Moments in Mediocre Motherhood: My X-Man is back!He finally seems to have overcom...

Moments in Mediocre Motherhood: My X-Man is back!
He finally seems to have overcom...: My X-Man is back! He finally seems to have overcome the sickness of the ages and is back to his typical cheery self. There’s lots of ch...

My X-Man is back!

He finally seems to have overcome the sickness of the ages and is back to his typical cheery self. There’s lots of cheery chatting from him. Which tends to begin with him yelling “GUYS! GUYS!” He expects an answer from each and every member of the family and continues to yell until the whole floor recognizes him.

He has developed some bad habits however, during his illness. He still collapses on the floor wailing, but that’s mostly when he’s told that he can’t pick his nose. That’s become a new favorite pastime of his. I blame the father figure, who was working with him on the all the names of the facial features. X-Man is a particular fan of noses. Mac observed X-Man shoving his finger up his nose and mentioned “Oh, I think he learned that from me.” “WHAT! Why would you teach him that?” “I mean, I think he figured that out by himself.”

The father figure is also concerned that X-Man is just a bit OCD. Mostly due to his new habit of rubbing his binky on his cheek before inserting it in his mouth.  And sometimes, if things are particularly rough or painful or just boring, X-Man will pull it out of his mouth, do a quick rub by and reinsert. I’m at peace with the whole process as long as it stays away from the nose.

As  X-Man continues along his path of sweetness, he’s spending more time with Gestated Cinco. He still calls his sister “nice nice” and that is certainly how he treats her. For the most part. I have caught him trying to lick her feet. And I have no explanation for that. Gestated hasn’t actually seemed to notice. And I’m sitting here wondering how many more times I’ll have to yell “Don’t lick the baby’s feet!”

At least they keep it new and interesting. 

A hallmark of the postpartum period for me is anxiety. In non-hormonal periods of life, I buy it in Costco sized quantities. So life’s a barrel of monkeys after childbirth.

I haven’t really adjusted to life with five children, but that hasn’t stopped me from charging ahead and continuing with my never ending list of things that must be done yesterday. We have been ill since Gestated Cinco arrived, and has resulted in me referring to our little princess as Typhoid Cinco. It’s been ugly. I’m on a first name basis with every urgent care doctor in the system and am customer of the decade at the local Target pharmacy. Apparently being customer of the decade does not actually expedite the whole filling the prescription process.

So there I was, wandering the aisles of Target, listening to Mac ask me to buy him a toy, or a toothbrush, interesting choices for sure. The girls were arguing because they exist and X-Man was drinking my Starbucks. Gestated, fully aware of her typhoidesque behavior, was sleeping in her car seat.

I was grabbing random items, things that we needed. The girls would pause their arguing over whose hair style was more soccer-like, yes for reals, to remind me of something else they couldn’t live without. That toothpaste tasted nasty, they wanted that one, and they were out of hair ties….etc. Mac kept mentioning that he really, really wanted a toy.

Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed an onsite security officer was following me. And it seemed to not be a coincidence. If I stopped, he stopped. When I moved, he moved. Subtly was not his strong suit. Neither was facial hair growing, but that’s a different story. I immediately envisioned a large poster of my face hanging in the front of the store announcing “Shoplifter!” Never mind that I hadn’t actually shoplifted anything. Nor was I planning on starting. But obviously something had brought me to the attention of security. I tried to reassure myself that he just figured that I would try to smuggle something out in Cinco’s car seat, so when he saw me check out, it would all be fine.  So I played it cool, kept my nice mom voice on, continued shopping.  I made sure to carefully observe all that the girls showed me, especially the “cute” outfits. Because that’s what good moms do. They don’t snap “I said hands on the cart” they smile and enjoy random detours down aisles of stickers.

However, Dudley Do right continued to practice his French espionage skills. And I was getting frazzled. So I turned, real casual like, and made eye contact. I actually took it a step further and flashed him a smile and batted my eyes. Well, I’m sure that’s what he thought. I was actually begging for mercy Morse code style, but this guy was clearly more fluent in text speak than any code. I moved on, convinced that as his cover had now been blown, he would now move on to more productive endeavors, such as shopping cart retrieval.

However, he didn’t leave. I failed to fall for his arranging things on the shelf routine and found myself with a headache and a bad temper. At this point, both girls were pirouetting in front of a mirror and Mac was announcing excitedly that he wanted me to buy him the Angry Birds Star Wars pillow he saw. I asked outright “Slow day?” 

