Some Mommy Blogging
I haven’t really talked much about the kids lately, and it’s mostly good. There hasn’t been a big milestone, too often milestones are marked by trips to the Emergency Room or the school.
Jane has one soccer game left in her school season and Alexander is about to start his Little League Season. Mr. G is Alexander’s Little League coach, and like every year, he feels like he can’t possibly make the time. Like every year, the time is there and father and son have a wonderful springtime. I get to cheer, and read books, because baseball is slow. Very slow.
Valentine’s Day was nice. We hung out and swam. Yes, East Coast, its was a balmy 84 degrees all weekend so we spent it in the pool. Jane picked out lipstick for me, I got the kids a few sweet gifts, and we got Mr. G the ice cream cake he loves. It was a low maintenance Valentine’s Day and we all enjoyed it.
Alexander had some stomach pains last week, and now he has a drippy nose. As soon as I get him to the doctor for one symptom it’s gone and another one kicks in. He hasn’t actually gotten sick, but he seems to flirt with it. When he’d woken for the third day in a row with a stomachache but no fever (as the back of my hand would take his temperature). So finally I get him to the doctor, but by the time I walk through the door I’m imagining Crone’s disease and stomach cancers, I’m not thinking virus. Thank goodness the doctor is. She said he had a tiny fever (like 99.2) so it was probably the same virus the other 12 kids in her office had that morning. Just to be sure though we would need a stool sample.
Yep. Now I’m a shit collector. In order to get a stool sample you wait until your kid needs to go and you put a piece of saran wrap over the back half of the toilet. When they have a bowel movement you take your rubber gloves and use a tongue depressor to put a bit of the feces into a collection jar. Then you wrap it in aluminum foil SO YOU DON’T HAVE TO SEE IT. You take the saran wrap, the gloves and the shit covered stick and you place them in your awful neighbor‘s trash bin (because they’re out on the street anyhow). Since it is 5pm and the lab closes at 5.30 you take your son’s feces and put it in about 800 ziploc bags and store them in the refrigerator. The next morning, when you are ready to take the chilled shit to the lab, your son wakes up feeling “just great mom”. But now he has a runny nose, and I absolutely am not taking him to the doctor for a clear drippy nose. I have to save my money for a few good therapy sessions and a new refrigerator.
It’s mostly easy around here. The kids are good, they’re doing well in school, they’re playing nicely with their friends and although they’re more independent each day there’s a lot for me to do.
Last week when I went with Alexander on his field trip he was unhappy. He didn’t want me there. Then he stood with me at lunch in front of all of his friends kissing my cheek and whispering in my ear, “Mom, I’m so embarrassed that you’re here. I really wish you weren’t here. This is embarrassing.” And he kept kissing me.
That’s where we’re at.