Grossology: Parent edition

A number of character-building experiences await me in the laundry room.

I wish I were kidding.

Usually I adhere to a strict policy about not discussing things scatalogical on this blog. I get enough of that at the dinner table. So do many of you. My overall feeling is that the less said about this stuff, the better.

At the same time, there is comfort in knowing that one's shitty experiences are shared, right?

I should start by saying that this tale isn't nearly as shitty as some. Not by far. This is no story of a long-weekend sponsored by Norwalk. It's not even a story of the morning after the night before at Mandarin.

It's just a tale of the slightly ridiculous and gag-worthy.

Some of you have already heard me complain about being under the weather lately. The sinuses that wouldn't clear got scary, face-swelling, jaw-stiffening and ear-clogging on Friday night. It's been both a godsend and a bummer that this has coincided with my mom's highly anticipated visit from Victoria, since it has meant extra hands to help with the kids and the presence of my OWN real life mother to tell me to take a nap.

Part of the highly-anticipated bit has been a special-introduction dinner. The meet-the-parents kind. Only in this case it's meet-the-parent. Singular. All this to say it's not the kind of dinner you cancel just because you're a little woozy from your antibiotics and you can't hear out of your right ear.

But when he arrived with his own child in tow, special guest had to introduce himself to special grandma because I was in the upstairs bathroom, discovering that my three-year-old had soaked the back of his two layers of T-shirt by semi-falling into the toilet.

"Oh, hi," I said barrelling down the stairs with yucky T-shirts balled up, excusing myself for not being able to touch anyone while I just nipped into the laundry room for a wee second.

Barely two minutes later I was back upstairs, gaining a better appreciation for the extent of the imperfect mounts and dismounts executed by my youngest son, normally fairly competent in this arena. The rest of his clothes were done for. The toilet needed to be scrubbed. The child needed to be bathed.

However else would one begin a dinner party?

With boy's bottom speed-bathed, I returned to the main floor with a second bundle of laundry and a child dressed in only underwear.

Dinner progressed as could be expected, with three children seven and under eating absolutely everything my gourmet-cook mom had prepared and absolutely nobody related to me standing on his chair to better make a point.

Mere seconds after the cookie bribes were dispensed at meal's end and an under-the-weather Cameron had retired to the couch, his little brother exuberantly belly-flopped on him (in an attempt either to either hug him or begin a wrestling match - who can tell with boys?) causing Cam's sniffly, dry nose to bleed. Rather a lot.

Of course in hugging and comforting him, we both got covered in blood. After the bleeding stopped, Cam changed all of his clothes and I changed my sweater, trudging back downstairs with a miffed but mostly recovered big brother and a third bundle of laundry.

"Okay, well.... that's done!" I chirped, turning to some task at the kitchen counter.

"I hate to tell you," said my mom, "but your neck has, um, a big smear of blood."

A quick check in the bathroom mirror revealed that I was indeed sporting a bit of a zombie look. The other dinner party hosts would be SO jealous when they heard about this!

It was a successful dinner, though, despite the unexpected presence of some body fluids. A little blood and stuff doesn't really faze any veteran parent - am I right?

So I shouldn't have been fazed when, two days later, my young potty procrastinator missed the toilet, fouling the white bath mat in the grossest of ways, seemingly at the very instant that I removed the bunny from his cage so I could clean it (not my favourite job), an act that caused our rabbit friend to pee on the bottom-bunk quilt in protest.

Could it be that in the interim between whisking away the yucky bath mat and wiping human bottom, my pet had gone who-knew-he-could-pee-that-much crazy on the formerly adorable quilt? Yessiree.

That's what I'm talking about people. It's no afternoon in the trauma room, but there times when I can't even believe so many kinds of gross can occur in the space of five minutes.

And I don't even own a dog.

Got a similar story of your own? Please share it in the comments. Just not while I'm eating lunch, okay?

