The saying goes, “It takes a village to raise a child.” But, we live in a day and age where parents get divorced, siblings spread out across the country and the only people willing to watch your child want to discuss their “fee.”
If the Tsetse fly gets me, there’s no passing my kid off to another gal in the tribe.
A couple days ago, I came down with a stomach virus. I called it the sick cruise without the “cruise.”
As I made my every five-minute dash from the bed to the bathroom, I could hear my husband’s groans of irritation with the kids growing louder as the night wore on. If dramatic sighs were a sport, he’d be an Olympian.
NOT my husband.
I tried to take over at one point, lying on the couch while the kids watched television, but within minutes had to say, “Mommy has to go potty.”
There is nothing worse in a family than a “man down.” (or woman down)
My mother-in-law broke her arm this past week when she fell while cleaning the top of the fridge. My father-in-law posted about it on Facebook, but it was in Spanish. For several minutes I was trying to figure out why she jumped from the fridge, hurt her arm and they turned into Tarzan and Jane. There was a Tarzan reference, but clearly my Spanish isn’t that great.
All it takes is one member of the family down, even the extended one, to derail all plans. She was supposed to watch the kids so we could celebrate my husband’s birthday this weekend with a rare overnight alone. Now, we’re trying to figure out how we can survive a couple hours at the race track with two kids. (Can you even take kids there? It seems illegal. Those places always reek of cigar smoke and seem to be teeming with aged sex offenders)
When I finally felt good enough to at least pick up the kids from daycare, I told my daughter I was taking them to Boston Market because “Mommy is too sick to cook.” She said, “Then I won’t talk to you.” I said, “What?” She said, “When you’re sick, I won’t talk to you.” So, at some point I must’ve scared the bejeesus out of her when I was ill. I can totally picture it: Me lying on the floor, writhing in agony and her bothering me about where her bunny’s blanket is and me shouting, “DON’T TALK TO ME. I’M SICK!!!”
Instead of being able to ask my mom for a hand, I’m text messaging her that I’m slowly dying of digestive failure.
Instead of being able to ask my mother-in-law for a hand, well… I’m just glad she still has a hand after the whole swinging from a fridge incident.
It takes a village, but we’re all in the “isolation hut” now. Not just reserved for menstruating ladies anymore. When there’s a man down, you suddenly wish you were better neighbors.
It takes a village. It also takes a team.
Last night my daughter started to cry in her bedroom. My husband found her hiccuping and burping.
Being astute, he rushed her to the bathroom where she promptly blew chunks across the tile floor.
We’re like an elite hazmat crew, working at high speeds, silently triaging the scene. My husband’s running the tub and whipping off her pajamas. I’m grabbing a plastic bag and every cleaning product created.
Within 15 minutes, we’ve got her sleeping in bed with minty fresh breath. I’m like a crime scene cleanup tech. You could sell that bathroom without anyone being the wiser to the gore it’s seen.
Props to any single parents out there. If I was one, I would just crawl under a vomit-stained bath mat and cry until DCF showed up.
Living The American Scream 