The making of a monster

Apparently I will be turning my 4th and final child into a spawn of the devil. Or else he had natural tendencies and I'm just too tired to beat them out of him. I mean, besides the fact that once I solve one problem with him, another one pops up all of a sudden, he gets away with murder.

Back when I had triplets, and I suspect with most first time parents, it all seemed so important. Scheduled eating, sleep training, rigid nap taking, planned walks and so on. And, naturally, with three it was more important. If all three were allowed to eat on demand until they were 2 I'd be insane (more than I am already I mean,) But one baby eating on demand? Eh. I'm up anyway. Some triplet nightmare or something, or just the aches and pains of being old, post pregnancy and fat.

Naps? Well, unfortunately for the kid, he's kinda screwed by association with triplets who only nap once a day and need to get out of the house every morning. Makes it hard for him to nap whenever he's supposed to. So, then when I am home with him, how can I expect him to follow a nap schedule? Sleep training? Well, how do you go from rocking that tiny infant to sleep with tears in your eyes while singing love songs to him to letting him soothe his own dang self? The triplets were never rocked to sleep in their lives. Sucks to be them, but it was reality. A bouncy chair or swing, maybe, but no mommy ever sang and rocked them to sleep.

Ugh that makes me feel guilty as sin.

And so this kid will probably be on the bottle until he's 8, wake at night until he's 18, and live in the basement of our home playing computer games and drinking liters of Coke until we croak or he slaughters us in our sleep due to deep psychological problems. Caused by me. Babying the crap out of him.

But he's just so cute! How do you not also keep thinking that this is the last time I get to spoil a kid, snuggle a sleepy baby, see one of his middle of the night smiles greeting me, or bottle feed him into a food coma? It'll be years before I have grandchildren, I have to soak all this up or miss it forever!

I'll sleep when they go to college. For now I'll just watch them sleep.

Margaritas

Have I told you yet that my pediatrician said I could have a drink and not 'pump and dump' yet? Someone explain to me why there is not already a margarita in my hand?

For those of you who don't know what that means there's this idea out there that you have to have your drink and then pump your milk out and dump it so the kid doesn't get any alcohol through the breastmilk right? Now, anyone who has ever had to attach their particularly personal appendages to a machine several times a day for the express (ha ha) purpose of being expressed will understand how completely abhorrent it is to throw any of it away. It's like throwing away money or blood or something. I worked hard to produce that stuff, it is so not being thrown away.

And so, pump and dump was unacceptable. More painful than NOT having a margarita.

But now I get to drink again! Not that I was a big drinker originally, but there's nothing I craved more during pregnancy than a nice cold margarita. Good god, do I still not have one in my hand? What the hell is wrong with this scenario?

This is truly exciting. I'm just going to see how long it takes for my husband to see the benefits of getting a margarita into my hands as soon as possible.

Oops, I did it again!

I played with my birth control, got lost in the dark....oh baby baby..

I mean, oops. I'm pregnant.

So, now that all of you have picked your jaws up off the floor. It's true. I didn't pay anyone and I still got pregnant! I have triplets, which means I get to have sex maybe once every 4 months? And I still got pregnant.

Silly me.

I am actually very excited. Apparently the universe must think I'm doing an ok job to throw another helpless infant at me. Or maybe they were caught looking the other way but how fun is this? I get to see what being pregnant with one baby is like! (So far? Sucks.) I get to sleep with a baby, possibly breastfeed, give birth 'naturally' (why am I excited about that? Who knows), and generally allow my children to do the bulk of the childcare. I mean, why else have three older kids? Babysitting? Check.

No really. I am terrified too, but if you must know, I wanted another one. Pregnancy is weird and woman hormones are weird. It wasn't too long after I gave birth that I wanted to be pregnant again. Which is pretty pathetic considering I spend every single second of every minute complaining while pregnant. Triplet pregnancies suck. But this time, lucky for you, I'm finding the second trimester to be a bit nicer on me. I'm only 3 days in, but forgive me for enjoying the fact that the first trimester exhaustion, nausea and mood swings have been gone for 3 days.

And count yourselves extremely lucky that you missed all the whining that went with that period. Expect, however, third trimester to be a nightmare. Especially as I get closer and closer to the possibility that a large sized baby (this family makes none other) will be exiting by a method I have not experienced as of yet.

Ok, let's hear it. Only, if you're going to berate me for being pregnant again? Don't bother. I'm too happy.

