Motherhood Uncensored

If At First You Don't Succeed, Lie Lie Again

I can count the number of times I've watched porn on my two hands. For me, porn is less of an "Oh Baby. Let's watch some porn! Uh Uh" and more of a "Hee hee. Porn. *giggle* *snort*" type situation. I'd much rather watch a few choice Sex and the City reruns and the Top Gun sex scene and go on my very very very merry way.

But one fine evening last June, I found myself alone, bored, and sexlessly pregnant, and so I decided it might be fun to order a porno off of our Direct TV. Now, it's not the first time I've done the pay per view porn thing, and you'd think that after a couple of times, I'd learn my lesson, mostly because when it comes to PPV porn, I'm not sure what's worse - the movies themselves or the descriptions - the latter of which had me watching some girl enjoying the spray of you know what on her face from a gaggle of really ugly old dudes, and a bunch of lovely but extremely large African American couples doing it in an above ground pool.

I'm not sure how anyone could have gathered that from "hot girls and guys getting it on," but I did, and sold about five minutes of my extremely valuable time to the devil for $10.99, only to be followed by a long hot shower, mainly to disinfect and cleanse my poor eyes.

Of course, this was all an archived figment of my memory until a few weeks ago when I discovered that the damn cable box records your purchases. And try as I may to delete them, I was completely unsuccessful, my only fear being that my husband would decide to click around and discover "Dymes 10" and "Breakin' Them In 3" on the "purchased" list.

And wouldn't you know, yesterday morning I'm standing in the kitchen when he yells "Hey. There's a couple of purchased movies here for like $10.99! What the hell is that about?"

Now, the smart, former self that had one less child and waaaaay more brain cells would have just chalked it all up to research. Granted, it's highly unlikely that any mom would want to know the benefits of having that sprayed upon her face, not only because we moms get enough shit sprayed upon us and while yes, it might be great for our skin (what dude came up with that bull anyway?) still. Ick. And truly, not many moms I know are going to do it in a pool because we all know how much piss is in there.

So, I did what any woman, wife, and mother of three running on no sleep with obviously really bad taste in porn would do.

I lied right through my teeth.

"Oh yeah. Was that in June or something? The Direct TV people emailed me -- something about a hacker. Can you believe that?"

"We didn't get charged, did we?" he asked. Gotta love my thrifty husband, right?

"Oh no. They took it right off our bill" I replied, trying not to giggle.

"Well, okay. So long as we didn't get charged."

So lesson learned. Never order bad porn off of Direct TV. That's what the have the damn internet (and the clear history feature) for.

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Happy Halloween! Here's a spoooooky tale -- who needs costumes when you're a mom?

Where Everyone Knows Your Name. Well, Except Your Own Mother.

I would expect the Duggars to mix up at least a few of their 470 kid's names. Of course, they could just yell "J" and at least one would answer. Same goes for Jon and Kate and their television cast of characters. Although a woman with 8 kids who still mops the floor three times a day probably doesn't forget anything.

But me, the mother of three kids, calls each child by the wrong name (or better, no name) at least once a day.

It wouldn't bother me so much had I not been known for my memory. Yes, some folks are known for their smashing good looks or being incredibly easy, but I was known for my knack for remembering things - say everything from the books of the Bible (won me a Bible and $5 back in Junior High Sunday School. Woo!) to bizarre facts about Johann Sebastian Bach that afforded me the highest score in my undergraduate music history class. A very worthwhile achievement that is paying off dividends as we speak. (Okay, not so much).

I can almost annoyingly provide you with the name of some random character actor who most people have never heard of and then tell you all the other movies he's been in over the last few years. And much to my husband's chagrin, I can rattle off all his prior offenses in date order with specific quotes when necessary.

And yet, I've called Drew that "Oh what's your name again?" about 5 times already this week.

As if the mothering gig couldn't make you feel less human, you know when you're pissing yourself every time you cough and sneeze and walking around with a gigantic maxi pad in your monstrous underpants with a baby attached to your boob, it's sort of nice to say "Well, at least I have my memory."

Alas, apparently I don't.

It's sort of odd how even though I've got kids of different genders with totally different names (no Sam and Pam, or Jadyn and Cadyn here), I still flub them up. My mind goes completely blank and I just yell out whatever I can think of first. I bet you can actually see the wheels of my poor crotchety brain turning as I stand there rattling off names like I'm calling roll in an elementary classroom. With my luck, my son will grow up thinking his name is QuinlanMargotDrew.

Now I get the whole pet name thing. It's not because they're being cute or sweet, but more so because they can't remember their kids' damn names.

Stumped.

