Category Archives: How Embarrassing

My Water Broke And I Did Not Know!

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For K.  You asked for the story, and here it is!

My husband travels a lot and for long periods of time. I made him promise that he would not travel the last month of my pregnancy.  I was now almost a month from my due date and my husband was on his last trip before the baby was born.  I recently stopped working and had spent the last two weeks at home getting everything ready. I was sitting downstairs when my dad called. He said “I have been working at the beach and there is this new highway that I have wanted to try. It brings me very close to your house. I was thinking that I could pick you up.  You can stay with us until “big man” gets back in town.”  I am very close to my parents. I knew that my dad was worried about me being alone and that he was not interested in trying out a new highway. I knew it would be way out of his way, but I had been having a lot of contractions lately and honestly I would feel better being with family.   “If it is not too far out of your way – OK”, I said.

My dad picks me up and we drive the 2 1/2 hours to their house. I had been visiting my family a lot during my pregnancy. We moved to that city when I was three, and I lived there until the previous year when my husband took a new job.  He started his current job in December 2005 and I moved soon after.  I have a small family, but most of us lived in the same city and we are all very close.  After arriving at my parents’ house, I called and made plans for the following day.  I set up an appointment with my old doctor and made lunch plans with my grandmother.

I loved my old doctor. Growing up, I had terrible endometriosis and my doctor of 15 years, Dr. D, had taken great care of me.  He knew me, and also my mother, very well.  He was quick to find my mom’s tumor and perform her surgeries as well; he is a great doctor.  When I first found out that I was pregnant, I called him and set up the ultrasound.  Besides, I knew that I could not yet see a doctor (in the hospital) where I worked, because there were no secrets in my office.  I was not ready to tell anyone that I was pregnant and my staff would surely check the doctor notes online.  I saw Dr. D again when I was going to find out the sex of the baby.   My mom desperately wanted to see the ultrasound and I wanted his opinion on the health of my baby.  The majority of the time, I saw a doctor in the city where we currently lived.  The problem was that all of the doctors were affiliated with the same hospital.  The hospital is a teaching school which means that is full of residents.  Well, about a month ago, one of these genius residents missed a major problem that I was having and sent me out of there while still bleeding (a story for another day). So anyway, after their resident triage expert sent me home, seven months pregnant and bleeding, I called my old doctor.  My husband (who was leaving the next day for Brazil) drove me directly to Dr. D’s office, where he immediately diagnosed the problem.  I now find it ironic that during the drive, we said how we wished to have the baby with Dr. D.  Unfortunately, we knew that with my husband’s hectic schedule, we had to have the baby in the new place that we called home.

I had not been feeling great, so I was actually relieved to see my favorite doctor.  He checked me and said that I was only 2 centimeters and that the baby looked good.  He asked if I had any questions and I burst into tears. He then asked if I was ok and I said “I don’t know.  What do I do if I go into labor?  What do I do?  Where do I go?”  He opened the door and asked his nurse to get me a packet of stuff about the hospital.  He sat down and asked if my husband was traveling. I nodded. He then asked when he would be home.  I said that he will fly in late tomorrow and then come get me Friday night. He stood and pulled out his card.  He wrote his cell number on it and told me to call him if I had any problems. He patted my hand and said “I want to see you in a week.”  I paid my bill, but did not set up another appointment because I knew that I needed to go home.  I was not due for another month.  I could not stay here that long before having this baby.  I really wished I could have the baby here, but it just did not make sense!    I walked into the lobby where my mom and grandmother were waiting. They could tell that I had been crying and they followed me to the door saying “Are you OK, is everything OK?”   I said, “I just really hurt, but I am fine. I think I am just tired.”  They took me to lunch, but I could barely eat.

