Have you ever seen the baby/toddler shirts that say “Daddy Drinks Because I Cry” ? They are adorable and funny in a very true way. Crying can certainly lead to hair pulling and impromptu prayer from me but is less likely to make me reach for the bottle than some other things.

After yesterday morning and faced with 4 hours (yes four) of laundry folding, one might assuming that bottle of wine I was eyeballing would be toast. Thankfully, it is still sitting there, waiting for me. You see, I decided I needed to make a break for it and address some boob issues, namely they keep growing. Half way through my cycle every month they swell to mammoth proportions, spilling out of the cups. I am totally in boob denial 99% of time. I still have myself convinced that one day I might be back in a D cup… bwhahahahahaha yeah right. While standing naked with fluorescent lighting highlighting every dimple, dapple and roll would easily qualify one for a direct vodka infusion it is oddly enough, not what is driving me to drink… Tessa is.

My darling husband drifted off to sleep for about 15 minutes while I was gone (can you see where this is going?) Tessa is one of those kids that you simply can not leave alone, trouble should have been her middle name (oddly enough had Tessa been a boy the name Wilder was under consideration… it would have fit perfectly). During that 15 minute period Tessa managed to destroy my hallway. I came home to this:
and this
and worse. If you’d like to point and laugh at me some more you can even watch the video, pardon the low lighting I was so angry I didn’t think about film quality:

What is even more ridiculous is that this is a repeat performance. Last November Tessa decimated $125 worth of library books, and in the midst of the carnage was my night stand, the floor, the bed skirt and several other things (See original post HERE ) . I’m thinking that I could make a whole lot of money if I developed a tranquilizer dart gun preloaded with kid friendly doses. That way mid-scribble you squeeze off the shot and drag the carcass away, leaving you to cuss and clean up in peace.

Did I mention that i JUST painted this hallway less than a month ago ? (sob)

Mom simply stands for

M ean
O rnary
M asochist

Its one of those days when you roll out of bed screaming, matching the roar being emitted form your kids’ pre-dawn beds. The kind of day where you find yourself eyeballing the bottle of wine in your fridge before 8 am instead opting to eat a brownie that you don’t actually want but are convinced will make you feel better. And then in the pleasant sugar buzz that rushes around your body in 2.7 second due to consuming said brownie on an empty stomach, you decide it would be ok to give the kids yogurt. During your sugar crash, you weep while scrubbing yogurt off of the kids a little harder than you should and put the dog up on the table to Hoover up what is left of the yogurt that you are now blaming for your terrible rotten no good day. When the phone then rings at 9 am on the dot, you snarl into the receiver, hurling the phone at the wall when the person on the other end hangs up on you. Busting into tears you find yourself asking your 2 year old why someone wouldn’t want to talk to mommy, bellowing “I’m a NICE person, people LIKE me!”

It’s just after 10 am here, how is your day going?

Step right up folks, the time for atonement is upon us, set your spirit free! We all have moments we’re not proud of, no matter how hilarious we fear sharing them with the bloggosphere because they are our secret shame. Let us shine the light, let these truths fall from our lips and let us celebrate in our humanity and cleanse our souls (jazz hands).

Forgive me bloggers for I have sinned, it has been 2 weeks since my last confession. In the last two weeks I have been guilty of many transgressions but none so heinous as what will be known from here until eternity as “The Cracker Caper”

For the last few weeks I have been ailing with allergies and asthma, my body wracked by a horrible cough. While standing in the grocery store I was suddenly seized by one of these spells. I began wheezing and gasping, a gross gurgle emitted from my mouth as the cough burst forth from deep inside my lungs. I inhaled sharply and tried to stem the coughing by allowing only tiny breaths to draw in and out. My shoulders shook from the effort and my mouth exploded open coating 800ft of groceries with my mouth matter. Blazing through the air in the center of this saliva shower was a huge globular loogie. It crashed into the cracker display with an audible splat. Time stopped as I stared in horror. I slide my eyes to the left and then the right, with no obvious witnesses I simply patted the corner of my mouth to check for evidence and walked away.

Oh God, I feel better having told someone and if you happened to be the unlucky recipient of that cracker box, I’m truly sorry… Maybe you can sell it on eBay. The confessional booth is empty, step inside….