Smile yourself happy

I've finally bitten the bullet and plunked down a lot of cash to book a house for a 'vacation' with the triplets. I picked a lovely 5 bedroom house on the Russian River, which is only about an hour and a half from here. It's also only 30 min north of the grandparent's house in Petaluma, so I'm not stretching too much. All hell breaks loose and we can come scurrying home with our tail between our legs. Being only 30 from the in-laws also means if we forget things we are easily in reach of it or a walmart at any time. And if they fall and crack their fool heads, we are 15-30 from the nearest big town with a hospital.

Now where the nearest mental ward is I am not sure.

Triplets preparing their lounge chair act

In any case, I am trying to put a positive attitude on for this, since it scares me silly to be 10 days without a nanny to help out. I am contemplating ways to have help come but other than conscripting friends, I'm not sure. But I'm certain I have to be the positive one or it will go to heck for sure. If momma ain't happy....you know? So I'm going to try an experiment. This might shock some of you who know me well, but I'm going to try not to think of everything that could go wrong and I'm going to put a smile on and arrive like we're going to have the best time ever.

Think it'll work, this brain transplant idea? Because I never think of my worst case scenario thinking as a truly bad thing. Just know I'm always prepared for the worst and if the best happens, how great. Is it really worse to think the worst and then truly enjoy when you're wrong or than to think the best will happen and sometimes be disappointed? I don't know. In high school I was voted most pessimistic. So I believed I was. But in recent years I figured out it's not actually true. I am quite the optimist in most situations. What people misunderstand about me is that my sarcasm and dry sense of humor picks out the terrible things, the possible nightmares, the dark stuff, and uses that as fodder. So my jokes are negative, dark or possibly pessimistic. I'm not.

There are a few people in my life who have just not gotten this. They are not my friends ever if for long. If you think I'm just a complainer and griper, why would you want to be my friend? But is it their lack of sense of humor that is the problem or am I sometimes too much to take? Hard to say. Sure it annoys me when someone tells me I'm too negative or to lighten up. But I usually am just shocked. I'm sitting there at a wedding saying I hope the bride doesn't notice that the waiters just screwed up and someone thinks I'm being negative. Um, I'm empathizing with the bride? Or possibly I'm having a little fun making fun of the waiter? Or possibly I'm just making conversation? Or, heck, maybe I'm being a little snarky, but that's not a crime.

But I digress. I am a positive person or I would not be surviving triplets. I am a positive person or my mom would have me in the psych ward right along side her sometimes. I am a positive person because despite my misgivings, in three weeks I am packing up my entire house into a minivan and heading north for a week. Wish me luck.

catastrophic diaper failure

Dear Huggies,

I have been a fan of your overnight diapers for probably about a year now. My three gigantic triplets have worn them every night with much success, even though I had to use a size larger than recommended on your package to comply with their needs. Even my son, B, who holds all of his urine during the day just so he can fill up one of your diapers until they weigh at least 8 lbs in the morning, has been a success story. I mean we could probably squeeze his diaper out in the morning and find 5 gallons of pee. Seriously. I don't know why he pees so much at night, perhaps he dreams of waterfalls a lot.

However, recently we have been having problems. I consider the fact that I have had to wake up 8 of the last 10 mornings during the 4-5 am hour because one or more of my children is soaking wet a problem. I do not mean a little spot of leakage. I mean these children are usually wet from just under their ribcage to their knees or lower. I consider this an CATASTROPHIC. DIAPER. FAILURE. The fact that it is happening to a boy and a girl means that this is not a gender specific design problem. The fact that we are using a diaper a size larger than you would recommend means that we should have covered our bases. But, the mere fact that I am writing this missive at 4 am tells me and you that there is a problem. This morning I had the joy of changing two children in the dark. Whether the diaper replacement ended up properly applied or the region in question got properly cleaned has yet to be determined in daylight hours.

This, my friends, is unacceptable. I am a tired mom. I have had sick or disobedient children for about 8 weeks now, which, due to the level of complaining I've been doing, you may have already heard about through the grapevine. What is more unacceptable is that there is no overnight diaper one size larger than we use. That's right. Perhaps it never occurred to you that anyone should need an overnight diaper larger than a 6, which according to your package (which I might add, I might have to sue you for as it is false advertising at it's worst) is for children 35+ lbs. Now admittedly, my children are only hovering around the 30 lb mark but what am I supposed to do? Put rubber pants on over your diapers? Double diaper them with your already bulky overnight diapers? Wrap their entire lower halves in cellophane?

Because I am telling you right now that 4 am is a time I do not like to see. I do not like even more to have to change diapers and pajamas at this hour on one of more children. You must find me a solution. Immediately. While my in the dark diapering skills are improving, this is not a useful skill outside of raising toddler triplets. Seeing as how we, with our gigantic triplets, use approximately 1894 diapers a month, we are quite a valuable customer to you. So let's hear some brainstorming, or perhaps you could just make a freaking size 7 for me. Please?