The next day I woke up feeling much better.  It was around 2:00 and I was just sitting on my parents’ sofa when my dad walked in.  His doctor told him to try and walk every day.  He said he preferred the air conditioned mall and asked if I wanted to come with him. I said sure, and thirty minutes later my dad was walking (and I was waddling) around the mall.  We stopped to look at a Halloween store because it was mid-October and my parents liked to have these crazy Halloween parties for their friends. We were looking at the bazaar costumes and decorations when my back really started to hurt.  The pain was so bad that I had to just stop and rub it. My dad asked if I was OK and I said that my back was Really hurting. He asked, “Do you want to go to the car?” and I said, “No. I’m sure it will stop.  I do need to pee though!”  I had spells of back pain over the last few months, so I was not overly concerned.  Well, the pain did not stop, but we finished he walk. He got in the Starbucks line to get himself a coffee and me an apple cider, and I had another feeling like I needed to pee.  I told him that I needed to run to the restroom and that I would be right back.  When I got into the restroom it REALLY felt like I needed to pee.  I tried to go, but just a couple drops came out.  I remember saying “That is weird”.  I left the restroom, found my dad, and we headed back to their house.

My mom had called earlier in the day and asked if the baby was still beating me up. My baby kicked me and my ribs to the point that I could barely breathe, but today she was very still. My very active baby was eerily still today and now that my pain was getting worse, I started worrying about her. I had just sipped on a sugar-filled Carmel Apple Cider and expected her to be moving a little.  Mom called again and I caught her up on my worries and my increasing pain. She said that she was leaving work and that we would go out to dinner.

Food was the last thing on my mind because, by this point, the pain was severe!  It was only in my back; it never reached my abdomen at all!  I had contractions the last three months of my pregnancy and had to spend a lot of time (after work) on my side with my feet up.  I had been hooked up to monitors multiple times now, because of the intensity of my contractions.   I knew very well how contractions felt, but this was not even close.  The pain was awful, and now it started to run down into my legs.  The pain was so bad that, when it hit, I would have to start pacing. I thought about back labor and tried to time the intervals between the pains, but I did not know if you would time it from when it hit my back or when it ran down my legs (or do you even count that at all). I read a lot of books about labor, but had never seen any mention of the pain running down into your legs before. My mom gets home and sees my state and gets concerned. They decided that I needed to eat. (What is it with parents trying you feed you during a crisis?)  She thought that since I had eaten very little the past two days, the baby and I would feel better after some nourishment.

We go to a near-by Chinese restaurant and place our order. I show them how when the pain leaves my back it runs into my legs. They stood and watched my legs and it looked like they were convulsing; it was a little horrifying. I leave the table to go try and pee.  I once again have the urge to pee, but only a couple drops come out.  For a few days now, I have been feeling a lot of pressure in my girly parts.  I started wondering if it is just the pressure that is making me think that I have to pee, when I really don’t.  I get back to the table and say that I think I need to call the doctor’s office.  I am fumbling with the phone while my legs tremble, so my mom takes the phone and calls for me.  She gets the triage nurse and starts to tell her what is going on.  My mom is speaking very loudly in the phone and I was starting to get a lot of looks.  These tables are pretty close together and my mom yells, “No!  Her water has not broken, but she is in serious pain and is shaking pretty hard!”  I look at the people beside us.  The man is staring at his egg drop soup and looking pretty disgusted.  His wife looked horrified, because her eyes were about to jump out of her head.  I gave them a little wave, then a quiet little “Sorry”.  We are told that the doctor will call us back.  Our food comes, but I can’t eat.  My parents are finishing their meals when the doctor phones and asks about the baby and her movement. She told me to go home, drink a coke and eat a candy bar, and she would call back in 20 minutes.

I followed her instructions, but still felt no baby. The only thing I felt was back pain. I told her about the pain in my back, my legs trembling uncontrollably, and the urge to pee but nothing would come out.  She said that “back pain, pressure, and peeing are not uncommon during pregnancy, but I am concerned that the baby is not moving.”  I called my husband and he said that his plane from New York had landed.  He said that he was heading to a dinner and then home.  I told him “something strange” was going on and that the doctors were sending me to the hospital to get checked out. I told him that I only had my wallet, not my phone, and for him to call my mom or dad’s cell.  I was very relieved that he was off of the plane and back in our state.  I felt better until I got in the back of my parents car and put my hands on my legs.  My legs would not stop shaking and I was starting to get scared.  We drove uptown to the hospital and found the labor and delivery floor. I told the nurses that I was due in a month and they took me to a triage area. One nurse said “We don’t have many rooms tonight. There is a full moon and women are having babies left and right!’