The recent addition of our swing set has done more for me than my children. At all hours of the day and night, I tip toe out to the yard for a chance to stretch my feet into the sky.

My neighbors surely think I’m nuts. Since moving in nearly 2 years ago we have, admittedly, done some odd things- like showering in our backyard. Nothing has garnered the looks and window peeping quite like my swinging. One might assume from all the hullabaloo that I’m nude or throwing silver dollars, but alas it’s just me. Back and forth I go, leaning backwards to study the sky, pondering what needs to be done.

There are a few places I seem to do my best thinking. I like to take long winding drives to nowhere, all along the way pouring out my feelings. With gas so pricey I find the shower to be a suitable substitute but when I only have a small taste of time or I want to avoid getting pruney fingers, I hit the swings.

Where do you do your best thinking?

Happy Half Nekkid Thursday

I would love to inject a bit of levity into your day. Recount how the valets disappeared with my car keys or how I find it amusing that my prescription says to take after “supper” but I’m having trouble keeping it up today.

Here at Find Yourself, we’ve been dealing with some heavy crappy crappity crap crap shit and it sucks. Thus far I’ve been doing ok, taking my own medical escapades in stride. Today I was hit with something that I knew was coming, yet crushing none the less. Mira has officially been diagnosed as PDD-NOS, which falls under the autistic spectrum. I was ready to hear those words but not for the realities of the situation. I worry about her and how she will cope in a unforgiving world when she has so many sensory integration issues. I worry about school, regular school.. once she’s out from the protective shield of VE preK, how will the rest of the school receive her. Will I scar her for life by putting her into a specialized charter school? Will it screw her up if mainstream integration is my goal?

When I became a mother I had to learn to forgive my own mother. There are things I feel she should have done differently but I now realize that she was actually doing the best she could. Not only did she have to deal with the circumstances that life laid out before her, but she had to deal with her own daemons and limitations. Interweaving these circumstances into a life with purpose and humility, while balancing your own personal needs with the needs of your children is no small task. I find myself standing at these crossroads now, and my knees are trembling….

Should I feel bad for going to the gym while I was still belching marshmallow mint after eating 3/4 of a peppermint pie? And should I feel even worse that the entire time I was at the gym I was thinking about the other 1/4 of pie waiting for me at home?

(title is sung to the tune of the old batman theme) I’m not a big Meme-r but when Melissa tagged me with the 6 weird things about yourself meme I just had to jump on board. AC, over at Call Center Purgatory coincidentally tagged me with a 5 things meme and hey why not. AC was one of the first blogs I started reading and, I think, the first to give me linky love, memeing for him is the least I can do. I am warning ya’ll now that this will probably be fraught with grammatically frightening structures coupled with poorly spelled, mis-homonphoned rhetoric - Cough syrup with hydrocodone married with steroids and some tylenol PM can make for overly truthful, non sensical revelations. I will be sure to make excessive use of punctuation, also.

6 weird things about Fidget

1) If it comes out of my body I must examine it. Stick a Q-tip in the ear? I have to inspect it. Blow my nose? Gotta take a peek. Wipe my ass? Of course I’m checking that paper. Pop a zit? Ohh that’s my favorite. I LOVE examining what comes out of those!

2) I can suck my own nipple. Yes, yes I can. It’s dead sexy and is a great party trick, kinda like tucking your leg behind your head. A hush falls over the crowd and once everyone recovers from the awe inspiring sight you are the bell of the ball. Unfortunately I can only reach righty and Ms lefty gets VERY jealous. I don’t make this common practice as I am thoroughly concerned about contributing to my tribal titty syndrome .. You know tribal titties right? It’s where your breast turn into triangularly shaped flaps from all those years wandering in the bush lands with no bra.. or in my case several years of nursing and DH overzealously enjoying them.

3) I can juggle and walk on stilts, but not at the same time (that would be like trying to walk and chew gum, way to much concentration and grace required!). My years spent working with the theme park crowd has not only yielded me some interesting friends - hypnotists, cross dressers, circus folk, stilt walkers, fire eaters, and the like - but has also afforded me the opportunity to learn weird skills.

