH YOU, STOP SCREAMING!" and "I WANT TO THROW YOU OUT THE FUCKING WINDOW" and then maybe I would also cry. Not because I felt like THAT big a failure, but mostly out of the frustration that builds when someone is screaming in your face for hours at a time and you can't just say "fuck you" and leave.

Looking back, it really wasn't so bad. Because right now, we are experiencing Asshole Time 2.0. Also known as the Terrible Twos. Also known as "Stop smacking your head into the ground when you don't get your way then crying because you hurt yourself" and "Mommy isn't laughing because you are being a dick" (side note: I accidentally taught Caitlyn the word dick this weekend) and "Don't hit me, asshole" and "Don't climb out of your crib. You are in time-out. Asshole" and "Keep your fucking diaper on" and "Snatching my phone and then throwing as hard as you can when I try to take it back is NOT cool" and, most of all "Stop fucking WHINING about everything". And it's so much worse. I'd take a hundred Asshole Times in exchange for Asshole Time 2.0.

My kid is funny and charming and adorable. So it's hard for me to deal with asshole Caitlyn. It's like she's possessed. By an asshole. Right now I'd say the split is about 60/40 in favor of her being an asshole. That other 40% is downright magical though. Her personality is so defined now. She does these unexpected, ridiculously charming things. Like last night, we were at a Super Bowl party and while the Super Bowl was on in one room, the Puppy Bowl was on in the other. She loved her some Puppy Bowl, let me tell you. Somehow, she understood that there was a connection between the two and would often walk out of the Puppy Bowl room, hands in the air and shout "TOUCHDOWN!". Shit like that makes it really hard to leave her in the woods to be raised by wolves until she gets her attitude in check.

Right now, hitting is the battle I'm fighting the hardest. Caitlyn seems to think that any slight, real or perceived, shall be dealt with by the merciless strike of her hand. She also seems to think that when I get pissed about it and put her in time-out, that kissing the spot she smacked me in should get her out of a punishment. Sorry, kid. It doesn't work that way.

The mood swings are really difficult too. She transforms from the smiley, cheerful girl I know into a screeching, whining, angry beast in a matter of seconds. She feels the need to exercise her will at any cost. And her will is to be diaperless and armed with an ice pop and my phone at all times. It's exhausting.

This is definitely a phase right? I often wonder about my parenting choices. I feel like I'm doing a good job, but everyone has an opinion about everything I do. My mom, my husband, my sisters, random dicks in the grocery store. And so I find myself questioning the kind of parent I am. Am I too easy on her? Do I give in too quickly? Am I mistaking Terrible Twos for my parenting style just turning her into a full-time asshole? I don't know. Tell it's just a phase, you guys.

Busted Knees and Broken Faces

You know how policemen beat their wives with a sack of oranges because it doesn't leave any bruises? Huh? You mean that isn't common knowledge?

Anyway, despite having no plans to start beating Caitlyn, I realized that if I wanted to, I could totally get away with it. Uppercuts to the lip. I'm just saying. Toddlers man. No one questions it when she busts her face open.

I probably sound like the worst parent ever, but I just find it incredible how often this kid hurts herself. I regularly find bruises, cuts and scrapes and have no idea how they got there.

She's going through a cute little phase though. With all the rain we had last week, plus my natural clumsiness, it was inevitable that I would bust my ass. I'm kind of notorious for falling down all the time. My mom mocks me relentlessly about it. She was keeping a running tally of all the places I'd fallen back when I was a teenager. And she was pretty convinced that I had never been somewhere and not fallen there at least once.

So it was slippery. And I was in a rush. And I'm a fucking klutz and you should maybe just be 2 minutes late to a meeting as opposed to rushing when you are a klutz and it's raining outside. So I fell. Hard. And scraped up my knee pretty badly and fucked up my ankle.

Anyway. I got home and took a shower and was walking out of the bathroom in my towel when Caitlyn spotted my knee. She came over and pointed to it and I confirmed that "yes, oww, mommy got hurt". And then she did the cutest thing I've ever seen. She bent down and kissed my knee. Because she is the most adorable. The most adorable ever.

I'm still pretty scraped up and Caitlyn still comes over and gives my knee a kiss any time she sees it. It's the cute dysentary. She is oozing cute from all her orifices. I love it.

Then the other day she walked over to me. She was in her diaper, because clothes are for fucking suckers. I was cooking dinner or some shit and she was trying to get my attention (did I mention she says Mommy now? Finally. She seemed really committed to calling my Mom for a while, but the minute I got out of the hospital she started calling me Mommy). When I looked over I saw she was holding one leg up, looking at me expectantly. That's when I saw it. She had the tiniest little scab forming on her knee. Maybe a quarter of an inch. I wouldn't have even seen it if she didn't point it out to me. And then I knew just what she wanted. I was supposed to kiss her knee.