Your crabby mamma,

Mira

oooh that little....

So there I am, 2am wake up again. Kids are getting sick. The boys are coughing their lungs out, noses running at a fast pace and we begin. The least sick kid, A, is waking every 20 min. At first I am sympathetic. I mean her brothers are coughing, so how can she sleep? I go in, I pat her, tuck her in, stroke her head. Worry a little because she usually cries the most the night before she gets sick so I know what's coming right?

Meanwhile, because my children are annoying, B has decided that every time I come into the room it must be for him. Even though his sister is the one screaming, it's him I must have come running to pat, right? So since I dare to go to her first he starts in. Whining, standing up, rattling his cage, fussing, and eventually, screaming. Sigh. So I get her settled and step over to settle him down. No sooner do I step away but her head pops up. I step back over to her crib and gently (or maybe not so gently) place her head back onto the mattress. B pops up and starts fussing again. I mean really? Am I supposed to stay calm and rational at this moment? Do you two really not realize that you are one of three yet? I will pat whichever of you needs it most at whatever time and you are to keep your little head down on your mattress and zip it!

So it carries on like this until I leave the room, hoping I've settled each somewhat enough. 20 minutes later, I'm back on it. A starts screaming her fool head off and I return. I check her all over for leaky diaper, poop, broken parts, scorpions, you name it. Nothing. Wrong. Fine, I still feel sorry for her because seemingly, even though when I stand over B he does not cough, the minute I leave the room his coughing starts up again. I'd venture to guess 'someone' is sitting up when I leave the room but since I'm not allowed to tie him to his mattress, so it will be.

From 2-4am I play this every 20 minutes game. I am patient, no? But you know what? I'm done. At 4 I am physically done, mentally finished and overall going to kill a child if I step back in that nursery again before morning officially begins so I hear her screaming like she's being skinned alive but I wait. She calms down on her own, I begin to drift off thinking maybe it's all over. Oh, there she goes again. She's winding up for the scream when B says 'da' to her. That's triplet speak for "I'm awake too, wanna play?" Or so I think I've translated. So here's what it sounds like:

"Aaaaaaahhh..." "da" "Aaaahhh, DA DA, Auuuuuggghhhaaaaauughghwahaaaaaahhh!"

I kid you not. She paused in her scream to respond to B happily and calmly, "da da" being triplet speak for "I'm up for playing!" only to return to her screaming now that that business was out of the way. I can not repeat here the words that came out of my mouth when I heard this. If that girl thinks I'm stupid enough to hear her talking with her brother about playing and still think she's dying of some unknown condition at 4am? That little girl is wrong. That little girl is such a faker! I can tell you, however, that I did NOT get out of bed again. And you know what? She was alive in the morning. Probably a better result than she deserved.

Funkariffic

So this weekend I got into a pretty good funk about the whole vacation thing. I looked up Disney Cruises, as if I could afford one, and found out that basically you need the kids to be 3 and potty trained, which, with two boys means at least 4. Which, with the proper math skills I can deduce to mean we are not going on a family vacation that I will enjoy for approximately 2 and 1/2 more years.

Kind of depressing. I put out a sad call to my multiples parents in the SF area to see if this was really true. I am craving a change of scenery. Dying for it. And yet, if it's just more work and I have to give up my morning help, then why would I do it? Is it really that refreshing to sit on a different balcony, perhaps staring at waves or a river, after the kids go to bed than staring at my tv at home? And if they sleep badly because they're in a new place? And if I can't keep them from escaping into the woods and so never get to sit down is that worth it?

I don't know. I'm trying to find a solution in some house I could rent on the Russian River or in Tahoe that has a fenced back yard, a different climate (anything different than cold foggy SF might be nice) and perhaps a beach, park or playground nearby or even better, a pool. There must be a way for me to 'get away' and feel ok about it. There must...

Free me!

There are so many triplet moms out there who do so much more with their kids than I do. I feel like I've been trapped inside my house for years since it started when I was an 800 lb pregnant woman. I mean, sure, we go to the park in the mornings and we've been to the zoo and the Discovery Museum in Sausalito (which rocks) but being on Facebook puts my life in a sad perspective. These women are off to lakeside cabins, barbecues, trips to mountains and beaches, playdates and relatives' houses far away.

What am I doing sitting on my arse? I thought it was a triplet thing that had me so homebound. You know, my usual shtick about how you all with the one baby can miss a nap and only have one crabby baby but I am NOT having three missed naps and crabby children. NOT. I mean I'm not insane right? Kids who have missed naps are miserable. Nightmarish even. They look like this:

Actually I have no pics of angry children because we never. miss. naps.