4) I’m allergic to medical adhesive and Velveeta. Of all my allergies these strike me as the weirdest. At the time Velveeta had a phone number you could call should you have a medical problem. I called them once my rash went from suspected mosquito bite to a complete transformation into itchy welt woman. They did noting… told me to call my doctor or head to the hospital. I ended up taking a quadruple dose of Benedryl and later woke up on my kitchen floor wondering what the hell had happened.

5) I have a highly sensitive nose, so much so that it disrupts my daily life. Sure there are things that I love the smell of - art supplies, particularly oil bars are high up on my list but mainly smells make me GRUMPY. Take today in Wal-fart for example. I am minding my business, avoiding direct eye contact with anyone when the most horrific personal smell invaded my space (By personal smell, I mean a persons smell.. not a filthy no bath no deodorant smell but the natural smell this individual emits on a daily basis regardless of cleanliness status). I look up and spot the offender. I am forced to leave the isle because his musk is so strong to me that simple breathing through my mouth didn’t help - I COULD TASTE HIS ODOR! I raced from the isle and headed to a corner to privately convulse and dry heave for awhile. When I THOUGHT the coast was clear I resumed shopping only to end up hemmed in by this guy in the self checkout lane. His smell was so distracting that the woman monitoring the self checkout lanes pushed me out of the way and finished ringing up my purchases.. I could not physically function near this dude and his funk… no one else seemed to notice… just weird ole me!

6) I worry. Constantly. About EVERYTHING. That plane overhead might crash and what if it hits my house and then we all die in a fiery inferno? Is the door locked? (get up and check, return to bed) Is the door locked? (get up, check, return to bed), Is the… bang head into wall repeatedly. Pause headbanging to go check if back and side door are locked, resume madness. Did I pay that… Oh god are they looking at me? Should I… Seriously you name it, I worry about it. I can’t use an aerosol can without thinking about the melting polar ice caps. Throwing away glass, metal, and plastic gives me guilt for days, cutting someone off in traffic makes me worry about ruining their day. Therapy is helping… sort of.. I’ve been banned from checking the locks more than 2 times so at least when I lay down at night I can obsess about something other than the locks, like whether or not I’ll get cancer from my deodorant since I use 4 times the amount of any other human.

Damn that was epic.. ok I’ll try to be more on topic for this 5 things meme (ya hanging in there? I can wait if you need a snack or smoke break.. hummmm humm humm laa la dee dah… back? ok)

What were you doing ten years ago?

*Probably cutting class

What were you doing one year ago?

*I was hopped up on brain meds and spiraling out of control. I was also gaining weight at the rate of a baby elephant

Five snacks you enjoy:

*chocolate
*ice cream
*almonds
*crackers
*hummus

Five songs to which you know all the lyrics:
*ok so we’re skipping this category because I don’t know song titles, I know the lyrics and it would take to dam long to type it all out!

Five things you would do if you were a millionaire:

*Buy land, lots and lots of land
*build a HUGE studio and gallery for myself, host my own workshops and shows
*get my various ailments requiring surgery, such as my jaw, taken care of
*order the Hubster to quit his job and do what he loves
*get a maid, one that does windows and laundry because I hate me some laundry.

Five things you like doing:
*Blogging
*Dancing
*Art projects
*Talking
*Eating

Five things you would never wear again:
* an “A” cup.. aint never gonna happen, even with surgical intervention I think the doctor would get half way through and decide to go home.
* neon spandex bike shorts. Where do I start on this one? Neon is so.. WRONG and then spandex? I think you should have to undergoing special licensing to obtain a permit for wearing items containing for than 25% spandex
* Chucks… I had quite a collection in highschool and I loved them dearly. in retrospect they made my big feet look clownishly long and ridiculous
* Daisy Dukes.. another high school mistake… mine even had white lace trim (rolling eyes)
* Slouch Socks, once you develop cankles all these do is accentuate and highlight your cankliness. they are also extremely obnoxious, especially when one opts to stack 2 different colored pairs on one puffy veiny cankle.