They put me in a room and I showed them my legs shaking.  She told me that the baby was probably in a weird position and putting pressure on a nerve or something in my back.  They got me a gown, hooked me up to a monitor, and walked out.  I looked at my mom and said, “Do you think I’m in labor?”  She said, “Well, your dad does!”  The nurse came back and looked at the monitor and said, “You are definitely having contractions!” I said, “This can take forever, right?  Can I go home now and just come back in the morning?”  She said, “Let me check to see if you water has broken.  I also need to get a urine specimen.”

I go in the bathroom and set the cup down. I was in a frog-like stance (trying to hold the gown and look under my big belly).  I squatted down to get the cup, when a little trickle of fluid came out.  I stood up, got the cup, squatted again and the same thing happened.  I said, “OK, I just peed on the floor or my water did break!”  I went back and told my mom that I think my water broke. “These tiny little trickles of fluid have been coming out today, but only when I try to pee.  I mean, they were just a couple drops!  I never wet my pants or soaked the floor!  It never even leaked out!  Isn’t that what happens when your water breaks?!”  My mom said “I always thought so!”  The nurse was gone for a long time and the pain was getting serious. My husband called and it was now 10:30 pm.  My mom said “We still don’t know anything, other than that she is having contractions”.  He sounded exhausted.  I told him to get some sleep and we would call him back.

The nurse finally came in and said that she put some of the fluid on a strip and it turned blue.  “What does that mean?” I asked.  She said, “Well Honey, it looks like your water has broken.”  I asked, “Am I definitely having this baby now, or can I go home?”  She said “You are definitely having this baby, and I can’t let you leave after your water breaks.”  I asked her why it never came out and she said that the baby’s head was so low that it was blocking the exit!  “Is that normal?  Is the baby OK?” I asked.  She told me “There is NO normal when it comes to child birth.”  I then told her that my husband was a few hours away.  I asked if he needed to come now, or if he could wait until the morning.  She said that she would talk to the doctor.

I now realized that my contractions started around 2:45 this afternoon, while my dad and I were standing in the Halloween store at the mall.  That is also when I felt all of the pressure and the sudden feeling that I needed to pee.  I was horrified that my child’s head was blocking the passage so that the fluid was not able to escape.  I asked my mom “Do you think all of that fluid is hurting her?”  My mom said “I just don’t know!”  I tried to stop worrying about the baby, and instead focus on how stupid I was!  I kept thinking, “I should have known! “ I should have known that my labor would be strange and that this would not go as planned!  After having so many contractions, in my abdomen, I just never considered that I would not have similar contractions when I went into labor.  I also never knew that my water could break and I would not know.

I seriously could not believe that I went into labor in a Halloween store in the mall.  I also could not believe that my water broke in that store, but just didn’t come out.  But, in this case, it was probably a good thing that I didn’t flood that particular store.  Customers would have thought I was trying out some weird costume or Halloween party trick, while employees would have thought they were being “Punked”.  But no, it was just an average day in my life; an average day in my very unpredictable life!  Now, I was left to wonder – will my husband actually make it to the birth of our child?  Yep – Just an average day!

Not Another Squirrel!

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A few weeks ago I actually witnessed an unbelievable sight.  The entire family was outside.  The kids played in the driveway while my husband and I stood looking up at a tree that had just lost a huge limb during a storm.  We were both standing close to the tree studying another limb that looked dangerous and badly damaged.  A squirrel had been moving around in tree, just doing what squirrels do, and then it happened!  It looked like the furry little thing went to jump to a lower limb, but missed!?  We stood there with open mouths, and watched the squirrel plummet to the ground.  It was falling feet first, but did a mid-air flip. The squirrel hit the ground with a thud and went completely still.  “I think it just committed suicide!” I said to my husband.  He walked toward it and I yelled “Don’t touch it!  It is probably just messing with us!”  My husband got close, while I backed away.   He then said, “I think it’s dead. Maybe it was sick.  It is covered with ticks and they are swollen; it is actually pretty disgusting!”