The one time I took a 'vacation' with the triplets about 3 hours north to a beach like area it felt like more work. I mean, I do have a nanny to help most mornings and on vacation? Not. So how is it a vacation when it's more work and harder than my 'regular' life? How would a lakeside cabin be any fun if I can't actually sit still on the porch and look at the lake? Except after bedtime? It just doesn't work for me. And as for barbecues, I'd have to run after children in someone's possibly unfenced backyard or a crowded beach area constantly. How do I enjoy that? I suppose friends would chip in and watch one or more kids for me while I stuff a little ribs in my face?

I mean I go to weddings where people get to bring their one beautiful moody baby but the couple can take turns. We can't! I couldn't get an appetizer down, much less a whole wedding dinner if I brought the triplets. So I guess I have to take my hat off to you much more adventuresome moms. You're amazing. You're fantastic! You're....out of your freaking minds! Or is there a trick? Tell me please? Because I have been counting the days until I can take the kids to carnivals and fairs and go on a freaking vacation and they still seem years away.

Oh but I AM going on a Disney cruise when I win the lottery. SO. AM.

Hey crabby pants...

Dear unknown nanny,

I've now spent two hours with you at my triplets' music and movement class, and admittedly I was busy chasing one of three around the room and participating in the class, but I've made some observations that I'd like to share. First of all, I'm not sure who hired you, but I'm pretty certain that the parents of that delightful little girl hired you for many good reasons. My guess is that they anticipated that you would actively participate in their daughter's life bringing her joy as well as discipline in good measure. None of us parents expects nannies to be 'on' all the time but when we pay you to care for our children we expect a few things:

1. An attitude that indicates you kind of sort of like our child or children at least a little bit.

2. A willingness to participate in the activities that help our child grow or just entertain them.

3. A smile at our child on an occasional basis.

4. An ability to at least pretend enthusiasm when the class requires it so that our child feels inspired to participate in the class on which we have spent our hard earned money.

5. Not to see the following behaviors: frowning at our child while smiling at everyone elses', sitting still when it's participation time, not singing the introductory song, or ripping of drumsticks or cymbals out of our child's hands disapprovingly when it's FREE. INSTRUMENT. TIME.,

Now, I don't know about you, but I'm inclined to tell on you. If I could find the parents of your charge and let them know that somehow they hired a surly, unhappy, non-participating, misses the entire point of music and movement class nanny, I think they'd be glad I told them. However, in a city of millions, my chances of reaching them are miniscule. However, if I have to dance through one more class while watching your black cloud stifle the joy of your charge I may find a way. I and my nanny can NOT be the only ones encouraging your charge to sing and dance freely as is the POINT OF THE CLASS. Unless you are taking her home to a glass house wherein she is not allowed to be a child, then I think she's allowed to make some noise and have fun in this class. Capiche? Liven up and chill out for goodness' sake or I might smack some happy into you personally.

Yours,

Mira

Kids and cats, the same?

How my kids are like my cats. Or vice versa naturally.

1. They chase each other around the house.

2. They fight with each other regularly, over me or random crap.

3. They all want to pile on me at once and none of them wants anyone else on me at the same time.

4. They prefer to play with garbage or wrapping more than the toys we spend so much money on.

5. I have to clean up their poop, pee and vomit on a regular basis.

6. They hate the doctor and practically claw me to death trying to get away from him.

7. They turn their nose up at half the food I serve them.

8. They destroy my furniture.

9. They want attention in the middle of the night.

10. They cry constantly while I'm fixing their meals, apparently not fast enough.

11. They writhe in agony while I'm trimming their nails even though I am NOT hurting them.

12. The Dr has to constantly explain their odd behaviors to me.

13. According to them I never spend enough time with them.

14. They tend to drool all over me.

15. They all have different personalities.

16. Oh heck, I love every messy, annoying, demanding one of them.

Aaaaaaaah. That's more like it.

Ok I'm back. thanks to a stretch of 4 or 5 hours and another of 3 that was given to me last night by my still sick but possibly drugged into submission children. No, I only drugged one. And she still woke up 4 times. But she spaced it out better. The night before she had done a 10, 11, 12, 2, 4, 4:10, 4:20, 4:30 thing that pretty much killed me. Not to mention the diaper explosion of B at 5:30 immediately following. I mean, when it rains, it pours, right? I'm hoping that when I head in there this morning I will find then all over the third cold and A's eye will just turn out to have been a cold symptom and not have turned into pinkeye overnight. That would suck. Because my chances of not having three pinkeyes? Miniscule.