Five favorite toys:
* My Little Pony - I’m so obsessed I painted a My Little Pony mural for my girls
* Lite Bright - though these are inherently evil for their foot wounding factor I still love the hell out of this
* crayons - they smell great, and you can make such lovely pictures with them (must be CRAYOLA!)
* Legos
* and that purple thing I keep tucked in my panties drawer (wink wink)

Wow seriously long winded. I’m surprise I didn’t pass out on the keys trying to finish this. You must be hard core to read this far, here have a cookie. I won’t tag anyone, I’m not that cruel. but if you happen to do either of these drop a link in the comments box.

File this under “Things they won’t tell you in Baby 101″

It’s everywhere “Breast is Best” it’s the “most natural” thing you can do for your baby. All the books say you’ll spend hours just gazing onto each others eyes while your home brew nourishes baby. I fell for it, BIG TIME.

I have never questioned the decision to breast feed, for me it was a given. I was raise by a mom who regretted every bottle I ever sucked down, thus when my little brother and sister came along she was not only a breast is best kind of woman, she was a La Leche Leaguer. I vividly remember being dragged to summer meetings. It was not uncommon to see a 5 year old siddle up to his mom and demand a boob, which was happily handed over. To this day I still think that once you can discuss nursing rationally with your kid, it’s time to wean.

But I digress, this post is not about nursing teenagers, it’s about the reality of breast feeding. You would think something that happens as a course and matter of nature would come easily, dare I say naturally? For many women the thought is a bit scary, or gross, even unnatural. The hospital is no help either. They swing wildly between a pressure cooker attitude and handing out bottles like they are this year’s must have baby accessory. All the lactation consultants I have encountered in the hospital have been fresh faced tight bodied women who have grudgingly acknowledged that have never nursed an infant but did attend “classes”. What is worse is when they send in a nurse who is only rotating through the floor, one who grabs your tit with her 6 inch long blood red fingernails and twists it around like a Rubik’s cube saying “are you sure you don’t want me to bring you some formula”. It’s things like this that send many babies off the boob and onto the bottle. The moms are under-informed, under-supported, and tired as hell.

When Mira was born I took her to my breast…. She stared at me. This exercise in futility went on for two days. The pediatric nurse handed me a Nuk bottle nipple and said “desperate times call for desperate measures.” I stared at her not quite comprehending what I was to do. Tears were streaming down my face and I was silently cursing my body for not getting it right. I had been reading books and stuffing my nipple into her mouth as per the diagrams. I was bawling and begging - eat baby eat! I began using an eye dropper to give her expressed milk, taking care to eye dropper her in the car directly before each weigh in. The pediatrician was telling me it was obvious that it “wasn’t going to happen.” That nurse standing there with the Nuk nipple became my saving grace. “Put it over your own and see if she’ll latch.” The feeling of having your own nipple pulled into and contorted to the shape of a Nuk Bottle nipple is indescribable, it’s probably the closest I’ll ever come to my childhood dream of becoming a Transformer .

As the milk rushed from my overly eager, overly full breasts Mira choked gagged and sputtered. She took a full 3 minutes to cut her 5 day old eyes at me, sending silent death rays. For a week I had to use that nipple at every feeding, gradually removing it from our lives. We joked about Nuk selling screw on boob collars to hold the nipple in place (well my mom was joking, I was really hoping). It was during this time I decided that nursing is supposed to hurt. Everyone told me it took some getting used to and I just figured that the blinding lightening coursing through my titties feeling is what they actually meant. A full 5 months into nursing 6 to 10 times a day, a full five months of dreading each session- blood started appearing in my milk. BLOOD!

Google, Excite, Alta Vista, Yahoo - how do I love thee? You efficiently provided me with thousands of links telling me that this and the aforementioned pain WERE NOT NORMAL. They were, in fact, symptoms of horrific cancers, infected milk ducts and thrush. Thrush is annoying but typically not painful, that is until it INVADES YOUR MILK DUCTS. Unable to get into see my OB I went for the next available thing - he was a “sports medicine” doctor and since breast feeding has yet to become an Olympic sport I had to tell him what was wrong, how to fix it and the correct dosage. The entire time my engorged blood squirting teat stood at attention between us, my erect nipple staring him, while he fought to maintain eye contact.