Ok, so that wasn’t really outright, but I didn’t think I would get far with “Hey jerk, what’s with the passive aggressive accusations of stealing?” He, in turn, looked sheepish and replied “Yeah, just killing time.” I would have had a sarcastic comeback but I was thrown by his sudden offering of items. Was he trying to frame me? And he was really bad at it because I already had that toothpaste, that box of q-tips and diaper cream in my cart. Didn’t I?

He continued “I was wondering how long it would take you to notice?” At that point, he noticed my blank stare.  “Uh, your little guy’s been tossing things out of your cart.” At this point X-Man put down my Starbucks cup and said “Uh huh” with his fat little hands reaching for his lost treasures.

See, Gestated’s ride took up most of the cart, so I had been placing items in the front seat with X-Man.  Which apparently became a game for him. In my defense, I entered the store with five children, and I knew where those children were in entire time. I also knew what almost all of them were doing that whole time. 

It was my turn to feel sheepish, and fairly annoyed that the same children who were constantly practicing to be paid informants for the FBI failed to notice X-Man chucking the very non-gross toothpaste that they absolutely could not live without.  So I gave up the whole nice mom charade announced “Hands on the cart and if you want your toothpaste, watch X-Man.” And attempted to retreat with my dignity. I’m not so sure that worked.

Baby made her first communion yesterday. It was a day to remember.  I’ll particularly remember pinning roses in her hair as she was bent over a toilet wailing that she was about to throw up. It takes a really pro to be able to style hair in those conditions.

Baby had a serious case of the nerves, which resolved as the service commenced. But for the previous hour, there had been tears and hysterics and nausea. She was convinced she would throw up while in church, and wailed “Why did I throw up and soccer, I wish I would now!”

Yes, soccer. Friday evening, Baby had a soccer game. She was playing well when suddenly she had a panicked look on her face. Clutching her stomach, she started to cry. Despite what I yelled, she didn’t take a knee, illness doesn’t help her listen. Her coach pulled her off the field and she threw up. Plenty. And then wanted back in the game. Since she was the second member of the team to vomit, and there was only one sub, her coach put her back in. The opposing team, having seen the vomiting, sensed weakness and mobbed her, so she passed right in front of the goal to her teammate for the first score of the game.  Afterwards she mentioned that her ear had hurt all day, so we took a detour through Urgent Care. Ear infection it was. I can remember a time when I would have been sad to spend a Friday night in urgent care, single handedly wrangling five children, but those days are a distant memory.

Saturday was spent operating heavy machinery in the rain, which seemed like a particularly bad idea come Sunday morning hysterics in the church bathroom. But as she was running around the reception with friends afterwards, I’m not going to feel too much guilt.

X-Man has decided that his first three syllable word should be Hawaii. We’re livin’ the dream here, about as close to the dream as we’ll get. And it’s just slightly alarming how many potlucks I attend to humor my children. I’m up to three this month alone. There should be a chapter about side dishes in “What to Expect When You’re Expecting.” 

X-Man has been very sweet to Gestated Cinco. He may resent me for uprooting his life, but he bears no ill will to his baby sister. In fact, as I was changing her diaper, X-Man was leaning in, cooing “ni ni” or “nice nice” which is my constant refrain when he is in her presence. Moved by the moment, I reached over to stroke his fat cheek, and left a streak of baby poop on his face.

That perfectly summarizes my life at the moment.

Gestated Cinco is crying and X-Man is yelling at Baby “Mine mine mee” because he thinks he should be the one to put the binky in her mouth.  And I am forced to admit that I believe the highlight of this week, the week Gestated is a full month old, will be my successful teaching of X-Man to do the Night at the Roxbury dance whenever the new ringtone for his dad goes off. I got tired of White and Nerdy.  It was actually quite the accomplishment in my mind.

Hey, I own my mediocrity. 

They tell you to not cry over spilled milk, but when you’re two year old dumps your fresh hot latte all over the car while you’re nursing another child, well it’s hard not to. Especially when said latte was supposed to be your breakfast and lunch.