It's amazing how you can have night after night of miserable sleep and just one night with a longer section or two can completely revive you. I feel like a human being today. I can handle whatever thousand things I should be doing, smile at my kids, make it through without counting the seconds to bedtime the minute they get up from their nap and so on. Or I think so. The rest of the day remains to be seen. The first order of duty is a shower. Somehow with or without help, showering on the weekends is a lost cause. And yesterday? Just too tired to step into the box. So I stink. And tonight is date night. Gotta try to look good at least because hubby does.

I am fairly certain, however, that something must go wrong. For goodness' sake I have 3 toddlers. I am dreading a visit to the dr today. I am prepared for pinkeye so that wont send me but you just never know and I have a bad feeling. I have learned that my bad feelings are generally right on. I'm like a bloodhound on the trail of bad news. I'm sure you'll all be waiting on the edge of your seat for an update...

Slacker Sunday photo

How many other children do you thing have done this exact same thing to this exact same maraca recently? I'm thinking 3 billion. Germs at least.

ACHOO!

Boogers again. No, really, 3rd cold in 6 weeks, BOOGERS AGAIN!!! I can not believe it. I am ready to instruct all triplet childcare providers that my children will be doused in baths of hand sanitizer upon leaving any public arena and before all meals. Meanwhile I believe all of their toys will be boiled and dunked in gasoline before being lit on fire to sanitize them. Now, I'm not sure many toys will survive this process but A. we have a lot of stinking toys so we can spare a few, and B. I. Don't. Care. We need to stop this situation pronto. I will not wipe more snotty noses every two weeks and survive. I can not spend one more kiddie meal watching them eat equal quantities of boogers with each bite of food. I will vomit. I know it.

Perhaps I should just make them bubble children? Although the weight of entertaining them all day long in the house might kill me a different way than booger wiping would. Perhaps more painful? I mean, their attention span would require 800 different activities in one morning alone if they did not have sand, swings and play structures or the rec. center full of toys to explore. Perhaps it's a better trade off not having to be inventive or energetic every morning to let them be exposed to the 8 million germs left behind by other snotty children who's parents were perhaps not as vigilant about wiping their noses before they overflowed onto the communal toys.

Or perhaps I should spare myself the effort and let them run around with boogers hanging down to their knees, ignoring the evil eyes from other parents and pretending I don't see anything. Would spare me some of the gross out factor, but honestly? I have cute kids. I don't think I could stand to watch them covered in snot. I want everyone else to see how cute they are, not how bad of a mom I am. Focus on the children folks! Help me out a bit, lend a kleenex to the effort. For goodness' sake.

I don't know what the solution is but I am not a happy mom right now. Long nights with lots of wake ups due to coughs and congestion do not make for good mornings and energetic mothering. Crabby sick children do not make me love my job. And I have pretty good natured kids despite the illnesses, perhaps they're just getting used to constantly feeling sick? But there has to be an answer to stop this cycle. Is it just common in the summer for kids to be sick more often? More kids on the playgrounds since they're not in school and so they are passing around more colds? Whatever it is, I think I'm going to dress them head to toe in kevlar or teflon. Or some kind of hazmat suit made for kids. I think I just came up with my million dollar patent! Hazmat suits for toddlers! We would all be so much happier without sick toddlers! Who wants to give me seed money?

Birthed child pains

The pain of children doesn't end at childbirth. Sure, it was more direct during that pregnancy thing. Bladder kicks, stretching muscles and tendons, hemorrhoids, and the usual discomforts, not to mention the actual birthing process, I don't care how the baby or babies come out. It all hurts and it hurts a. lot. For some reason we choose to subject ourselves to it more than once quite frequently but we don't realize what we're in for in the long haul do we? The whole stinking process of raising kids is painful, and I'm not talking about the mental stuff!

First, there's the back breaking lifting and carrying and toting and rocking and walking of the baby or babies. My back hurt like hell during the first few months! I still don't now how women wear those baby carrier things, my shoulders would ache for days after. Sure, I had huge babies but people wear those with their babies all kinds of sizes and I just don't see how.

Next, at some point you baby proof and baby gates are in half the doors in the house. Baby gates are not for keeping kids in or out of a room, they're for torturing parents! Every time I walk in or out of a door I get a new bruise from knocking my thigh against the frame. I can't even open the things fast enough to keep from kicking the stupid gate on the way through. Unbelievable. Where's the stupid remote control that opens the door and slides the frame into the wall?

Then, inevitably, the kids decide you're a trampoline, punching bag, gym mat or whatever and start jumping on you, pounding on you, crawling all over you and generally treating you like a great big stuffed animal. Try telling them to be gentle when they realize that when they pound on your belly it jiggles in a very amusing way. Try getting them to stop jumping on you when they realize it's such a soft place to land. It just doesn't work.

