Is More Really Merrier? (AKA: Should we have a third child?)

“Should I have a third?”

My answer is always the same, “It depends; it is a game changer.”  I don’t regret a single minute of my world with SH3 in it—not one single minute.   She is by far my worst sleeper.  She wakes up early and yells at her sister until she wakes up too.  She strips her diaper off, clogs the toilet and poops on the floor.  She pushes a chair to the counter and in a bin of 100 washable pens finds the Sharpie and hides to ruin furniture, walls, and clothes in peace.  She eats dirt, play-dough, beads, anything really.  I have nightmares of her eating a button battery and my sleep deprived mind invents the unbelievably horrific sequelae that will ensue (honest truth—multiple nightmares).   We have to tell ourselves, BH1 and I, not to let her, SH1, or SH2 over hear us call her “trouble” or “the destroyer of fun” under our breath because that is likely not good for any child’s psyche.

Yes that is Desitin...head to toe purple tube Desitin

She gets to keep her pacifier far longer than we ever thought of letting the other two have one.  We tried potty training for a week and gave up until “she is ready”.   I have been known to look away when I see her hit her sibling in hopes that they won’t tattle and I won’t have to punish her.   Time out for her is mere seconds and certainly not the requisite two minutes her siblings would have sat.  She doesn’t have to sit in the high chair or wear a bib although she is the messiest eater.  We watch what she wants on TV because her cries for “Peep and The Big Wide World” are loudest.  She has this ridiculous ugly stuffed rabbit with plastic scratched off eyes that is lovingly called “Babbit” and we all take to searching the ends of the earth to find it when it goes missing.   Some part of me wants to say that she has clearly taken the fight out of me, but maybe that is good.  Maybe she took the fight out of me for all the fights that don’t need to be had.  I may be close to admitting that my two year old has taught me to pick my battles.

All Because Two People Fell In Love (and Wrote A Letter Together)

Every year since BH1 and I were married we have written a Christmas letter.  Honestly, the first few years before kids when I was in residency the content was a little sparse.  Yes, yes I know it is seemingly generic and ridiculous.  I too have gotten the letters extolling the virtues of "perfect" children wherein Johnny is playing 6 sports at a college level even though he is in the fifth grade and Susie is a straight A student with her heart set on Julliard at the age of 12.  Our letter is not that letter.  Sure we get a chance to brag about our kids (who wouldn't?), but ultimately it is our year in review.  Our chance to look back on the year, good and bad and reflect on all the (mis)adventures we had and how we grew spiritually, emotionally, and physically.   

Our "perfect" kids
Photo credit: Ben W Photographic

Hurry Up and Slow Down

Yes, my kids are in that super hilarious (*sarcasm*) phase in which "potty words" are really funny.  They are funny to drop at the dinner table, to substitute in Frozen song lyrics in the car ("Let it gooo, Let it gooo, the poopy never bothered me anyway"), to whisper loudly in an ear, to shout as you jump off the jungle gym, and everywhere in between.  Our canned line has been, "Potty words belong in the bathroom", and as expected they are wise to this and now upon entering the bathroom in any capacity they will sing song potty words the entire livelong day.  They are smart; they get it.  Poopy is funny.  What is not funny is that SH2 still has several pee accidents a day and now SH3 wants to start using the "big girl potty."

As minions, we are in this together

I Hiked 65,843 Steps and All I Got Was This Bible Verse

I hiked 65,843 steps in one day.  I never would have imagined that hiking all those steps was going to be one of the easier challenges I would face these past few weeks.

Yes, I climbed all the way up this and then a lot more.

Moving Heaven and Earth

I had previously mentioned wanting to move my parents closer to us so that we could help them more; help them enjoy the things they love about life.  We moved them.  It was a very long week (okay more like a month) of packing, de-cluttering, organizing, and stressing.

The day of “The Move” was long, hot and hard.  It takes a village and in this case it took approximately 15 people 14+ hours, but in the end they slept on clean sheets in a made bed in an unpacked house eight blissful minutes away from us.