My kids figured out that something unusual was happening.  Possibly due to the fact that I was running down the hill covering my head (just in case more squirrels decided to dive bomb us).  I was also screaming “Gross!  That was so weird!  Eww!  That is so nasty!”  My daughter asked what was going on, and I said that dad was looking at a dead squirrel.  I told her that it was sick, and covered with bugs, and not to go near it.  “Did it just die?  What happened to it?” she asked.   My husband tells her that it fell out of the tree.  My daughter looked horrified and asked “What was wrong with it?”  My husband then replies “Well honey, the squirrel may have had cataracts, a tree nut allergy, or it just might have been very, very sad!”  My daughter now looked even more horrified and confused.  I gave my husband “the look”, let out a big sigh, and shook my head.  I took the kids in the house and as I closed the door, I could hear my husband outside laughing and saying “Babe, can you believe that?  “I have never seen anything like that; it was seriously unbelievable!  That thing just did a high dive right out of that tree.  I give him a 10, except for the landing!”  I shut the door and said “OH, dear!”  My daughter asked what was wrong.  I said “Nothing honey. I just think that daddy has been out in the heat a little too long!”  She nodded as if she understood.

Here we are, two weeks later.  My husband walks in covered in sweat and looking quite sticky.  He had been outside for some time.  I had already given the kids a bath and gotten them in bed.  It had been the world’s longest day, and I finally had a chance to sit down.  I sat on the bed and grabbed my iPad because I needed to return an email.  My husband was standing over me, grumbling about our latest squirrel saga; they completely backed up the gutters along the entire side of our house causing a pretty serious problem.   These relentless squirrels had climbed up inside the gutters, gotten under the gutter guards, and built a huge nest.  The gutter guys had been at the house today and the estimate to fix the problem was well over $1,000.   My husband was not happy!  He looked at me and asked if I had seen the trap. 

Evidently, while my husband was making our early coffee run, he ran by our local hardware store and bought some humane animal traps.  He said that he just wanted to catch the furry little bandits, and take them somewhere else.  He says that he sat the cage, or trap, near the gutter that they always enter.  He went on to tell me that he then took tortilla chips, spread them with peanut butter, covered them with chocolate Cheerios, and then put them in the cage.   

After letting this information soak in, I tell him that this all sounds completely ridiculous and like a huge waste of his time.  “What are you going to do with the squirrel when you catch it?” I ask.  “I am going to drive it up to the pool and let it go” he tells me.  “Aren’t they like dogs?  Don’t they come back?  And you are not taking them in my car. I don’t want some tick and flea infested rodents running around in my car!” I say, after recently seeing that tick-covered squirrel spiral to his death.  I then say, “I’m sorry; I’m tired.  But I honestly don’t think you will catch one anyway.”   “Guess what?” he says, “I already did!”

My husband has an interesting sense of humor, so I was trying to figure out if he was just messing with me.  “Are you serious?” I asked.  “I am dead serious!” he said.  And as if the entire conversation had not already been weird, it now gets weirder!  He then says “You should come look at the size of this thing; It’s huge!  It’s so big that it bent the large cage!  It is one big bull!”   “A bull?  I said.  “Yeah, it’s a male – a bull!” he answers.   I said “You are from California; you were a swimmer, a surfer, and a sunner.  Now you do math all day.  How do you know what male squirrels are called?  And how do you know it was a male for that matter?”  A question I now seriously regret asking as my husband replied, “Because I picked up  the cage and was staring right at it!  You can see his boy parts, and you should see the size of his “nads”, they are huge!  I then said, “Nads?  What are you talking about?”  He answered, “His Cojones; they are Enormous.  He must have to drag them up the tree!  Seriously, come look!” 