Not to mention the endless round of unintentional head butts, book corner to cheek hits, plastic hammer whacks and random full on kicks by children not entirely sure how to coordinate their body parts yet. I have bruises all over, especially on my face, but that's probably because I'm stupid enough to lean in again and again while making smoochy smoochy noises to kiss bellies and faces and feet of flailing children. I suppose I'll never be able to resist. The learning curve is defeated by sheer hormonal attraction to baby belly. Ach.

I'm sure I've missed a few, but you get the general idea. Raising children is cause for many injuries, bruises, strains, headaches and general malaise. And I'm not even talking about the illnesses they give you. Cold after cold after flu after cold. Good gracious. I need a vacation.

Triplets or normal?

I see behaviors in my children and sometimes I wonder, is it because they're triplets, or could any kid be this way? I begin with the story of our first music and movement class we took today, your typical toddler music class with random instruments and made up music in a random dance studio. We arrived there a bit early so we could get parking and get situated and snack, and found it was just an empty studio with mirrors on one side and no props out or visible. My children began tearing around the room like they were in their own living room. A yelling out a greeting to anyone who was in the room, B and C trying to destroy the teacher's paperwork, A beating on the mirrors like she was in grandma's house, I mean they were nuts! Meanwhile, the other kids trickled in, clinging tightly to their parent's or nanny's legs. Shy as all get out. One cried and B went over and sat next to her! Triplets? Or did I just get three extroverts? I'd argue triplets. We are in a constant state of socialization. If you can't handle a lot of people or kids around, you aren't going to make it as a triplet, right?

The other possibility is that I am just a laid back mom. Now daddy would disagree but he's missing the point. I am a controlling nightmare about naps and scheduling the kids, sure, but you try having triplets and not being one. What I mean is that I never pushed the kids out of their comfort zone even though they have been exposed to a lot. When they needed to be left alone, they were left alone. I fiercely defended them from poking and prodding by strangers. I made sure the extroverted child was put into the visitor's arms first, usually held the shy kid myself. But there must be something I'm doing right. They aren't addicted to binkies/pacifiers. They fall asleep within an hour of bedtime (well don't hold B to that but pretty soon after!) and have accepted that I am not coming into the bedtime before 7:20 am. They are off bottles, drinking milk, eating some veggies and fruits and growing like weeds. And apparently, you can take them anywhere!

I think this post has turned into a 'yay me' post. How about that? Amazing what a little music class can do!

On sleep

Speaking of evolutionary principles, what is the point of fighting one's bedtime till all hours when you know perfectly well you will be up at 6 am no matter when you fell asleep? It seems mighty counterintuitive seeing as how doctors have shown that inadequate sleep will affect you negatively in many ways. So why do toddlers fight their parents, sometimes for hours each night, about falling asleep in their beds and then spend the next day all bleary eyed and crabby for all to enjoy?

Of course it's not just the toddlers is it? How many of you adults out there fight your bedtime constantly? I say almost every day 'today I'm going to go to bed early because I feel like crap.' Does it happen? Oh no. Despite the fact that I know that my impatient, tired toddlers will be rattling their cages loudly and screaming starting as early as 6, I watch one more crappy show, read one more magazine, send one more email. I know I feel like my justification these days is that once the kids finally go to sleep I need a couple of hours to decompress but really? I'd feel better in the morning with less decompression and more sleep. And honestly? I didn't go to bed on time before I had kids.

So what is this about human nature? I'm a morning person and I still can't get into bed on time. So I spend my days dragging around trying to find the energy to play with three wildcats and rueing the lack of sleep I got last night, because in addition to my stupidity one or more babies may have had a bad night and awakened me 3 or 4 times for comforting, and I think to myself that there must be a reason we do this to ourselves? Perhaps the saber toothed tiger was on the prowl in early evening and we needed to be up to watch for it?

In contemplation of the noble tantrum

What is the evolutionary principle behind tantrums? Can you imagine, just imagine, cave mamma Ugg with child #1 standing just outside cave mouth #43 on Cave Mouth Street grinding corn or preparing to go out and gather and little cave kid Ugg Jr throws himself to the ground and pounds his tiny fists and kicks his tiny legs and screams like a bear to get what he wants? Do you suppose she rolls her cavelady eyes and hands it to him? Because I don't. I see cave mamma taking her club out and giving him a good whack.

Imagine, again, Mayan momma standing in the hot sun after harvesting corn (oh I'm not an indigenous tribe specialist get off my back) watching Mayan girl baby screaming to be allowed to play with that last ear of corn, because it had become her toy, and not giving it to Mayan momma immediately upon being asked. Do you think she might be tempting the Mayan god to select her for the heart sacrifice? I think I'd tread a bit more carefully if I were that kid.

