Craptastic Days

There are some days where I think I can handle being the mother of more than one child. Then there are other days like today, where I think this must be some kind of joke on me.

Marina slept extremely well last night. That was a welcome plus. But then at 6 am, I awoke to the sounds of Eli screaming "NOOO!" repeatedly in his room. I comforted him and told him he was just having a bad dream and then tried to trick him into thinking it was still night so he would go back to sleep. I got back into bed and closed my eyes only to hear him whining 30 seconds later. Finally, after several more failed attempts, I gave up and let him come into our bed and watch cartoons while I slipped in and out of consciousness and Marina kept sleeping in her bassinet nearby.

We eventually got up and started our day. Later, as I was urging Eli to get moving so we could go to the grocery store, he inexplicably hurled himself toward me. His giant head made violent contact with my upper lip (and the tooth behind it). For a moment I thought I had lost my tooth and my mind raced furiously, envisioning scenarios of gap-toothedness. But upon inspection in the mirror, I found my tooth to be sound, though my lip looked battered and swollen. Eli apologized to me throughout the day, which was very cute and sad. He would say, "Mommy, I didn't mean to hit you in the face earlier. It was an accident." Of course I told him I forgave him and that I looked much prettier with thick lips.

Then came the afternoon. Eli took a rare nap but decided at the end of it to poop in his Pull-Up diaper (I don't trust him in underwear for naps - and this is why). Lately, he has been in the habit of taking off his own diaper after sleeping and putting it in the bathroom garbage can (then I take it out later) then coming to find me. I heard some noise upstairs after his nap, but I was feeding Marina so I could only ask Eli what he was doing. He didn't answer me. Then a few minutes later he called down and told me he couldn't get this mess cleaned up. I asked him what mess, while passionately hoping he meant a mess of toys in his room. He told me that the mess was too big for him to clean up with the towel. This set the alarms in my head off. I asked him if it was a mess in the bathroom. Yes, he answered. I ran up the stairs, baby in arms, to assess the situation. He stood in the bathroom with no pants on. I asked him where the mess was. He told me it was underneath the high-quality bath towel that lay on the floor. I picked it up to reveal the discarded Pull-Up with a large ball of poop next to it and several smash marks on the ground next to the bath mat (I assume the towel failed at the clean up here). This was very displeasing to me. I had to be at work in 15 minutes and was waiting for Mark to get home to make our daily quick child exchange. I considered carefully what I should do. The thought occurred to me that I could stand there long enough for Mark to arrive and he could handle this situation but then I realized that was a pretty "crappy" thing to do to him. So, I put the baby in her bassinet and started the clean up. I used toilet paper to put the poop chunk in the toilet (Eli immediately insisted I should let him do the flushing, but I denied him this privilege as I thought he should not be rewarded). The floor had to go through an extreme scrub-down. I had to wipe and sanitize Eli since he had track marks everywhere. Then I saw a butt crack shaped stain on the carpet at the top of the stairs where I bet Eli sat down to contemplate his big problem before communicating it to his mother.

By the time Mark came in, there was a screaming baby in one room, a half-naked guilty-looking toddler standing in front of the bathroom, unsure of what he should be doing and a frazzled, crazy woman surrounded by poop-smelling plastic bags filled with trash scrubbing at the carpet in the hallway. When I heard the door open, I called down to him and asked him to come up because we "have a bit of a problem".

Eli was ushered into the bath while a comforted Marina sat in her bouncy seat, observing the proceedings. After repeatedly washing my hands, I ran out of the house, looking extremely unkempt, already late for work. No time for make up or hair brushes today! There would be no way to explain the last twenty minutes of my life in an effort to make an excuse for myself.

So, yes, there are some days (like today) where being a mom stinks (literally), but then I will get home and get a snuggle from my kids and think I can handle this for another day. Hopefully tomorrow all the poop will be in the toilet and I won't get peed on our punched.