I generally do not have a weak stomach when it comes to bodily functions. I've held many a head of a college roommate over the dorm toilet after a crazy concert choir party (don't laugh - those mezzo-sopranos can party hard). And I even cleaned up the barf and drunken piss of my college boyfriend before dumping him.

He peed on my shoes, people. There's just no forgiving that.

I sit glued to the television while my favorite balding rotund chef Andrew Zimmern eats roasted bats and sheep balls, although I admit that when the Man vs. Wild dude ate a live snake I did have to change the channel just briefly, mostly due to the gusto with which he tore into it. That and watching him speak with snake guts spurting out of his mouth didn't help either.

So when it comes to my children, I'm hardly squeamish. The regular occurrence of mucus fests, yak carnivals, and my personal favorite, the poop parties that accompany this parenting gig are just par for the course. And clearly, compared to the barf of your grubby, clothes-borrowing college [whore] roommate, you might even say that your kid's vomit smells like roses.

Okay. That's extremely far fetched. Sort of like when people say that breastfeeding poop doesn't smell when HELLO clearly it smells, but you get my point.

I digress.

I've wiped my kid's nose (and butt) with my shirt, so much so that the snot almost looks like an actual design and I've even eaten an entire meal with poop on my arm only to be discovered later after I realized that it wasn't my dinner than smelled like shit.

But for the life of me, I cannot deal with that damn slightly seepy hanging on by a thread crusty black umbilical stump.

Blech.

Now I Understand the Whole "Baby on Board" Thing

Apparently it only takes one trip to the airport with three children stuffed like sardines in the back of my Trailblazer to make me realize that people can be total and complete assholes.

Of course, it doesn't help that I decided to try on real, human non-pregnant person pants last night after plucking a ridiculous number of short wiry white hairs from the top of my greasy unshowered head.

Yes. I ignored Post-Partum Sanity Rules #1 and 2 (Don't try on real clothes and don't look in the mirror).

But seriously, take the people in their gihugic SUV who park me in at the ticketing drop off and then continue to leave their car and go chit chat with the sky cap for a solid five minutes. Do people not realize that there are, in fact, other people in the world that might not want to sit at the airport watching you check your Louis Vuitton suitcase?

Or, how about the woman in front of me at the Starbucks drive thru who pulls up just far enough past the speaker so that the person behind her (lucky me!) can't pull up to the said speaker and has to sit there screaming an order for a $4 smoothie for my cold-ridden toddler from five feet back. Even better, she decides to put on a full face of make up and complete her morning personal hygiene routine before moving up.

Clearly the "Baby on Board" signs are not reminding people to drive safely due to the presence of a sweet new life in the back seat. They're begging people not to be a bunch of assholes and move the fuck along because there's a screaming kid in the back who cannot be appeased without a milky nipple.

So, I'm thinking that "Post partum mother of three" signs might be in order.

Shouldn't that be a good enough excuse for my road rage?

Two Babies.

Since his sister started school in August, Drew has shared our alone time with a computer screen. Bedtime, after long days as a then pregnant and mostly single parent, was the only time where we were truly just mom and son, and even then I was pushing him towards the short board books and one-verse lullabies, just so I could dive into those precious few hours at night when the house was quiet and still, the only noise being the buzz of my laptop and the low drone of our television.

Even so, he still begs for me at bedtime, rushing for the "big books" and asking me to sing song after song as I hold him tightly wrapped in his favorite blanket, rocking in the pitch darkness of his room, the sound of his rain machine as my accompaniment.

I gladly pass the baby to my husband just so I can hold him for those ten long minutes, and perhaps earn back some of the time I spent what felt like seemingly wasting away his infancy and toddlerdom.

He's so big now, compared to his eight pound sister - running fast, throwing hard, and recklessly clamoring through the house like a loose cannon shot without aim, though still gentle in face and spirit. He speaks in pseudo sentences -- a few words strung together in a way that one can figure out the story he is trying to tell.

As of late, he desperately tries to find space on my lap which is otherwise occupied by a small baby. He searches for any morsel of thigh so he can plop his still diapered behind down and rest his head on me, poking and petting the baby in his own loving way. Most of time, it ends with kicks, head butts, and time outs, clearly his way of getting what little attention I can spare.

Yesterday, as I carried both him and his little sister up the stairs, his face warm from a low-grade fever and his head resting on my one available shoulder, he said "two babies."

It stung a little - these words from my sweet baby boy who's made veritable meals from the crumbs I've been able to spare him over this last year. And while I know our time together will come, when newborns aren't eating every two hours and spending the other hours nestled in a sling, it's hard not to feel a tinge of guilt.

Because when it comes down to it, he is still very much our baby.