And imagine, if you will, prairie settler family Miller just put prairie kid Joseph to bed and he throws a tantrum to the point of barfing on his bedcovers. Do you think that in an era of no washing machines and no multiple sheet sets he was allowed to do this time and time again for no apparent reason and not end up sleeping amidst his barf particles? I think not. I think he'd be washing his own sheets pretty soon in the river with bloody knuckles of his own. I think he'd learn pretty stinking fast not to barf in his bed. His mom wouldn't be running with his barfing self out of the nursery to try to stop the inevitable sheet change one stinking time. I don't think so. Heck, he'd be lucky to have a bed. And if he barfed in mom and pop's bed? I think he'd be hoeing a row of crops before he was 2.

I mean how did tantrums achieve anything until the current parental administration where we overindulge such children? In the last, what, 50 years there's been a sea change from children being a necessary production of help mates for the household to children being our entire reason for the sun coming up in the morning and goodness knows you better not wake/upset/scold/deny/deprive them. So I see how it's evolutionarily useful now. It works like a charm to lay your tiny little body down in the middle of a packed grocery store and go to town with tears and snot because you bet your mom is going to scoop your butt up and get you anything to shut you up so she can finish shopping because this is the one stupid chance she gets all week to get groceries and if she can't now you'll all starve.

Well not this mom. That kid and I will either be standing there annoying the rest of you until he's done with his theatrics or we leave and we starve. I know it looks bad to the other judging eyes and I've been them too, but you know once you're the parent that the difference between a tantrum and a true cry is so obvious to you at some point early on in getting to know this kid that you can not allow yourself to indulge the former. Because that only means more in the future. And those judging eyes? They can go have triplets of their own and then judge me. Well, maybe not even then. Because this is my kid, and for some unexplainable reason tantrums are there in the animal brain, even though I'm pretty sure that our ancestor apes used them to better effect and they should have been extinguished as a useful strategy somewhere around the 1300s, BC, and there is NOTHING. I. CAN. DO. ABOUT. IT. So smile sweetly and move on rubberneckers. Nothing to see here.

Holiday shmoliday

Long holiday weekends annoy me. Particularly because here I am exhausted at the end of one and everyone else is all fresh and, well, perhaps hung over. Fine, exhausted for a different reason. All sunburned and overfed and smokey throated from cookouts and sitting by pools and watching fireworks. See, I'm a holiday lover. Before I had kids who, for the first years of their lives, are keeping me from having any. Because what is a holiday if I lose my usual childcare for the day? That seems like NOT a holiday to me.

And I want to laugh about the idiot hooligans who set off firecrackers in my neighborhood half the night but I'm trying to sleep here. Why? Because my molar teething daughter has kept me up for 3 nights straight waking every hour or two to complain about it loudly. Because in the morning I have to get up, dress, feed and clean them and take the to the park singlehandedly. While at the park I have to monitor them on a jungle gym, catch B as he slides down the slide head first, A as she eats sand, C as he finds a step to just sit on and cry for no reason. But I also apparently have to monitor the 8 year old daughter of a dad playing basketball in the nearby courts for some reason?

First of all, this park is divided into two play areas with fences. The one we're in, for very young kids, and the other one for kids her age. Where does she choose to play? Here. How many times to I have to remind her that she has to close the stinking door behind her on the way in and out because I have THREE running toddlers trying to escape at every minute? And why does she have to bring in a cup of water to play in the sand with, leaving two wet sandy spots for my kid to sit in and walk in after she's abandoned them? No, I don't bring a change of clothing to the park with me, why would I? And how bad of a mom am I to have to let my daughter run around with a big wet behind on a 60 degree day?

Dad? Whomever you are? I don't think your wife's idea for you to take your daughter to the park was this exactly. I don't think she was supposed to entertain herself completely, do you see this as father/daughter bonding time? Do you think she'll look back on these days fondly? Oh, remember dad, how you used to take me to the park and abandon me so you could pretend you were still single and play with those loud sweaty men a testosterone laden game of basketball? Right.

So, I leave the Independence weekend a little crabbier than before. Shocking I know, but I think my transition to grouchy old lady may be completing. I'm the one at the window looking out at the neighborhood fireworks (and I'm not talking little tiny fireworks, I'm talking they got the kind that shoot up over their 3 story houses and explode, lighting up the neighborhood and echoing for miles) grumbling and moaning about kids and hooligans and where are the police. I'm the one sending dirty looks to the dad on the b-ball court ignoring his lonely daughter. I'm the one who can't wait until next year when the kids are old enough to take to a fireworks display and maybe spend the day cooking out and baking ourselves in the sun. Wait, what? That doesn't fit. Ok, fine, I have a little holiday spirit left in me. Even if it is all in future fantasy land.

