She Only Wants Mom

Happy Holidays Everyone!

With Chanukah and Christmas over, we have the New Year celebration and then.... back to regular life.  Everyone can start counting down to Spring Break.  I thought when I finished school that I would be done living from holiday to holiday, but it has continued on for me and pretty much everyone else, I think.

I had a most lovely Christmas despite the illness that is ravaging my entire family.  I'm hoping that this will be the last post where I bitch about being sick, but I actually have a relevant topic to discuss that pertains to being ill for a change.  I'm moving beyond the complaining.

Two days before Christmas, I crawled out of my car after my last appointment and dragged myself into my house and declared, "I need a doctor."  So off we went to the local urgent care place to see what my deal was.  After four long months, I've finally decided that I cannot wish myself better, talk myself into being "unsick",  deny that I was illin', all of the stuff that I was doing other than woofing down medication.  It was time to give into western medicine.

Turns out I had what looks like a smidgen o' pneumonia.  Imagine that.  It was a wee bit of a shocker when she said, "I think we'll take an X-ray to be sure."  But like a good girl, I am diligently taking my "Antibees, roids and gas" (antibiotics, steriods and inhaler) and I'm feeling much better.  Well, at least I can breathe deeply without choking.  That's still better!

During all of this drama, I discovered a very interesting development in my maternal bond with Allie.  I really kind of needed it because lately I've been feeling a bit left out of the parental situation.  She wants Justin for everything.  He even gets a more emphatic "I love you" than I do.  So, I needed to feel connected.  Here's what I discovered.

When Allie is sick, she wants ME.  Just ME.

So, I'm sure you're saying, "Big effing deal.  Why is that so odd?"

It's odd because of the two parents, Justin is WAY more nurturing than I am when it comes to injury and illness.  I'm not cold hearted and I try to help take care of him when he doesn't feel well, but he blows me out of the water.  The guy should've been a nurse.  Not a doctor.  A nurse, cuz nurses are more warm and fuzzy.

He does the boo-boo voice ("Oh, honey....I'm so sorry!  Can I get you something?  Let me feel your forehead.  You feel warm.  You're sick.  If you need anything, just let me know, okay?"), he checks on me constantly ("Do you need anything yet?  Orange juice? A snack?"), and he is majorly accommodating ("Let me pick you up and carry you to the bathroom.....now don't push.  I'll squeeze you gently until the pee comes out.  You need to rest!")

LOL. I'm just kidding about the last one, so you can put your eyeballs back in the sockets.

Actually, he will run around and do whatever he can for me when I'm sick, even if it's killing him.  He is a natural caretaker.  I was horribly sick on our honeymoon and he took such great care of me.  He went to hell and back to find medicine to help me function.  I remember crying and saying, "I'm so sorry I'm ruining our honeymoon.  You're so good to me.  I could never take care of someone like you take care of me.  I'm sorry I'm not as good at this as you are."

So, with that being said, if you were three and felt sick, who would you run to?

That's why it's a bit surprising to me (and him) that she only wants me.  She will push him away if he tries to fuss over her.  If he tries to help so I can rest, she demands that I help her.  She finds some sort of comfort from being near me that she doesn't get from him.  It totally backs up the nature part of the "Nature vs. Nurture Theory" that you hear about.  Her natural instinct is to want me.  And when I tell people this, they all seem to think it's completely normal.  "Of course she does.  You're her mother."

Well, WHEW!  FINALLY there is something she likes better about me!  SCORE!

To be honest, while I feel bad for Justin when he gets pushed away since I see how hurt he is by it, it feels wonderful to be needed by Allie in a way that no one else will be able to fulfill.  And while it usually annoys me a little to take care of people who are super needy, it doesn't annoy me at all when she is insanely clingy and needy.  On Monday night, her ears hurt (she has the same cold) and the one thing that she wanted was for me to rub the inside of her ear with a Q-Tip (or "ear tip" as she calls them).  She nudged me every five to ten minutes until 430am saying, "Mommy.  Please rub my ear with an ear tip."  And I absolutely didn't mind.

