It was like a Harold and Kumar Movie - but uhm it was all about Vi and parenting
So..
This morning we have a play-date at Great Lakes Crossing (GLC). However this week Violet has safety town. For reference - great lakes crossing and the city for safety town are 58 miles apart. I knew it would be tight but doable. We left GLC about 10 minutes later than we should have but we were on our way. Honestly , safety town starts at 1 pm and we would have been there about 1:06. (insert something about it being WIERD driving 85 to get your kid to safety town on time)
1 exit before our normal exit to get home, Vi tells me she is going to throw up. I ask a few questions and she really is going to get sick. I try to hand her something to get sick in but that doesn't make sense to her and the next thing I know she is vomiting everywhere. A LOT. The kid wretched a good 5 times. And then she begins to sob. Oh boy. She starts to act like Temple. (Temple Grandin =famous autistic women - our families hero)
Violet has a history with vomiting. All kinds - acid reflux, self-induced vomiting, picky eating vomiting, anxiety vomiting, anger vomiting, etc. She has been scoped, medicated, un-medicated, and seen a child psychologist. Marie, the shrink, said to us unless Violet is actually ill - life must go on (she said other stuff too but I'm not as into tough love as she was :P).
So - I cut across 4 lanes of traffic, and get off freeway and begin to plan. By the time I am at the end of the off ramp I have decided that we will run home, change, pop out the car seat, pop in a new seat and go on about our day. I call Randy near hysterical and tell him to call the Safety Town City and find out where the field trip is and ask if we can drive her there separately and tell him to say his daughter has a sensitive tummy and got sick on the way. He does this. YAY!
Once we are on our street, I tell Violet.
VIOLET!! Listen to me. We are going to go home.
I will take your clothes off in the driveway.
I will take your shoes off.
You are to go in ALL BY YOURSELF.
Get Jeans and Panties. (peed her pants when she puked)
Wipe your body off with wipes.
Get Dressed.
Okay Violet?
"undressed, jeans, panties, wipes, dressed"
Violet? "undressed, jeans, panties, wiped, dressed"
She says ok.
We pull in driveway I get out of car and I see her and the car seat. HOLY MOTHER DISGUSTING. I Cant even lift the car seat release lever their is so much puke. I cant push the release. I briefly ponder cutting her out of the seat it is so gross. Oh well. I am the Mom - just do it.
I get her out. Strip her down. Give her a brief lecture about never taking her clothes off outside by herself unless she absolutely has to. I unlock the door, repeat the script "undressed.. jeans, panties, wipes, dressed" (she has a mandatory safety town shirt she has to wear and I have that in the car - unscathed)
Now - to get the car seat out. I install those seats like car seat tech on Red Bull. Finally get the seat out - put it in the driveway and go to the garage to get another seat. (Don't ask but I have car seats for 5 cars and with no more Nanny - I actually do have a set of extra car seats). I run in the house for clorox wipes and pick up the misc piles of puke. I scrub the seats of the fusion the best I can.
OH! I am driving my mothers brand new Ford Fusion lease car that is kept in pristine shape. Like, if we keep it clean (never leave so much as an empty juice box in it), she keeps gas in it and handles all of the costs with driving it. Yay for vomit in the car!
Sweat is running down my nose, into my mouth, my glasses are steaming up... I finally take them off and get the seat in. Violet comes out in a twirly jean skirt and clean panties. I briefly want to say JEANS not a jean skirt but I resist. I get her shirt on and her keens on and put her in. She says "Mom I even got the skirt with the shorts over so when I play outside.. my butt wont poke out.. I can be modest!" I kiss her forehead and say "Okay Boo let's go!" and finish buckling her in.
Randy calls me and says she can still go but I have to drive her. "It is at Oakwood Metro Park, ok? You know where that is" I tell him of course and then we head on our way.
Part Two: Safety Town is from 1:00 - 3:00
We get to the general area of the metro park and well my gps takes me to the WRONG metro park. I also keep losing signal for the GPS because I am in the middle of nowhere. I text Randy, he sends me another address, and then another address. It is 2:05. I have been driving in circles - BIG FARKING CIRCLES for 35 minutes. Finally I go back to Lower Huron Metropark and the lady informs me I am 15 minutes away from Oakwood and to put in the GPS michigan memorial cemetary because all metro parks come up with the same address or an address that leads to lower huron. If I drive to the cemetery, I will drive past the parks.