Indentured servitude

Independence day means so much to so many people but independence is such a flighty thing. Once you have kids you are just never independent again, are you? It's a weighty thought, that once you give birth to this living organism you will never (if you're lucky) be without them again. Yes, they'll grow up and move away (18 long years from now) but they're still with you.

Not being alone is a positive reason for having kids, because who wants to be old and alone at the nursing home with no visitors and having at least one kid does increase your chances of having someone visit, at least on holidays. Now, having three simultaneously like me also increases your chances of having a next generation too, who might forgive you much more easily for your parental transgressions (seeing as how they were not visited upon them) and might therefore be more likely to visit you in your stinky urine smelling cubicle of hell. So it's definitely advantageous to decide to have children even if it means losing your independence.

Because what are the advantages of independence after all? Freedom to go anywhere you want, whenever you want. Well that's pretty appealing. But what if you have no one to go with? No one to tell about your adventures once you return? So, can you wait on that until they go to college? Perhaps. Freedom to sleep in, stay up late, watch what you want, answer the phone or not, walk around naked in the house. Well that's appealing too, but for how many years? We all stayed up late and slept in during college and some after. Was it really that great? Or was half the day gone before you got up and you were kind of groggy and out of place all day because your schedule is all off and it's hard to go to bed the next night and so on. So, perhaps we can sleep in on mother's day and when the kids are at camp and make it through 18 years that way?

Freedom to go out to dinner without hiring a babysitter, see a movie at the spur of a moment, run away for the weekend together and keep your marriage in good repair. Well, there's a lot of pull to that one. But what would it all feel like with no one to come home to who was missing you? No one who idolizes you, thinks you rock (well for now at least, leave me in my fantasy) wants to throw themselves upon you physically so they can slime you with snot and drool but make you feel like a million bucks? I don't know, it makes marriage hard, but it adds something too. You see a part of your partner you never would have seen otherwise. The nurturing father, the gentle caregiver, the guy who knows how to make them laugh while they're crying. The guy who took care of you while you were recovering from the worst c-section ever and never let on he was concerned. How would you have known about that part of him? You never would have fallen that much more in love with him without kids.

So maybe independence is overblown. I'm pretty sure when I sit and dream about what life was like before kids I might be rosying things up a bit. I'm pretty sure it wasn't all escapes to Napa B&Bs and moonlight beach walks. I'm also sure that I'm going to forget what it was like without kids soon and imagine that life without them would be pretty empty, just hubby and me. Sure I still fight for a few hours here and there alone, I will never not be independent in my soul. But every time I find my quiet time interrupted by these amazing, smiling, laughing, loving, hugging crazies I call my triplets, I forget I was annoyed by the interruption. Bah, independence. Let the revolution happen somewhere else. I'm fine with my servitude.

Triple the fun

"You've got your hands full." As people have said this a million times to me in the last 16 months I have given it much thought. Do you think that I could find any parent of toddlers or even one single toddler who doesn't think their hands are full? I have had a theory for a long time that life with baby or babies is just like having a purse. You know that no matter how big a purse you buy you will fill it to the brim with crap. Suddenly you need one of those tissue packs, an extra pencil, perhaps a note book or a small book to reed if you get stuck in line, a little extra make up for touch ups and so on. If you had a clutch, you'd be fine with an id, lipstick, credit card and a few dollars.

Well having kids in your life is similar, if sort of the opposite way. If you have one kid you find that there are a million things you need to do for them. You will spend every waking second chopping food for home made baby food, sterilizing equipment repeatedly, plotting graphs of diapers and bottles, and staring into their eyes lovingly. If you have three infants at once you economize your time. Your infants are lucky if they get some rocking, one nap on your chest, a clean spoon in their mouth, and organic food processed by a corporation. You just have to adjust or you can't survive.

If you try to do everything for triplets you would fall down dead. So, triplets seem to adjust, they get used to soothing themselves sometimes, spend a lot of time in swings or bouncy chairs while someone else has a 'greater need,' and share every single cold with one another because of shared spoons. Now, do they suffer for this? I don't know. Because I believe most parents with more than one kid will admit that child #2 got less stuff and attention than child #1. "First child syndrome" which I have heard it called, means the first child sleeps in your bed until they're 2, rarely touches the floor for being held so much, is practically attached to you by the umbilical cord still. Child #2 gets less partly because you have to spend time with #1 as well but also because the novelty has worn off. It's not the first baby smell, the first co-sleeper, the first burp. So, do triplets suffer for never having been an only child? I suppose not more than second children suffer. But we won't find out until therapy begins.