I looked at my husband and said “Honey, I am a little concerned that the work stress is getting to you.  I think the 16 hour days are just too much.  You have known me long enough to know that I would rather be poked repeatedly with a fork, than to go look at that squirrel.  In fact, a unicorn will fly out of my tushy before I go look at that squirrel or his family jewels!”  He finally started laughing and said “Yeah, OK; I’m tired anyway.  I’m just going to let the thing go.  Besides, anything with nads like that deserves to be free.  But if it builds a nest in our gutters again, I’m going to teach it to skydive without a parachute – just like his friend.”  I replied with “Whatever you say honey!  And oh by the way, I don’t ever want to see, or hear about, animal reproductive parts again– especially the boy ones.  That is just more than I need to know!” 

After he left, I wondered if other people had lives like this.  Are we the weirdest family in the world?  Do other people have experiences or conversations like these?  At least this conversation taught me a valuable lesson – to only ask my husband questions that I REALLY want the answers to.  Also, I will never look at squirrels the same way again; they are cute no more!  I think we are going to have to move back to the city – Yuck!

Mommy Look!

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So we were in Starbucks (as we were almost every Saturday morning) but this Saturday was special because, on this day, my 3 year old daughter saw someone that she had never seen before.  She finally got to lay eyes on a figure that she had only before seen in books and the movie Peter Pan.

So the story begins very early on a cloudy Saturday morning.  My kids and I were looking for a table while my husband took place in the abnormally long line.  My daughter and I sat against the wall, and I sat the baby’s car seat in the chair across from me.  All of the comfy seats were already taken, so we were sitting directly across from the case filled with treats and we were easily within earshot of the people in line.  We had a view of the entire store and, as my daughter sat watching her dad in line, I noticed a bright green flash at the store’s entrance.  It was a very unusual sight.  A few people wearing cycling clothes were standing in the corner chatting and they all stopped as she entered.

She was obviously a newbie to sport of cycling, but boy was she prepared for today’s ride.  She was wearing a color that is hard to describe, because it actually glowed.   It was like an alien spacecraft had exploded and this blinding material was all that was left.  The color was neon green (we will just call it green with black accents) and she was wearing a lot of it.  I mean she had on the neon green and black shirt, the neon green and black bike shorts, and the neon green and black jacket.  This lady had the neon green and black tennis shoes, the neon green and black fanny pack, and even the matching water bottle.  Her hair was red, short, and very curly; it was so short that it stood up wildly all over her head.   Her black bandana, with neon green accents, smashed down the very front, and made the hair around the top and sides of her head stick out even more.  As she walked toward her friends, the crowd literally parted as people took in the neon spectacle.  Her cycling friends were also dressed to ride, but they were dressed much simpler and did not cause you to choke on your bagel.  It is hard to explain because the others also had on unique outfits.  They wore shirts of various color (even neon) and many had logos.  There was just something so different about this outfit.  I am still not sure if it was just that the color was so strange, or that it seemed a size too small as it clung for dear life to her enormous knockers (which were so smashed down that they stretched from her armpits to her belly button).  She walked with a swagger that shook her water bottle and something that I am pretty sure was a compass.  I did not understand the compass; I mean is it really possible to get lost while wearing the fashion equivalent to a strobe light.  This woman was totally and completely covered with glowing green and black.  I found myself wondering if she had somehow found neon green toilet paper and stashed it in her fanny pack.  Although most of us tried to look away, you just had to look again.   It was like a tractor beam was pulling you back to bask in a confusing neon haze.

I sat and watched as everyone stared at her and I tried to figure out if I had just encountered the world’s most confident woman or most naive.  Should I applaud her or feel guilty for staring.  I was concerned that she may have fallen prey to some slicked-back-haired, smooth talking, cycling salesman.  Or maybe she had a cold and accidentally took the drowsy nighttime medicine on the day of her clothing purchase.  These were good possibilities, but still did not explain why she put on the outfit this morning.  I forgave her for the hair standing straight up on her head.  I mean who hasn’t fallen victim to a bad hairstylist (although there really should be a state board somewhere tracking this guy down and permanently removing his scissors).  I was smiling at her and trying very hard to look approving.  After all, you could tell that she had not exercised in a while and decided to try something new and make a change for the better – good for her!  I sat there and hoped the others would come to similar conclusions and would stop staring and mumbling under their breath.

