Sweetness and Light and Feces

I want a raise. I simply do not get paid enough for this job.

Little Buddy has been having explosive diapers for a couple of days now. He's acting perfectly normal except for the part where he has a very small appetite and horrific Huggies. This is the kid who has always been willing to eat whatever we put in front of him. Now he's turning his nose up at everything and then, when we attempt to insist that he eat it, throwing it at us. And we've had several ridiculously nasty diapers. Matthew will be walking along, minding his own business when all of the sudden he gets a strange look on his face, grunts, and lets out a horrendous sound from his nether regions. In the matter of one second he'll be covered from the top of the front of the diaper to the top of the back with runny goo. It's special.

Last night, our door flew open at 3:40. The Rock Star was sobbing about throwing up. It took us a few seconds to realize he'd thrown up on the floor of his room after attempting to make it to the bathroom. I got him cleaned up while Troy got the floor cleaned up. Then I made a bed for him on my floor, Troy got him a big bowl, we put a nightlight in our bathroom, and left the toilet seat up. A half hour later he was barfing again but, luckily, he made it to the toilet. He then proceeded to have horrible diareara (his word, not mine) all morning.

At one point I heard sobbing coming from the bathroom. As I opened the door, I asked what was wrong. I needn't have asked. There was poop everywhere. It was very reminiscent of that one time on the plane. Except, you know, the bathroom was bigger this time. "I didn't make it!" He wailed. I'll say. There was poop in his clothes, poop on the floor. Poop on the side of the toilet, and poop down his leg. He was perched on the top of the toilet and he was embarrassed (and hey, he'll get to relive his embarrassment again when he's old enough to read my blog! So yeah for that!) and just kept apologizing to me. I explained that he didn't have to apologize, that it was an accident, that I knew it wasn't his fault, and on and on and on. When I'd cleaned him up I had him get down and that's when I realized that it was somehow also on the bottom of his foot. The floor of the bathroom filled with Garrett sized poop prints. Neat. When all was said and done I realized that the toilet was full of paper and, well, plugged. Sweet. Just as I started to unplug my boy wailed, "I have to go poop again!"

"Run upstairs, quick!"

And as I unplugged one toilet he filled another.

And before I could rinse out his clothes he filled the bowl again.

So I gave him a third of an Imodium.

My house is a mess.

There is still a chunk of quesadilla on the floor where it landed when Matthew lifted his chubby arms over his head and lobbed it at me. There are receipts on the counter and clothes on the bed. At least they're freshly washed and folded. Today I broke up a fight between a one-year-old and a not-quite-four-year-old over a pop-up book that Garrett had first. I put Garrett in time out because a certain one-year-old had knocked over a certain not-quite-four-year-old's farm and the not-quite-four-year-old got so mad that he took his anger out on his bed and threw everything on the ground, blanket, sheet, and all. He's been destroying beds lately and it's really getting on my nerves so I put him in time out on top of the naked bed. I held Matthew as he sobbed simply because his brother was crying in time out. I brushed my teeth. I think. I wiped a lot of bottoms. Or, that is to say, I wiped the same bottoms a lot of times. I fed them lunch. A toddler threw lunch at me. I put both boys down for naps, sat on the couch, and exhaled.

I've said it before and I'll say it again. Sometimes raising kids is all sweetness and light and unicorns dancing on rainbows and sometimes it's all out guerrilla warfare.

But just before I put them down for naps, Matthew--the human food pulverizer--flashed me the most brilliant smile. And, as I laid with Garrett while he fell asleep, he whispered, "I really love you. Sweet dreams, Mama."

So who knew unicorns danced on rainbows even during war?