I have a feeling that Allie will be like me and my mom.  When we are sick, we want to be with someone, but we don't want to be bothered by it.  My mother is the only other person besides Allie who never annoys me when she's injured or ill.  She could whine and bitch until the cows come home and it wouldn't make me crazy.  Of course, I"m just guessing because she doesn't do that, so I don't really know if it would be agitating or not.

When I went to the doctor earlier this week, something else unusual occurred.  Allie does NOT care for doctors offices.  We have the most awesome pediatrician and she does nothing but cry from the minute she sees him.  When she goes with Justin to some of his appointments she is miserable there too.  But for some reason, she insisted on coming into the doctor's office with me.  Like, full fledged freaking out in the waiting room, begging me not to leave her kind of insistance!  Now I have no explanation for that one, but I am kind of curious what it was all about.

So, I hope that this is the last entry I make for awhile that says anything about me being under the weather unless I have another momentous discovery.  I would just like to thank all of the moms, young and old, who commiserated with me and offered sympathy.  It really made me feel better to know that this happens to so many other people when their kids go to school.  I was trying to outsmart it and be tough, but the germies were gonna get me no matter what.  That's just how it is.  I concede.

I plan on being back beforehand (I've got a doozie of a topic, but I need to calm down before I can write about it without sounding like a lunatic), but should something happen and I get sidetracked, Happy New Year, everyone!

I saw this on Facebook and thought it was excellent.  Game on!

If you clickity click on the banner below, it will seem like nothing happened, but it did!  You can close the window as soon as it opens if you like.  T'anks peeps!

We're Just Rookies!

I'm sick.  Again.

This will be round number four since September.  Allie is STILL sick since October 4th.  And Justin just sort of floats in and out of sickness as we go (the benefit of being somewhat of a germaphobe.)

I figured out what's going on though.  I really don't give a rat's ass WHAT this cold is about.  What I wanted to know was WHY we keep getting sick.  And I've come to the conclusion that this is like bootcamp for new parents.  It's the minor leagues.  When we get to the Major League (Kindergarten) we will be prepared and invincible!

Maybe not invincible, but we will be dodging bad (germ) pitches left and right!  I'm a rookie in the world of educational sickness.

I'm in complete awe of Allie's teachers.  I have three very good reasons why.

First of all, they are totally impervious to all of the germy bodily fluids that fly around that classroom.  I asked one of them the other day how she manages to not catch a cold, and she said that her immune system is really strong after being subjected to colds for so many years as a teacher.

(Side note: and how STRONG it is!  She recently told me a hilarious story about when a kid sneezed right in her face and her mouth was open.  Instinctively she reached for Purell and wiped her tongue with it without thinking.)

The second reason why I love Allie's teachers is that they tolerate my wacky husband (they actually find him endearing, thank God!), who until recently was staying for the first 15-20 minutes of Allie's 2.5 hour class to make sure she was comfortable with him leaving her there.

There was always some reason.  "She started to cry when I went to leave."  "She begged me to stay."  "She's not feeling well so I wanted to make sure she would be okay before I left."  Complete helicopter parent.

Now you see where the title of my blog came from.  HE is assuming the traditional "mom role" and I'm trying to work out my mom role somewhere on the flip side.

Finally, after talking with the teachers (did I mention that I love them?) about this, I finally had a little chat with him.  "It's been four months.  You need to just go.  Do you see any other parents there for the first fifteen minutes of class?"

"Sometimes I do!  And sometimes there are other parents there, too! You're not there.  You don't know."  Um.....sure.

I could see where this was going.  I had to bring in testimony from an expert witness.  "Well, I talked to Mrs. J (one of the teachers) and she thinks that Allie will be just fine if you drop her off and go.  Remember the first day how they told us that she would stop crying by the time we reached the end of the driveway?"

"They told me that they are fine with me being there!"

"Yes, dear.  That's what they say to your face.  Behind your back they are thinking maybe you should get the hell out of there before I have to pay a second tuition for your forty year old ass."