And I did. And then I asked if her knee felt better, if mommy's kiss had helped. To which she responded with a pained "Owwww". And then I kissed it many more times.

This isn't something I've ever shown her. I give her kisses if she gets hurt, but the idea that she should reciprocate the gesture was just about the cutest thing I've ever seen, and something she decided all on her own. My girl. She has a natural tendency to be nurturing and sweet, to care about other people.

I think as parents, we always question our choices. We always wonder if we are making the right decisions. We fear that we are raising brats or assholes (especially when they are just hitting their stride in terrible-twos type behavior). And so it's really nice to have a moment like that, where you realize that your kid really is as awesome as you think she is.

Parenting for Dummies- Chapter One: Don't Let Your Kid Eat Glass

You know that expression about assuming? When you assume, you make an ass out of u and me. I've found this expression is doubly true when you have a toddler: Don't assume she wants to use the potty just because she's taken off her diaper. Don't assume she's hungry just because she said she wants to eat. Don't assume she wants you to hold her just because she's standing at your feet, begging a chorus of "up"s. Because she will make you look like an asshole every single time.

Monday was Christmas baking day. I had taken the day off and spent most of it making a delicious array of cookies. Caitlyn thought cookie baking day was amazing. Obviously. She wanted to help. She smiled and giggled as I gave her little tastes. She snuck up behind me when I wasn't paying attention and snatched cookies off the table. It was exactly what I envisioned when I thought of having a daughter. It was everything simple and joyful about creating little traditions together. Right up until we had to make a trip to the Emergency Room.

You see, I made an assumption. It was late and I had finally finished my baking. As I packed up my cookies, Caitlyn walked by me chewing on something. A cookie, no doubt. Except of course, it was not a cookie at all. It was a glass Christmas ball. She was holding it like an apple and taking bites of it. And chewing it. And swallowing it.

Really kid?

I can't quite figure out what is appealing about chewing on a piece of glass, but Caitlyn was downright confused when I freaked out and snatched it out of her hands.

I guess I should have seen it coming. She's been calling them apples ever since we put up our Christmas tree. Naturally I worried that one might break and cut her, which is why everything made of glass was very deliberately placed above waist height. I honestly can't even figure out how she got a hold of it. But she did. And she thought it was delicious.

A quick call to the pediatrician confirmed that we would need to take her to the ER for an x-ray. We were there from about 10pm till 1:30am. Which is way past Caitlyn's bedtime. I expected her to be cranky, but apparently the ER is the most novel place in the world if you don't actually feel sick.

Our 3 and a half hours in the ER broke down a little something like this:

10pm-10:20pm- Admissions and waiting room.

10:20pm-10:30pm- Caitlyn sits patiently (haha- PATIENTLY!) while a nurse takes her vitals and puts an ID bracelet on her.

10:30pm-10:50pm- Caitlyn tries to take off her hospital bracelet (she succeeded about 2 hours in)

10:50pm-10:52pm- Caitlyn is put in a hospital gown, which she promptly rips off and spends most of the rest of the night in her diaper.

10:52pm-11:05pm- Caitlyn turns the TV off. Caitlyn turns the TV on. Lather, rinse, repeat.

11:05pm-11:15pm- Actual interaction with a doctor. Many jokes about Caitlyn having "the Christmas Spirit inside of her".

11:15pm-12:00am- Caitlyn licks or kisses a surface which I do not deem sanitary.

12:00am-12:30am- Caitlyn runs squealing toward the door of her room. Rodolfo has to repeatedly block her from running through the halls of the ER.

12:30am-12:45am- Dora the Explorer DVD while we wait, followed by 2 x-rays where Caitlyn does a mostly awesome job of standing still and we get the front and side view on the first shot.

12:45am-1:00am- Caitlyn opens and slams shut the cabinet doors in her room. She tries to steal gowns and blankets. She catches her dad's hand in the door when he tries to stop her.

1:00am-1:05am: Another meet-up with the doctor. "Bla-bla-bla, don't let your kid eat glass and check in with your regular pediatrician tomorrow" (this sort of makes her sound like a bitch, but actually she was awesome and Caitlyn instantly loved her).

1:05am-1:15am- Get Caitlyn dressed and go the hell home.

Did you know that if you bring your kid home from the ER and she isn't actually feeling sick, she will be all fucking wound up like you went to fucking Disneyland or something and not want to go to bed till 2:30 in the morning? Also, she will sleep till noon the next day which you will appreciate at the time but not as much when you actually have to go back to work the following day and her sleep schedule is all fucked up and she wants to stay up till 2am EVERY night.

Stop smiling and go the fuck to sleep

Also, does it make me an awful parent that I thought she looked adorable in the hospital gown and during the approximately 5 total minutes she was wearing it I took a bunch of pictures?