 

 

 

 

 

 

Comments

[Karyn Climans]

I saw someone with a great t-shirt that said, "Shit happens" ... one of my favourite sayings. If I ever find this t-shirt, I'll send one to you as well. You deserve it after last night.
I do have a story to share: My eldest son was less than 30 seconds old. My doctor (who I adore) lifted him up to me and as she did this, he crapped all over my leg. My doctor laughed and congratulated me on being initiated in to motherhood!

[blakeroo]

Parenting is such an adventure, no? Sorry to hear your illness was topped with loads and loads of laundry.

From my side, my 2yo has a super-sensitive gag reflex, and is given to coughing up her dinner from time to time. I have 'caught' more cups of puke at the dinner table than I care to think about. In fact, it happened tonight. And it's happened twice in the IKEA cafeteria. We go with nonchalance.

You should collect these responses and send them to a high school sex ed class. "This could happen to you..." would be a great tool for the abstinence unit.

[Jim M]

The only blood and stool story I have that would begin to compete with yours happened when I was smote with what the bible calls the "botch of Egypt", the pain and the itch whereof thou canst be healed. Apparently, Preparation "H" stands for prepare for the hospital, but all they can do there is rip a new one out for you, not heal the old one;(

[Jpriest]

I have a 4 year old daughter, an 18 month old son, 2 dogs and a wonderful husband. The level of gross-ness can get quite high at our house.
One particular time, when my son was around one (and putting absolutely everything in his mouth), I came upon him eating something suspicious. Very concerned I immediately went to him...this 'suspicious' item was located at our back door...unfortunately one of the dogs was not let out in time..
Once I realized what it was, I grabbed my son when he proceeded to puke all over himself and me. I yelled for my husband to help. We agreed he would clean up the mess, and I would clean the baby (who, along with the puke, had mushed up poop all over him and a nice chocolate brown ring around his mouth!).
Good times!!

[Anna de la Cruz]

I was giving my 3 yr old son a bath at the same time as his 6 mth old sister. She was in a bath seat. My son was playing with the water and suddenly held up his hand and said "Mama, where did we get this brown soap?"!!!! I totally freaked out!! I had to scrap the bath and gave them a quick shower, after which I unceremoniously dumped them both into their father's arms and upchucked my dinner!!

[Betty]

I'm reminded of the Eddie Murphy routine, with brothers in the bath, where he sings, "... and then a big brown shark came..."

My kids are 6 and 8; we also have three cats and two really big, really voracious, dogs. I've survived big brown sharks, toilet near misses (and far misses), targeted projectile poop and barf, hairballs, poo balls and "I don't remember feeding you anything blue" balls. Now nothing fazes me, except having to clean out the drain trap in the kitchen sink. That's really gross.

[Kyla]

It might help a bit to know bunnies can usually be litter trained and that would at least ease the cleaning of the cage a bit :)

For more info on litter training and more

http://www.ontariorabbits.org/diet/behavinfo4.html

[Maureen McLaren]

I grew up in a family with 5 brothers and 2 sisters, me being one of the middle children. My mother is quite the intelligent, hard-working, and dedicated mom that you would expect her to be after having 8 children. Well, she started us all very young doing our own laundry. I think my mom managed to get away with doing laundry for only 2 children, and by the time the rest of us came along, the oldest 2 got the worst of the chores.
This is the way my mother ran our household and because of that she managed to create 8 very independent children without neglecting our needs.
To conclude, I successfully completed my first load of laundry at the age of 6, taught by my older sister.

[Gramma Sheila]

My daughter has two boys aged one and two. The younger one has been diagnosed with infant reflux and the older one has a "sensitive tummy" She has barely gone through a single day in the last year without someone throwing up, sometimes multiple times a day. She calls it a great day if no one vomits. Not long ago the older one couldn't even see his own soiled diaper without vomiting. She had to snatch it up quick after diapering before he saw anything or he would vomit. She often had the little one vomiting because of reflux and the older one vomiting from looking at the younger one. Needless to say she carries wipes and spare clothes for everyone everywhere ... and is truly one amazing mom!
PS.. little one is on meds for reflux now and everyones life is improving =)