Then there’s after a long, late night nursing session, when your baby decides to thank you by vomiting up all of her dinner.  That’s a horrific case of spilled milk, because it requires clean up and changing and, worst of all, more late night feeding and less late night sleeping. It’s almost as painful as the time I dumped a bottle full of hand expressed milk. I still cry thinking about it.

I ran everyone to bed early tonight, because I’m feeling so very tired. It’s like the last three weeks have finally caught up with me. Of course the father figure has been snoring for the last three hours. Because he’s tired. I wanted to hit him, but that involved putting Gestated Cinco down, and that’s just not an option right now and it also required more effort than I can muster.  So I’ll mutter things sarcastically to him while he’s sleeping, in the hopes of permeating his dreams.

The problem with having a relaxing, calm Mother’s Day is that it just helps reinforce how very, very tired you really are. Gestated Cinco was born almost four weeks ago and I have yet to have a day off. Well, there was the day after she was born, but even then, I didn’t get to sleep until 4am. We left the hospital and ran errands, I kid you not. The next day I was at Baby’s soccer game, doughnuts in hand for her birthday, while listening to mandatory job training. It’s been nonstop. Partly because of how the father figure’s job situation played out, partly because our living situation doesn’t allow me to relax ever, and gas prices require me to consolidate trips. I’ve laughed about being a failure as at the whole stay at home aspect of motherhood, but I’m not laughing anymore. I’m just eating copious amounts of m&ms. 

Which might not be what Gestated is looking  for in her diet. Which than might explain why she is so not 

interested in anything but being held by me. But she’s perfectly cute so I’m down with that.

But it makes typing hard. And I gots my priorities. Not to mention that if she happens to drift off, I have a better chance of drifting off myself. And as it stands now, she's fascinated by the big, bright computer screen. 

I think that 2013 is trying to kill me. I don’t know why, despite what I write here, I really am a nice person. At least I intend to be. And I don’t get what this particular year has against me, but there’s some serious hating going on.

Not everybody is as aware of everything that Starbucks does. I am. So I have been taking advantage of the half price Frappuccino’s this week. And sharing the wealth with my progeny. It’s been fun. So yesterday, I took Sir Cranky-Pants, and by that I mean X-Man, to get a strawberry one. X-Man is my eater, and he had to sit in a hot car for an hour and a half waiting on Mac, Baba and Baby, and he’s been sick. So what better for a mother to do than load him up with sugar.

X-Man enjoyed his first few gulps and then he wanted me to taste. So I did. But apparently I did it wrong, because he kept thrusting the cup in my face, with the straw up my nose. Which might have been the intention. I finally took the cup from him, because my nose needed a break, but no melt down occurred. Rather he turned all his attention on my cup of water. And polished that off without a second thought to the treat. I’m an awesome mom. I buy my kids sugary treats and they choose water. I should win on like ten different levels.

X-Man’s been sick since Cinco stopped gestating. So it’s been hard for him to adjust to mommy not always able to hold him immediately. He still is running fevers and breaking out in rashes, and three trips in one week to the doctor haven’t helped resolve anything. He’s angry and opinionated. He’s taken to hitting and biting me. Mostly when I tell him no, or put him down to pick up his younger sister.  He bit my leg in retaliation and was shocked, shocked I tell you, be find himself reprimanded. He collapsed in a heap of wailing, leaving me to wonder why  even thought I was the one who hadn’t bitten anyone and I was the one feeling guilty. And overwhelmed with the desire to pick up my little X-Man and soothe him, which outraged Gestated Cinco who would have bitten me if the thought has occurred to her.

X-Man has been a terror and I am about ready to ship him off to reform school. But then, as I was sitting in the doctor’s office for the fourth time in a week, I watched him scratch his sister’s head, as she slept her baby carrier. Not a “you told me no” type of scratch, but the gentle stroking that I often do to his own head. I started to scratch his head, which cause him to snuggle closer to me while doing on Gestated.

It was a beautiful moment. One that ended when I told X-Man that he couldn’t stick his finger up my nose while scratching his sister’s head. If I had thought about it, I would have just left it at “don’t stick your fingers up my nose”, but I was distracted by the head butt and collapsing onto the floor in a heap to wail away. Which might explain why he can’t get healthy?

If I had let him actually empty out the contents of the garbage can, all would have been well. But as the crazy lady with five kids who seems to live at the doctor’s office, I figure keeping up appearances was more important. That would be the appearance of not being moved by the immense tragedies in my son’s life.