The attention kept coming her way, and not just because of the super cyclist/super hero outfit, but because she was a loud talker.  She suddenly started yelling “I’m here and I’m ready to do this!” while pumping her glowing arms up high in the air.  This is the point when my three year old spotted her and started saying “Mommy look! Mommy look!”  I looked straight ahead of me at the men standing in line, who were also listening to my daughter.  They threw me a smirk, as they looked back at the loud talking, loud walking lady.   I tried to distract my daughter by pointing to her dad, who was way down at the other end, waiting for our coffees.  The lady now announces, to the entire store, that she has to use the restroom and heads our way.  As she gets right in front of our table (which happens to be right at the center of the unusually long and slow line), my daughter stands up.  She actually stood up on the bench, stuck out her arm, pointed her finger at the woman and yelled “Look mommy, a pirate!  Aaaaarrrrrhhhhh!”

I looked up and the entire Starbucks line was completely doubled over.  Tears were running down faces, hands were on stomachs and a few even clapped.  My face was completely red.  I was trying to keep my composure as I looked over at her friends and mouthed the words “Sorry!  Those crazy kids!”  The good news was that the lady already had her back to us at the time of the comment.  I was hoping that she had missed it completely.  My husband walks over with the coffees.  Some guy, who could not stop laughing, steps over to us and says, “That was awesome!”  My husband looks at me and asks what is going on.  I tell him and he asks, “Did she really say Aaaaarrrrhhhhh?”  A completely different man answered for me.  “Oh yeah” he said, as he wiped a tear off of his face.  My daughter then looks at my husband and says “Oh daddy, I’ve never met a pirate before!”  I was trying to decide if we should just leave, but we stayed and had our coffee and sandwiches. 

The lady seemed OK as she exited the restroom.  She still looked happy and excited, so I assumed that she somehow missed the whole thing.  I only looked at her again when she was outside the store.  I could now see that her hair, forced down by the bandana, actually was in the shape of a pirate hat, the water bottle on her hip was similar to a looking glass, and the compass goes without saying.  The outfit was so bizarre that my daughter decided it could only be worn by a very select few.  Lady neon actually did kind of look like a pirate!

It was a horribly embarrassing morning for me, but for my daughter, it was the best morning ever!  She spoke of this morning for months.  She told people about the morning that she met a pirate (a neon green pirate at Starbucks).  That is the great thing about kids; you just never know what exciting adventures lie ahead, even on what started out to be a gloomy, mundane Saturday morning.

Barfed On In A Mexican Restaurant

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My little boy had not been feeling well for a couple days.  He had an ear infection and a fever and had been on antibiotics for three days.  Anyway, we had been housebound for two days due to an ice storm.  Now, the roads were finally clear and we wanted to go out to dinner.  There is a small Mexican restaurant that is pretty close to neighborhood.  We figured it would be open and we would not have to spend too much time on the roads.

We arrived at the restaurant and got out of the car.  My two year old was dragging his feet and barely moving.  It was pretty chilly, so I bent down and picked him up so we could get inside quickly.  Once inside, the hostess walked us to a booth.  My daughter slide in the booth while I waited for a high chair for the little man.  My husband was standing beside me and we both heard a very wet burp.  We both shot each other a weird look and then I felt something hit my neck and chest.  I was still standing up, holding my son and he was throwing up down my v-neck shirt.  I was in absolute shock as I looked at the hostess who handed me a bunch of napkins.  I apologized to the hostess and looked at my husband and frantically said that we had to go.  My husband told me to run to the bathroom and they would wait for us outside.

I ran toward the bathroom and he got me again.  I was still holding him tight and he, once again, aimed right down my shirt.  I was covered in vomit and was almost to the bathroom when he got me the third time.  The vomit was now all over my jacket, my shirt, and my chest.  My bra was full of puke and it was now running down,  across my belly button, and into the top of my jeans.  I could just feel the hot vomit running down my body as I grabbed paper towels and tried to wipe my clothes off.  I was standing there hot, wet, and completely grossed out, just trying to wrap my head around had had just happened.  This was like some bad college flashback; this was like the worlds worst date!  Anyway, the puke was just soaking in to my pretty purple fleece, so I just wiped off my sons poor little face and left the bathroom.  I was looking for a back door so that I did not have to walk back into the main dining room covered in barf.  I mean nothing makes you want to eat a big old plate of refried beans like a mother and son covered in chocolately milk vomit.  Someone helped me open a back door and I ran out to the car.

