THIS is why we wish it away

This morning the mini-est muffin woke us up at 4:00 am demanding "JUICE!" and "WARM!" (code for warm chocolate). This is actually an improvement from the nightly midnight, 2:00 am, and then 4:30 demand, which had been going on for a couple of weeks. It was like having a newborn again, something I'm pretty sure I don't want to do again!

I finally pulled my thinking out of my sleep-deprived brain and realized that as long as I gave him a reason to wake up and demand, this would continue. I also realized that this probably started when we were all very sick with fevers and coughing and pain from ear infections and the goal was to JUST GET EVERYBODY TO BE QUIET SO I CAN SLEEP A FEW MORE MINUTES!!!!

What this means now is that we're going to have to "help" him return to the habit of sleeping through the night with the ability to self-soothe. Sounds reasonable and caring and appropriate. Until you add the "Logan Factor."

Logan is what we euphemistically refer to as an "intense child." (This IS the reframe!) He came into the world this way, literally tearing his way out in less than 4 hours (not enough time to get the only epidural I ever asked for, thank you very much!!)

This dramatic entrance set the stage for life with Logan. Don't get me wrong, he is very, very cute.....and it's a good thing! Otherwise, he'd probably be in someone else's care, if you get my drift.

So, this morning, after lying calmly (said through clenched teeth) in Brennan's bed and not responding in anyway to "JUICE!" or "WARM!" or "DADDY!" and occasionally dozing, Logan was done for the night at 5:40 am. So we got up. Bleary-eyed I made some coffee, made first "JUICE!" and then "WARM!" and snuggled with Logan on the couch while he watched some TV thinking hopefully "maybe he's waking up so much because he's not getting enough Mommy-time?". I went upstairs to take a shower which meant more crying and pleading and, of course, that woke up his brother.

I went ahead with the shower, a little worried about what might be happening out there. My fears were justified when I discovered a diaper on the bathroom floor but no Logan. I hurried downstairs, towel-covered and dripping, wondering how much pee I'd have to clean up.

Logan met me with a you-know-what eating grin. I mean that literally. He held out his hand and said "Poop!" with much pride and excitement. Then he said "Mouth."
There is no word in the English language that effectively conveys how nasty/gross/nauseating/disgusting that is.

It took me a while to find all of it, but I did and cleaned it up after giving Logan an unwanted bath. All this before 7:30 am.

Fun times.

Update

OK. Here's what kept me out of the blog-o-sphere for so long:

The mini-muffins had their second change in child care arrangements in 2 months. Our fabulously energetic and unbelievably cheap child care provider (who just happened to live right across the street from us) decided to accept an offer to make personal training DVDs which have the potential to go nationwide via the backing of the Trump Corporation. I'm not sure why she chose that over our 2 wonderful boys....it's really a brain bender....

Anyhoo......now they are going 5 mornings a week to a NAEYC accredited child care/pre-school center. I had put their names on the waiting list over a year ago and the spots came open not long after we had hired an in-home provider for a lot more money and with much less energy than our aforementioned provider. Needless to say, I jumped at this opportunity. I figured, if I'm going to be paying through the nose, it's gotta be worth it.

So, after three weeks, we had all settled into the new routine....mostly....which was no small feat, considering the mini-muffins had been pretty insulated from the wider world until now. And I had gotten quite spoiled with lounging around in my "lounge" clothes until around 10 am 2-3 days a week.

It was pretty miserable the first couple of weeks. There was much weeping, wailing and gnashing of teeth -- and you should have heard the kids! Seriously, it was exhausting to manage two tantrums AND get to the office and compose myself before my first client every single morning, but I hung in there because I knew it would get better. And it did.

Then came the predictable day care induced illness fall-out. During the next 3 weeks we went through two rounds of colds, one much worse than the other. We're all STILL coughing two weeks from the onset. Again, I'm hanging in there because I'm told that the illnesses now will build stronger immunity in the future.

Brennan still asks why he has to go to school "so much," and I tell him because his dad and I have to work "so much." I'm helping him put together the idea that going to work means we have money to pay for things, like his Lightning McQueen wardrobe and chocolate milk habit. He now understands this idea so well that frequently when I pick him up he asks what I bought today. Thank you, Capitalism!!

That takes care of the little ones. Now for the big ones:

The studly muffin, being a 16 year boy, has been busy keeping us on our toes with a variety of 16 year old boy-type behavior -- most of them extremely stress producing for parents. As much as I'd LOVE to go into details, I won't. For one, it's too painful to have to tell the stuff over and over, and two, I guess I don't want to embarrass the kid too much.

ONO called this phase of parenting the "limbo phase" because you can't really do any "hands-on" parenting, but they're not old enough to send out into the world with a friendly swat (or swift kick, depending on the kid) on the butt. So you just try to continue to offer support and empathy when they fall flat on their faces, try not to take too much of it personally, and believe that they'll be ok in about 5-10 years.

Hmmmm. That sounds a little like a prison sentence.

I really DO love my children

So I'm heading out the door to the office and Brennan says "I don't want you to go to work." He says this to me more often than not and I patiently (usually) explain to him that I go to work so that we can afford his "warm hot chocolate" habit.

He's really insistent this time and ONO says "Maybe Mommy should be a full-time stay-at-home-mommy and never leave the house."

I look at him real quick, see that he's sort of smiling, breathe a sigh of relief and say "I would need a lot more drugs to do that. Lots and lots of drugs. Did I say LOTS?"