They live close (like come-for-dinner-and-go-home-let’s-not-make-a-night-of-it close) and we recently had them over for dinner to celebrate escrow finally closing on the sale of their old home.  The kids and I made chocolate cake with white icing which is their favorite.  My mom helped with SH1’s homework and instructed me on how to re-wash the couch cushion covers.  My dad tirelessly played hide and seek with SH2 and SH3.  I made dinner and answered pages, accepted patients from other hospitals, and talked to residents via phone while my husband mowed the lawn.  It was all very pedestrian, perfectly pedestrian.

The same private waterfall we took a photo at 10 years ago
The only thing changed about it was us

It takes a village to raise 3 small humans, it take a village to get homework done with SH1 when SH2 and SH3 want to play and dinner has to get on the table but your physician wife doesn’t get home until 6:11pm and she has had a very long day too.  It takes a village to downsize 66 years of life into a 2 bedroom town home.  It takes a village to feed/shuttle/love/bathe 3 kids so my husband and I can go on a once in a lifetime 10 year anniversary vacation to Maui WITHOUT small humans.

We brought SH2 a coconut purse (because she is a “collector”) from Hawaii and she has not put it down.  

"This is my coconut purse, my Mom and Dad
brought it back for me from Huhwhyi.
Do you want to see what is inside?" 

She tells every.single.person she sees about where it is from and how she became the proud owner of such a treasure.  The coconut purse is breaking already; the lining is coming away from the coconut.  I know nothing will replace this coconut purse and I have decided to take a “come what may” approach to its eventual demise.  SH2 is growing up; they all are.  SH3 sleeps in a big girl bed and shares a room with her sister and SH1 has a bunk bed in a room of his own.  The nursery furniture was carted away by a sweet couple who are excited to start a new chapter in their lives. 

I am so glad that this all came at once, the move, the big girl bed, the vacation, the Ikea 100000 piece bunk bed, and the reconnection with the man I love.  If not, I would have cried on the floor of the empty nursery laying in the spot where SH3 ground Desitin into the carpet and wondered what was next.  

Two days before we sold this furniture I spent no less than 4 hours 
attempting to get Desitin out of the carpet/ottoman.

The smile on her face...grrrrrr

My village supports me.  My God sustains me.

For the first time in my life, “come what may” is not welcoming the other shoe to drop, but ushering in a new chapter wherein things are a little easier and I smile more.  I am in a really good place right now and I thought you should know.

Perfection in so many ways

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The Day A Bear Ate My Bones

I get the following text from my husband (and father of our children) on a casual Thursday mid-morning.  I envision my husband pulling a too small chair up next to SH2 who is coloring.  For the sake expediency we will call him Big Human 1 (BH1) and she looks something like this.  Her eyes may or may not be open while coloring.

BH1: May I join you?

SH2: Sure 

BH1: Do you come here often?

SH2: Yes, with my sister.  But not my mommy.

BH1: Why not your mom?

SH2: She's dead

BH1: That is so sad.  What happened?

SH2: She went out to milk the cow, but it wasn't a cow.  It was a bear and it ate her bones and her body

BH1: I am so sorry to hear that

SH2: It's okay I'm drawing her a picture.  She's getting fixed up.

Admittedly, I was shocked to learn that a bear ate my bones and I was dead.  I think every mom's first reaction is one of self deprecation, "Oh great now my 3 year old is killing me in her kooky daydreams."  Until I realized exactly where this crazy kid picked up these notions.  I have been reading some Laura Ingalls Wilder books to the kids at night mixed in the Magic Tree House series when they grow weary of Ma and Pa Ingalls.  Two weeks ago this is the page we read.  

A case of mistaken identity
Little House in the Big Woods by Laura Ingalls Wilder
Illustrations by Garth Williams

We had read about Ma going out to milk the cow in the dark and giving the cow Sukey a little smack on the booty to get her to move away from the gate only to realize it was a bear.  In SH2's version, however, I did not meet with as quite a fortunate fate as the book characters who all survived including the cow tucked safely in the barn.  I am still not sure why she killed me off in her version but regardless this is living proof that she is likely an auditory learner and can remember things with amazingly good accuracy like her BH1.  Well that and you should never smack a bear on the ass or it will eat your bones.    

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Never Say No To Long Hugs or Brushing Teeth

My husband has been encouraging me lately to write something about work. 

No matter how hard I try, my musings always start out about work but always end with small humans, which as you can assume is very much like my everyday life.  This post is no exception.  