We were close to the house and nobody was on the road, so I just got in the front seat  holding the puker on my lap.  My husband took off the little guys jacket and put the seat belt across us both.  My little man was eerily still as he sat on me with his head on my shoulder.  My husband had the defroster on and the entire car started to smell like spoiled milk and hot vomit.  I told him to turn it off so that the baby does not blow again.  We were almost home and my daughter started saying “It smells so bad!  I’m starting to feel sick!”  I told my husband to “step on it!”

We pulled in the garage and my husband put the door down while I stripped.  I had to take off every single article of clothing.  I  had baby barf in everything from my panties and bra to my Ferragamo loafers.  My hubby took off the little man’s clothes and the baby and I took a naked walk through the house, all the way to my shower.  I scrubbed the vomit off of myself and washed it out of my hair while the baby played with the hand held shower head.  He sprayed everything he could find and made a terrible mess, but I was so focused on getting clean that I did not care.  I finally washed his hair and my husband walked in to tell me that he was taking our daughter to pick up some Italian food.  He helped me dry off the baby while I got dressed.  I decided to keep him up since it was still early and I wanted to see if he was going to blow again.  My son was still sleeping in his crib.  It is a solid wood crib that weighs over 250 pounds.  The crib is hard to move and has very tall, curved sides which are hard to clean, so I decided to put up the air bed for us to sleep on.  I brought up the portable DVD player and put on a movie trying to keep him still whiled I made stacks of clean sheets, towels, pj’s, and pillows – just in case.  I finally got a chance to stop moving and I sat on the air bed watching my little man.  I could barely believe how much had just happened in the last hour and twenty minutes.  I was sitting there hungry (because I never got dinner), tired, and wondering if other mom’s had ever been barfed on in a Mexican restaurant.  At this moment, I was only sure of one thing – Parenthood is No Fiesta!    I really wanted a margarita!

 

Grandma, Did You Pee in a Urinal?

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Ok, so I have two grandmothers and both are in their 90’s.  One grandmother is fairing much better than the other in terms of “confusion”.  I have a very small, very close family.  We now live only three hours away but I desperately miss the weekly dinners together.   Unfortunately this incident occurred a week before we were set to see them.

Yesterday my mom calls and we are discussing our upcoming beach trip.  Then out of the blue she says “oh, you want believe what happened to your grandmother last night”.  She said that they had finished dinner and my grandmother was going to use the bathroom (as she always does just before we leave).  Well, she leaves the bathroom and comes over to the table with a confused look on her face and a huge biker dude following her.  She sits down, still obviously confused, and just looks at the huge man with the santa-sized beard.  Our family gives a polite “hello” as they sit wondering what she has done.  He then says     “she is ok.  It is all ok.  Look, what happens in the bathroom, stays in the bathroom!  I think she got a little confused.”  He gave a smile and a little chuckle and then patted her on the back and walked away.  My family now realized that she had gone in the men’s room, but was still not sure what occurred.  My Aunt leans in and says ” mom, what happened in the bathroom?”

Well,  it seems that she was not completely aware of what had taken place, but she did know that the restaurant had installed very strange toilets that had no doors and were very hard to use.  So basically, my ninety one year old grandmother took a pee in a urinal and none of us know exactly how she did this.  She also shared the experience with a very big, very burly, very bearded biker man whose name we don’t even know (but wish I did).  For I am intrigued by his gentle giant who helped  my grandmother with the predicament she was in, and although she will not remember him, I feel fairly certain that he will always remember her!  This is one of those situations where not remembering what happened is more of a blessing than a curse!

