The Mom World: Where Insanity is the Norm

Somewhere on the journey of motherhood, insanity becomes the norm.

You come to a point when you realize that things are so rarely as (it seems) they “should” be, that you begin to embrace things simply as they are. And at that point, very little your children do or say will phase you. It is, after all, your new “normal.” You start expecting the . . . un- expected . . . if that’s possible.

Whenever it’s quiet while I’m making lunch, I start to wonder.

So I turn to my 2-1/2 year-old son, who is playing ever-so-nicely by himself in the living room. “Where’s Mara?” I asked.

“She’s upstairs,” he says, without even looking up. “She’s tied to the changing table.” As if that were the most normal thing in the world.

Maybe that should have worried me. But I’m a mom. This is MY normal.–Your kids say things like that, don’t they?

Besides, I don’t hear any screaming. How bad can it really be?

I am curious though.

Going upstairs, I find my daughter. And yes–she’s tied to the changing table. She was wearing her Lowe’s Home Improvement apron we got at one of those Kids’ Project Days, and Micah apparently had used the strings in the back to tie her to the changing table. It was some sort of Peter Pan scenario, involving pirates, of which Micah was one.

I had to untie her, so she could come down for lunch.

Later (same) daughter calls to me, in the most endearingly chipper tone, “Mommmmee! I have a sur-PRISE for you!–It’s in the potty!”

I pause. Not sure if I want to know.

Then I take a deep breath and ask, “Is it . . . poop?”

“YES!” she exclaims, as if I’ve just given the winning Jeopardy question.

“Yes!”

I’m a mom.

Welcome to my world.