We Have All Had One of Those Days

    

It is just past 8 o’clock.  I find myself slipping into the covers of my bed.  The coolness of the sheets soothes my tired body and I feel myself taking a breath for the first time today.  Ever since I committed to watch my two nephews, Fridays have become so exhausting.  I didn’t expect this Friday to be much different.  However, a thought I had that morning may have been a little more than I had asked for…
The doorbell rang.  It was 10:30 in the morning.  I was in the middle of French braiding my daughter’s hair for her kindergarten western dance.  By the time I finished and headed down stairs, my sister-in-law had already dropped off her kids and left.  That is when it all began.  My four-month-old nephew woke up.  His curdling screams let me know he was ready to eat.  I began rummaging through the diaper bag.  No bottle.  I dumped the diaper bag.  No bottle.  I called my sister-in-law.  No answer.  I thought there might be a way to get into her house to get a bottle.  Her baby uses a bottle with an unusual nipple.  I have a toddler who uses a bottle, but toddler bottles are different than infant bottles. The flow consistency is a lot faster in a toddler bottle, but what was I to do?  I filled the bottle up with formula and attempted to feed him.  It didn’t work.  The flow was too fast that he ended up spitting the milk out, drenching his shirt in the process.  Plan B.  My neighbor just had a baby – she was sure to have a bottle I could use.  On my way to her house, another neighbor found out of my distress and offered a bottle for me to use.  As I was transferring the formula from my bottle into the borrowed one, I noticed it said “quick flow” on the top.  I tried it anyway only to find a river flowing down his shirt a second time.  Back to the beginning of Plan B – borrow a bottle from the neighbor with the newborn.  It worked.  No drenching; only familiarizing a starving infant with a foreign bottle.  Six ounces down, a diaper change and a clean shirt and there was peace once again. 

That peace shortly ended as we were about to leave.  My four-year-old nephew squished his red otter pop all over my daughter’s white shirt she was wearing for her program.  I didn’t have time to put it into the washing machine so I carefully pulled it off her head, attempting to not mess up her hair in the process, and began rinsing it out in the sink.  I added some bleach which removed the red spots right away.  I then began blow drying the shirt in attempt to quickly dry it while at the same time giving orders to get shoes on, find backpack, and grab the diaper bags.  Meanwhile, I looked down at the shirt and noticed the red spots, which had turned white with the bleach, had now turned purple as they began to get dry.  It was useless. Time was running out.  She would have to wear a damp, purple blotted shirt to her program.  I carefully pulled the shirt over her braids, grabbed the baby and two diaper bags in one arm and the toddler and car seat in the other arm and headed out the door.  It was 15 minutes later than I intended to leave, but we were off and on our way, content once again…I thought.

We were halfway to school and my 15-month-old threw up all over himself and his car seat.  The smell was breathtaking.  I removed my seatbelt and leaned over my seat to the backseat as my husband drove down the highway.  I struggled to clean up the stomach acidy chunks from off his shirt and behind the seatbelt of his car seat with a diaper wipe.  Why did I not pack the container of bleach in the diaper bag!  Meanwhile, we made it to the school in just enough time to slide past everyone and parade into the seats in the front row marked with bright green “Reserved” signs. “Yes, we are the ones who get to sit in the special reserved seats – I am Mrs. McDougal’s daughter,” I said to myself in a loathing sort of way as stares from every which way fell into our laps.  I didn’t want to be noticed.  I spent all morning solving problems all I had time for was to throw on some jeans, pull up my oily hair and wipe the remaining makeup off my face from the day before.  My in-laws walked in shortly after us and sat down next to us in the last two remaining “reserved” seats.  It took my thoughts off all the stares.  The program was only minutes away from starting when my Grandma and her friend walked in expecting to sit in seats marked “reserved”.  My in-laws graciously slipped out of their front row seats and found some of the only remaining seats in the back corner.  Finally, the program started.  My mother unexpectedly decided she needed to introduce two important people.  I was one of them.  If everyone wasn’t staring at me earlier, they were then.  The dances began and my husband started recording.  Four dances went by.  BEEP!  The memory card was full and there were still three dances left!  

I simmered in my frustrations until my father-in-law invited us to lunch at McDonalds.  We had an hour to burn before the kids got out of school so we graciously accepted.  As we began to eat, my 15-month-old showed signs of throwing up again.  I frantically tried to grab napkins without any success.  He vomited into my husband’s hands - appetizing.  He seemed fine after a few minutes and decided he would try and eat again only to end up throwing up all over his entire Happy Meal.  I felt like my father-in-law bought a meal just so we could throw it away without even eating it.  My son threw up two more times as we were leaving McDonalds.  We fervently left to pick the girls from school.  “Could this day get any worse?” I thought to myself.  as we picked the girls from school.  As my daughters climbed into the car, one said, “It reeks in here!”

I roll over.  My stomach churns.  That thought I had this morning about not expecting this Friday to be any different had been that I actually hoped there would be a little drama.  My husband had work off and was spending the day with us.  I wanted him to see why every Friday night I was too tired to go out and why I was too exhausted to stay up past nine o’clock to watch a movie.  I wanted him to experience what I had to experience for the last ten Fridays.   I wanted him to know that holding a crying baby for two hours and taking care of four other kids at the same time was beyond exhausting.  I wanted him to know that it was as tiring as I made it out to be.  Maybe hoping for a little drama was just a little too much to ask for!