Coffee in a Sippy Cup – Desperate Times Call For Desperate Measures

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Ok, so I really needed coffee this morning and we were in a really big hurry.  I ran to the cabinet for one of my travel coffee mugs, but they were gone.  I ran to the pantry to look for a disposable cup and only found some tiny little clear thing; this cup was way too small and thin for hot coffee.  I ran back into the kitchen chanting “plastic cup, plastic cup” and noticed an open cabinet door.  My daughter had left the door open when she picked out her cup that morning.  I peered through the opening at my two best options.  I could pick a pink princess cup or a blue  car cup.  I grabbed the pink princess cup, removed the lid and started to fill it with steaming hot coffee.  I was ok until it was time to attach the spill-proof top. “You are not really going to do this are you” was running through my head as I attached the Sippy cup’s top.  I grabbed the cup and my bag; I placed them in the car and then worked on getting my children buckled in their seats.

As we were heading down the street, I picked up the cup and held it to my lips.  I looked over to see our neighbor standing at the corner with a big smirk on his face.  Ok, so maybe he wasn’t smirking as much as he was giggling.  Yep, my neighbor was doing the grown man giggle and i was hoping that it was  about something other than the fact that I was drinking out of a baby cup.  I mean he is pretty old.  Maybe he could not even see my cup.  Maybe he has glaucoma or something.  I let out an embarrassed  groan and started mumbling under my breath and my daughter looked up to see what was going on.  I then hear “mom, is that my favorite princess cup?”  “Yes honey” I said.  “Did you put coffee in my favorite princess cup?” she asked.  I groaned and nodded yes.  “Mom, why are you using my favorite cup for your coffee?”  I stopped at the stop sign, looked back at her and said  “because honey, desperate times call for desperate measures”.   “Are you desperate momma?” she asked.  I did not answer but only turned up the radio.  I then heard my four year old say “well, just don’t do that again”.

I finished my coffee by taking quick sips while moving, but never at stop lights.  I kept hearing “Are you desperate momma?” in my head.  Well, I must be desperate and for what, coffee?!  I decided at that moment that I needed to get off of the junk.  I looked inside myself and then announced “I am addicted to deliciously sweet coffee.  I am willing to make a fool of myself for this stuff and it has to stop.  I will not stoop to this low level ever again.  I am drinking too much coffee and it is negatively impacting my life!”  We arrived at my daughters appointment and I took the kids inside feeling sad and ashamed.

The  appointment was over.  I was hot, tired, and I was listening to my children scream from the backseat.  “I am hot” my son screamed.  “No, I am too cold” my daughter screamed.  “That is my book.”  “No that is my book.”   “Mom, blah, blah, scream, blah, blah!”  I could no longer make out what they were saying, because at that moment , it all became clear.  I did not need to cut out coffee.  No way, no ma’am.  What I need is to increase my daily intake.  I mean, if I had not been so exhausted and tired, I could have found one of my four travel coffee mugs and  would have never used my little girl’s sippy cup and would have never worried that I was a coffee addict.  Thank goodness I worked that one out.  “Hey kids, want to go to Starbucks?”

My Grandmother Faints

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So I was telling my family that my daughter was about to have her tonsils and adenoids out.  They were all shaking their heads and going well, this should be interesting. They all know the seriousness of her fear of doctors and procedures .  But during our discussion my adorable 91 year old grandmother told me a story.  She told me that my uncle Robert had to have his tonsils out at the age of two.  She said that during that time (almost 68 years ago) they used ether during the surgeries. She went on to say that while she was waiting for Robert to come out of surgery, she was getting nervous and started to need to tinkle (her term for pee-pee).  Being the dedicated mother that she is, she did not want to leave to use the potty for fear that she would miss something.  So, they bring out her son and she was sitting there determined to be the first thing he sees when he wakes up.  She said that the room was thick with ether fumes and she was starting to get dizzy.  Suddenly Robert wakes up and starts screaming.  My grandmother stands up to comfort him and as she does she faints, falls to the floor, and pees her pants.  She said she woke up in a big puddle with nurses standing over her.  She was very upset that she had soiled her lovely wool suit, but my grandfather went home to bring her a new one.  I found this story so helpful because I used to think that these embarrassing things only happened to me, but now I realize they are hereditary and I feel much better!