Contrary to what it looks like here, I do work.  I work full time in fact as a hospitalist at a teaching hospital and I love my job.  I find it hard to sort out what exactly I can write about without talking about interactions with patients or trainees which is illegal.  I recently worked 21 days in row and that was hard...really hard on me but even more so on my family.  I swore not to do that again and from that self-made promise comes this post.

It sucks to come home exhausted but try and turn it on for your kids who are dancing and shouting with delight when you walk in the door.  I struggle to be thrilled and grateful for that greeting, but honestly sometimes I cannot muster the strength.
I get tired too.
I get tired of being touched.
What a weird thing to be tired of right? 

Can I please be tired of something more normal?  Something that does not make me feel like the coldest most heartless mom ever? 

Group Hug

I was tired of nursing a baby or pumping every 2-6 hours around the clock for 14 months and was guiltily relieved to give it up and take back ownership of my chest (or as SH3 points to them and says "Tummy?" and then points to her belly button.  I continue to work on not being insulted).  I get tired of listening to lungs and hearts with a stethoscope so short that I can smell what the patient ate for lunch yesterday, tired of picking up bandages to see what horrors lie beneath, tired of hugging someone and telling them they have cancer, tired of introducing myself and shaking hands, tired of vulnerability, fear, despair, hope, pain, and healing, tired of touching.  I often wonder if I leave a little bit of what I was saving for my kids and husband behind with every patient, nurse, colleague that I see and at the end of the day I am all used up.  

You see I am not a "hugger", my love languages are "Quality Time" and "Receiving Gifts" (The 5 Love Languages by Gary Chapman).  Touching is something I have to do with conscious effort. My son and husband's love language is "Physical Touch".  They are cuddlers and sit-close-to-me-breath-the-same-air type people.  So what is my deal?  I am not grossed out by much of anything, so I can safely say that is not it.  As a kid, I was loved and cuddled a lot, another dead end.  I wonder what is it about me that keeps me from rejoicing that these snuggly warm bodies want to be close.  

I recently did a book study at my church of 1000 Gifts: A Dare to Live Fully Right Where You Are by Ann Voskamp and on the first meeting I admitted to a table of women that I find it very easy to rationalize the uncomfortable or unfitting parts of who I am with seemingly plausible excuses about why I can't or don't have to do something.   

I have been touched all day long; Mommy just needs a minute to herself

I don’t have the energy to play/cuddle with you; I am so emotionally and physically exhausted from all the human suffering I saw today. (OK so maybe I wouldn’t use those exact words with a 3 year old.)

I am talking to Daddy, can I have a second? 

I have icky work clothes on; let me go change before you show me what disaster you have created.

Why are you all wet?!  Where are the couch cushions?!

I want to change how I treat the love they all so freely give.  

Loving is not a chore, it is a pleasure.  Touching is not a hardship, it is a gift.  Cuddling is not a nuisance, it is life giving. 

Stay with me here.  We recently made a rule in my house that we are not allowed to say "no" to anyone wanting to brush their teeth.  (Yes we had to make it a rule because brushing the teeth of 3 kids under 6 is NEVER convenient, NEVER quick, NEVER easy, and ALWAYS a mess, but it needs to be done and the kids love it.)  I was focused on the inconvenience of it for me and not thinking of them and how I should want to foster a love of good oral hygiene.  At this point it is all good genetics and lazy dumb luck that no small human has a cavity.  (That and I feel bad about my kids hearing me lie to the dentist about flossing their teeth. "Sometimes we only floss three times per week"  AKA: never).

Tragedy averted

No more excuses.  It is not about me at all.  It is about what those around me need.  They are not asking to smear blue toothpaste on the counter and spray spit on the mirror, they are hoping I will just reach out to them. 

Yes.  Just Yes
Image credit: Rants from Mommyland

I am grateful for arms to hold them, breath to squeeze out, hair to rumple, an ear to whisper love notes into, and a heart that always has enough room for one more touch.  I am grateful for the chance to emulate that stupid sticky blue toothpaste that glues itself on to every surface it encounters.  Today I will be more like that toothpaste I hate.  I will glom on to them and appreciate the joy it brings to my small humans.  

Let us be grateful to people who make us happy, they are the charming gardeners who make our souls blossom. 
--Marcel Proust


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