From the second dosage of Diflucan on our nursing relationship blossomed. Suddenly it WAS like all the books say. We could spend hours, rocking, with her tiny hand buried on my hair. I would sing and she would pull off to give me sleepy satisfied smiles. This was the bliss I had hoped for. With Tessa I had the complete opposite problem, she was a veracious eater and latched like a pirhana. Only days into our nursing relationship I had nipple blisters. I didn’t even know it was possible to develop blisters on my nipples! I had to wear these silicone shells that made me look like I was hiding robo-nipples under my shirt. I sought the help of a professional lactation consultant who was not affiliated with the hospital. It was the best $50 I ever spent. 20 minutes into the session we had a latch that worked for mom and baby. Though I often had to remove and restart her, over the next few weeks she got the hang of it and we fell into a tandem state of bliss.

I would have never made it to this point had it not been for my husband and mother, their words of encouragement bolstered me up when my opinion of myself slipped so low. I’m sure that my initial struggles to establish a good nursing relationship were complicated by undiagnosed Post Partum Depression, something that is only beginning to get the media and main stream attention that it needs. Just as in my birthing installment, I recount this harrowing tale not to dissuade you from childbearing or nursing, but simply because no one told me! Everything I read, everything people said - it all sounded so natural. I want you to know and understand that just because our bodies are built for it, doesn’t mean it won’t take work. Even when it seems that it’s impossible, it sometimes actually IS possible. I also want you to understand that not only is it cheaper, not only is it healthier, it’s time well spent. When my baby grows into a sass-mouthed 15 year old I will sit and think about those moments when we merged together. Our breath settling into a pattern as I drew her near, watching her eyes flutter softly as she took comfort in me.

many other blogging mama’s have covered breast feeding their own eloquent way, here are a few you can check out

Dooce

Laila

Blogging Baby

Squab

Lou

What would you tell a first time mom?

If you don’t hear from me soon I’ve probably died of THIS or THIS. I guess it could be THIS but on the whole I would rather it just be THIS. I’ll update later.

Bonus points to whomever can name the song the title of this post came from.

~*~*~*~*~**~*~*~**~*~*UPDATE~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

For the next week I will be a walking drug store, for the next 1-2 months I will be a walking medicine chest, after that I can narrow it down to maintenance drugs

bronchial inflammation is making my asthma go coo coo for cocoa puffs, thus sending me into these killer coughing spells which make my chest abs legs and everything else hurt , which is why I thought I might be having a pulmonary embolism (hey they run in the family, my auntie died of one). To calm said problem I am starting a short course of steroids. I have calculated that by the end of this week my arms and abs should be totally ripped, my penis will atrophy and fall off, and I should be a full fledged Rage-o-holic. To compensate for sexual dysfunction the doc prescribed me some FUNNN cough suppressant. He also added an inhaled asthma preventive- the container looks like a boys wee wee and I’ve been instructed to suck on it one to two times a day. This is all in addition to what was previously prescribed by him AND my regular doctor.

meds count:

Daily:

1)Flonase
2)Singular
3)Clarinex
4)Abuterol
5)Some other asthma preventive inhaler thingy
6)perception cough suppressant
7)steroids
8)asprin
9, 10, 11 ) 3 different supplements to deal with my Adrenal Fatigue issue

and sometimes 12) Xanax

Does this strike anyone else as a little nuts? Apparently we go this road or we check into the hospital (um yeah, Id rather suffer daily coffee enemas, have every last eye lash plucked and listen to Kid’s Bop 3 on repeat for the rest of my life than go to the hospital).

Bonus question the above lyric is probably in 10,000 song but the one I was thinking of is THIS ONE

(knock knock knock…(pause)…..bang bang bang bang… door slowly swings open)

The Slacker Brother: Yeah

Fidget: So I was thinking today would be a great day for you to pack up your stuff and move

The Slacker Brother: um…. ok

(insert pregnant silence)

Despite feeling sad over his departure,I have spent the evening prancing around my house totally nekkid. Tomorrow I’ll don a biohazard suit and fire up the blow torch. He lived here for 5 months, never once cleaned his room and MAYBE once washed his sheets. Happy Half Nekkid Thursday, I feel 170 lbs lighter.