OH MY GOD. At this point I am laughing and crying.
Come on - I am trying to get my kid to her stupid safety town, I have puke ground into my pants, the car reeks, Violet is trying to maintain and poor Ophelia is trying to just hang in there.
I text Randy and he is like Just go Home and tell Violet it didn't work out. I tell Violet I will try one more time and then we are going to be done. FINALLY 2:18 I find the park. Bish makes me pay to get in. I tell her I am dropping my child off and leaving. I will be there 5 minutes. She says "SORRY" and I scrape change up in the car, use random singles, and pay to get in. We start driving in the park. Driving.. driving.. Finally see a sign that says "Nature Center 2 miles ahead".. Are you shitting me? It is 2:24. Mind you safety town ends at 3 pm. Then -we get to a fork in the road and no sign with what direction to turn. We of course go the wrong way and end up in the FISHING area.
I try to make light of all of this and say "Where is Dora and your map when you need her?"
Violet is trying to make the best of it. Eventually we get to the nature center. FInally we find the bus and a massive parking lot. We get out , Ophelia is passed out, damn if I dont have to walk a trail to get there. Ophelia does not move fast and cries when she can't keep up. So I pick up the 30 lb toddler and start to huff us all.
It is 2:32. Why am I doing this?
We walk up to the nature center just as the groups are walking out. I find the police officers, give the mini version of what happened (They knew something from when Randy called because Violet's leader had her name tag for her), and check to see if she can ride the bus home. Violet joins her "yellow" team, walks out to the bus and gets on to ride back to Safety Town.
I follow the bus back to safety town. I text Randy and say my stress is through the roof and if he would come home from work early. He says he will let me know and he does leave just around 2:30. I call him and tell him she is safely on the bus with her team and I am following them back. He said "Awesome" and I could hear a smile in his voice.
I get off the phone. I am not sure if I want to cry or what. I have some brief waves of "why can't I have a normal kid and why do I have to do all of this shit and and and..." and feel guilty for having those thoughts. (You can all say kids puke and why didn't I just stay home and call it a day. But i can guarantee you that you have never dealt with a toddler who had bouts of bulimia where one episode of vomiting can turn into months of serious chaos and disrupt every single aspect of your life) I feel SO alone. This isn't an average day for most people. It just sucked. My head was so quiet. Somewhere in here I did have some humor because I am following this big bus and just well... it is kind of funny. "Crazy Mom covered in puke drives kid to park for 3 minutes.."
We get back to Safety Town. I go to get Ophelia out and she is smiling, "Is it time to pick up Violet, Momma" I just kiss her and tell her it is time to get Violet.
I see the other Mothers going to get their kids, stepping out of their nice new vans, with their nicely done hair, and cute clothes. I think about myself, stinky, hair glued down to my face, puke on my clothes, and I have waves of both jealousy and gratitude. I feel just fat and ugly. Oh well - keep walking.
I go into school, listen to the ending re-cap of the day, sign Violet out for the day and we leave. I ask Violet what is wrong -she is totally silent. She tells me she is mad she didn't get to do her activities. I am exasperated but we work it out.
We drive home. We pull in the driveway to find Daddy in his dress clothes in a SWARM of flies hosing down the car seat that is in 3 million pieces. The flies are everywhere - all over the seat, the bits of puke, her clothes, etc. Lovely. But the sight of my husband washing down her seat is melting my heart.
I picked us up Chinese food and then he let me sleep from from 5:30 - 8:00.
In the end, she got to safety town, and we didn't let no stinkin puke to get in our way.
Why did she puke? She said she had too many sweets and shouldn't have had that last cookie. (She had undiluted apple juice and vanilla gold fish crackers. (those are cookies to her))
And somewhere it would be relevant to say the meltdown we would have had if I would have said "oh honey, I'm sorry you had an upset tummy, we will stay home today ..." would have ended up BADLY.
Massive love and appreciation for my husband calling the City (he _never_ does that kind of thing), leaving work to come home for me, and for dismantling the car seat and dealing with the flies. And also for the nap.
