Crappy Parenting

We all know that parenting is a thankless, full time, hard ass job that doesn’t come with instructions, rules, or paid time off. (Ok, well, it DOES come with one rule: Keep them breathing. But I kinda feel if you need that spelled out for you, maybe you should re-think the whole procreation thing.) We also know that it’s one of the most rewarding, satisfying, and awesome jobs in the world. Or so they keep telling us. Maybe that kicks in when they’re grown and starting to procreate themselves, giving us those sweet little grand kids that make up for us not killing them as teenagers.

But I digress. (As I usually do.)

Even as tough as parenting is, we wouldn’t trade it for anything. But……there ARE those moments. The ones where you begin to question if having kids was your brightest decision. (Until you remember that sweet bundle there was a “surprise” and it wasn’t an actual decision so much as too much mattress mambo one night.) Any parent who tells you that they haven’t had at least 1 of these moments is lying. They happen. The frequency multiples with each successive child, so if you’re high strung, panicky, or squeamish, you might want to stop at one, two max.

Mostly, kids are just being kids and they don’t even realize that they’re giving you gray hair. Like the time my 5 year old was teaching his 2 year old sister how to climb onto the end stand to the back of the couch so that they could roll down it onto the floor. Miraculously there were no concussions or broken bones. Maybe it’s the time your third child found the tub of Vaseline that you kept because he tended to get diaper rashes and smeared it along the back of his bedroom door and door knob. Or the shampoo he poured on his rug. (Do you know how hard it is to clean shampoo out of a rug? It just froths and bubbles and froths some more….not cool dude, not cool.)

After four kids, I have a veritable list of these moments, probably as long as my arm. Apparently though, that doesn’t mean that I can’t still be surprised from time to time. That fourth (AND FINAL!!) child wants to make sure that I’m not just going through the parenting motions with him; he wants to make sure I’m still kept on my toes. He wants to make sure he’s DEFINITELY the last child every to spring forth from my loins.

And he’s found a way to do just that.

A few weeks ago I was trying to sit down and call our internet provider who decided to deactivate our email addresses when we transferred service to the new house (Because now I have to change virtual addresses too? WTH?). I was dreading the call, the kids were not in a “let’s let mommy have five uninterrupted minutes” kind of mood, and I had just gotten on the line with THE GUY. From the other room I hear the youngest (who is 2) call to me: “Mommy, tum here!”

I cover the mouth piece of the phone. “YOU come here.”

So he does. He waddles in holding his hands up like a hostage in a stick up, covered in…..is that? Nooo, it can’t be. I grab his hand by the (clean) wrist and gingerly bring it to my nose. “Oh. My. God. What did you do?” I asked the two year old attached to the clearly shit covered hands. I grab him by the waist and sprint upstairs with the phone tucked under my ear, trying not to let the internet guy know the dilemma I’m now facing. Should I explain to him that I need to call back? No, I’ll get the 15 year old to run a bath, we’re almost done fixing the email, I can do this.

Have you heard of Murphy’s Law? Yeah, so of course nothing went simply. The daughter was not interested in a poop covered brother no matter how cute he normally is, the email system wouldn’t respond so I could fix it quickly and get THE GUY of the phone, and I made multiple dashes between the bathroom upstairs and the computer downstairs. I get the boy in the tub and spend the entire time trying to condition him: “When you poop, what do you say? You say, mommy, change my diaper. Your poop is NOT a toy.” Repeat this every 30 seconds for the duration of the bath.

Now, none of my other kids ever made me clean up their poop covered hands….the ones that are only covered in their own excrement because they thought, “Hey, wouldn’t THIS make a good toy? Let’s find out!” No, that was solely the fourth child. He wanted to be different. Mission accomplished.

So, long (and very nasty) story short…..I fixed the email AND washed his royal crappiness. Who says parenthood is boring? (It wasn't me. I would NEVER say that. I would knock on wood if I ever uttered those words. Plus get out the garlic and the crosses and the 4 leaf clovers. You can never be too safe.)