Monday, January 24, 2011

Fluids

A few weeks ago I had a day filled with bodily fluids.

Charly has been a little hard of hearing lately. When I took her to the doctor, he said there was so much wax in there, he couldn't even see her ear drum. Well, that would explain it, then. The nurse tried to flush it out with water, but it wasn't working, so we stopped. I tried a variety of drops at home with no luck.

So, I took her to another doctor to try again. The doctor was going to scoop it out, but Charly would have none of that and actually chose to try the warm water flush again.

My friends, you would not believe what came out of that child's ear. She hated it. She was screaming bloody murder and I'm sure scared all the kids in the waiting room to death. We had to bring in another person just to hold her down to do the other ear. There was no way I was leaving that office without both ears gleaming with cleanliness.

Later that day, I went in to get Felix from his nap. He has had a fascination with taking his diaper off lately. I think you know where this is going. Yes, his diaper was messy, yes he took it off, and yes, there was definitely some shmear to clean up.

Felix was heartbroken when I got upset. I didn't yell, but I did start moaning, "Felix, no, no, no!" His little lip quivered, "Okay, Mommy. Sorry, Mommy." Since cleaning him up was the priority, I took him to the bathroom and plopped him in the tub. He thought a cold shower was coming and started screaming and clawing tooth and nail to get the heck outta there. Secretly glad that my cold shower tactics work so well, but sad that he thought that was what was happening, I put him on the toilet, drew the warm bath, turned the water off, then put him back in the tub. Without my intending to, he learned that taking his messy diaper off = cold shower.

I kept expecting Sammy to come home all bloodied up to complete the trifecta of fluids, but luckily she came home clean as a whistle.

These stories aren't anything out of the ordinary, most moms have similar battle scars. What did fascinate me, however, was that dealing with these things didn't bother me, they didn't gross me out. It's not that I woke up that morning really hoping that I could wash Felix's sheets on the sanitary cycle. But when they're your kids, you skip past the gag reflex and go straight for the heart strings. Charly's ear flush didn't gross me out, I just thought, "Poor girl."

With Felix Picasso Fisher's masterpiece, I was more concerned with his little lip quivering than the "other stuff." How does that work?

And that, my friends, is motherhood.