This morning we have a play-date at Great Lakes Crossing (GLC). However this week Violet has safety town. For reference - great lakes crossing and the city for safety town are 58 miles apart. I knew it would be tight but doable. We left GLC about 10 minutes later than we should have but we were on our way. Honestly , safety town starts at 1 pm and we would have been there about 1:06. (insert something about it being WIERD driving 85 to get your kid to safety town on time)
1 exit before our normal exit to get home, Vi tells me she is going to throw up. I ask a few questions and she really is going to get sick. I try to hand her something to get sick in but that doesn't make sense to her and the next thing I know she is vomiting everywhere. A LOT. The kid wretched a good 5 times. And then she begins to sob. Oh boy. She starts to act like Temple. (Temple Grandin =famous autistic women - our families hero)
Violet has a history with vomiting. All kinds - acid reflux, self-induced vomiting, picky eating vomiting, anxiety vomiting, anger vomiting, etc. She has been scoped, medicated, un-medicated, and seen a child psychologist. Marie, the shrink, said to us unless Violet is actually ill - life must go on (she said other stuff too but I'm not as into tough love as she was :P).
So - I cut across 4 lanes of traffic, and get off freeway and begin to plan. By the time I am at the end of the off ramp I have decided that we will run home, change, pop out the car seat, pop in a new seat and go on about our day. I call Randy near hysterical and tell him to call the Safety Town City and find out where the field trip is and ask if we can drive her there separately and tell him to say his daughter has a sensitive tummy and got sick on the way. He does this. YAY!
Once we are on our street, I tell Violet.
VIOLET!! Listen to me. We are going to go home.
I will take your clothes off in the driveway.
I will take your shoes off.
You are to go in ALL BY YOURSELF.
Get Jeans and Panties. (peed her pants when she puked)
Wipe your body off with wipes.
Get Dressed.
Okay Violet?
"undressed, jeans, panties, wipes, dressed"
Violet? "undressed, jeans, panties, wiped, dressed"
She says ok.
We pull in driveway I get out of car and I see her and the car seat. HOLY MOTHER DISGUSTING. I Cant even lift the car seat release lever their is so much puke. I cant push the release. I briefly ponder cutting her out of the seat it is so gross. Oh well. I am the Mom - just do it.
I get her out. Strip her down. Give her a brief lecture about never taking her clothes off outside by herself unless she absolutely has to. I unlock the door, repeat the script "undressed.. jeans, panties, wipes, dressed" (she has a mandatory safety town shirt she has to wear and I have that in the car - unscathed)
Now - to get the car seat out. I install those seats like car seat tech on Red Bull. Finally get the seat out - put it in the driveway and go to the garage to get another seat. (Don't ask but I have car seats for 5 cars and with no more Nanny - I actually do have a set of extra car seats). I run in the house for clorox wipes and pick up the misc piles of puke. I scrub the seats of the fusion the best I can.
OH! I am driving my mothers brand new Ford Fusion lease car that is kept in pristine shape. Like, if we keep it clean (never leave so much as an empty juice box in it), she keeps gas in it and handles all of the costs with driving it. Yay for vomit in the car!
Sweat is running down my nose, into my mouth, my glasses are steaming up... I finally take them off and get the seat in. Violet comes out in a twirly jean skirt and clean panties. I briefly want to say JEANS not a jean skirt but I resist. I get her shirt on and her keens on and put her in. She says "Mom I even got the skirt with the shorts over so when I play outside.. my butt wont poke out.. I can be modest!" I kiss her forehead and say "Okay Boo let's go!" and finish buckling her in.
Randy calls me and says she can still go but I have to drive her. "It is at Oakwood Metro Park, ok? You know where that is" I tell him of course and then we head on our way.
Part Two: Safety Town is from 1:00 - 3:00
We get to the general area of the metro park and well my gps takes me to the WRONG metro park. I also keep losing signal for the GPS because I am in the middle of nowhere. I text Randy, he sends me another address, and then another address. It is 2:05. I have been driving in circles - BIG FARKING CIRCLES for 35 minutes. Finally I go back to Lower Huron Metropark and the lady informs me I am 15 minutes away from Oakwood and to put in the GPS michigan memorial cemetary because all metro parks come up with the same address or an address that leads to lower huron. If I drive to the cemetery, I will drive past the parks.
OH MY GOD. At this point I am laughing and crying.
Come on - I am trying to get my kid to her stupid safety town, I have puke ground into my pants, the car reeks, Violet is trying to maintain and poor Ophelia is trying to just hang in there.
I text Randy and he is like Just go Home and tell Violet it didn't work out. I tell Violet I will try one more time and then we are going to be done. FINALLY 2:18 I find the park. Bish makes me pay to get in. I tell her I am dropping my child off and leaving. I will be there 5 minutes. She says "SORRY" and I scrape change up in the car, use random singles, and pay to get in. We start driving in the park. Driving.. driving.. Finally see a sign that says "Nature Center 2 miles ahead".. Are you shitting me? It is 2:24. Mind you safety town ends at 3 pm. Then -we get to a fork in the road and no sign with what direction to turn. We of course go the wrong way and end up in the FISHING area.
I try to make light of all of this and say "Where is Dora and your map when you need her?"
Violet is trying to make the best of it. Eventually we get to the nature center. FInally we find the bus and a massive parking lot. We get out , Ophelia is passed out, damn if I dont have to walk a trail to get there. Ophelia does not move fast and cries when she can't keep up. So I pick up the 30 lb toddler and start to huff us all.
It is 2:32. Why am I doing this?
We walk up to the nature center just as the groups are walking out. I find the police officers, give the mini version of what happened (They knew something from when Randy called because Violet's leader had her name tag for her), and check to see if she can ride the bus home. Violet joins her "yellow" team, walks out to the bus and gets on to ride back to Safety Town.
I follow the bus back to safety town. I text Randy and say my stress is through the roof and if he would come home from work early. He says he will let me know and he does leave just around 2:30. I call him and tell him she is safely on the bus with her team and I am following them back. He said "Awesome" and I could hear a smile in his voice.
I get off the phone. I am not sure if I want to cry or what. I have some brief waves of "why can't I have a normal kid and why do I have to do all of this shit and and and..." and feel guilty for having those thoughts. (You can all say kids puke and why didn't I just stay home and call it a day. But i can guarantee you that you have never dealt with a toddler who had bouts of bulimia where one episode of vomiting can turn into months of serious chaos and disrupt every single aspect of your life) I feel SO alone. This isn't an average day for most people. It just sucked. My head was so quiet. Somewhere in here I did have some humor because I am following this big bus and just well... it is kind of funny. "Crazy Mom covered in puke drives kid to park for 3 minutes.."
We get back to Safety Town. I go to get Ophelia out and she is smiling, "Is it time to pick up Violet, Momma" I just kiss her and tell her it is time to get Violet.
I see the other Mothers going to get their kids, stepping out of their nice new vans, with their nicely done hair, and cute clothes. I think about myself, stinky, hair glued down to my face, puke on my clothes, and I have waves of both jealousy and gratitude. I feel just fat and ugly. Oh well - keep walking.
I go into school, listen to the ending re-cap of the day, sign Violet out for the day and we leave. I ask Violet what is wrong -she is totally silent. She tells me she is mad she didn't get to do her activities. I am exasperated but we work it out.
We drive home. We pull in the driveway to find Daddy in his dress clothes in a SWARM of flies hosing down the car seat that is in 3 million pieces. The flies are everywhere - all over the seat, the bits of puke, her clothes, etc. Lovely. But the sight of my husband washing down her seat is melting my heart.
I picked us up Chinese food and then he let me sleep from from 5:30 - 8:00.
In the end, she got to safety town, and we didn't let no stinkin puke to get in our way.
Why did she puke? She said she had too many sweets and shouldn't have had that last cookie. (She had undiluted apple juice and vanilla gold fish crackers. (those are cookies to her))
And somewhere it would be relevant to say the meltdown we would have had if I would have said "oh honey, I'm sorry you had an upset tummy, we will stay home today ..." would have ended up BADLY.
Massive love and appreciation for my husband calling the City (he _never_ does that kind of thing), leaving work to come home for me, and for dismantling the car seat and dealing with the flies. And also for the nap.