The truth is that they really don't care.  But they have also told me that they think it would be fine for him to leave far earlier than he does.  I also know that he's sweet and polite and entertaining....and they know that it's really HIM who has a hard time letting go.  Not her.

Now he drops her off, says goodbye and leaves.  He's moving out of Rookie status in the "cut the umbilical cord" department.

The third reason why I love Allie's pre-school teachers is this:

This is what Allie gave us for Christmas.  I started crying as soon as I opened it up.  Her little footprints and toe prints put together in such adorable fashion.  I never expected something so creative!  She also brought home cookies that they baked that day, but as you can imagine they are long gone.  Very tasty though!

As soon as I started crying, Allie started checking me out.  She figured out that it was a happy cry and she got all maternal on me, she hugged me and told me it was going to be okay and that she loved me.  My heart felt like it was the size of Alaska, full of love!

I hope you all are having a wonderful holiday season!

If you clickity click on the banner below, it will seem like nothing happened, but it did!  You can close the window as soon as it opens if you like.  T'anks peeps!

Five Out and Five In

Happy 5000 Blog Views!  Wow!  For something that started as a project for fun, I've been lucky to have so many people interested in "the opinion of little ole me"!  Whether it was 10 people who showed up 500 times or 50 people who showed up 100 times or whatever, this has been a lovely experience and I'm grateful and honored that you have been here.  Thank you.

I hope you all had a magnificent Thanksgiving.  Mine was tremendous.  Thank you for asking.  I am a great lover of the traditional Thanksgiving meal and we celebrated twice over the weekend, so how could it go wrong?  This was the first Thanksgiving in six years that I didn't have to work and got to really enjoy it.   Plus I got to see all of the family I love, on my side and my in-laws.  Four star Thanksgiving for sure!  I'll attach a photo or two at the end.

Allie, the child who has an unusually diverse vocabulary, has thrown some zingers my way.  I say diverse because she can be totally incorrect with her grammar, and she follows it by busting out the four star words that make us go, "How in the hell does she know that?"  Sometimes you will get them both within the same conversation.  One minute she will say, "I seed the pap-ah ova thay-rr" and the next she will say "Would you like to read the instructions as well?"  One minute she's a New Yawker and the next she's little miss proper grammar.

So, in her honor, I'm going to list the five most irritating words/phrases that make me wish the Language Police would come fine people for using them, along with five that I feel should be snuck into Webster's Dictionary.  DON'T CLICK THAT BUTTON!  I know you're rolling your eyes and thinking 'borrrrrrrrrring', but I implore you to just skim through this.  Do it just for shits and giggles!  You might be saying this stuff and don't know it's wrong, therefore, you will learn just like I did from someone else.  I'm only sharing knowledge, not preaching.  We be equals, dawg.

Bad bad words that give me pre-vomit cheek water:

1- IRREGARDLESS :  This sucker is numero uno.  For those of you who think it's not a word, I regret to inform you that it is.  Some jackass in 1912 decided he wanted to sound like a smartypants (more on that one later) and started using it. Here is my argument....Regardless means "in spite of things" or "without care".  And that freaking "IR" they slapped at the means it's going to be the opposite of the rest of the word "REGARDLESS".  So does that mean irregardless means "caring about things; with care"?  Nope.  Oh my gawd, it's too exhausting.  I hate the person who made this word up.

2- COULD CARE LESS: So, you COULD?  Then that means you DO care a bit.  It's "Couldn't care less".  That means that you've reached the bottom of giving a shit.  You totally don't care.  Not even a rat's ass worth of caring.  "COULD" is the opposite of what you really mean, and trust me when I tell you that people hear it and the polite ones are thinking, 'What a moron.  It's couldn't, not could."  Maybe you don't care that people think you're a moron.  Therefore you couldn't care less.  (see how I did that?!)

3- FUNCTIONABILITY:  Not a word.  Not even a little bit.  The person is trying to say functionality, but functionability sounds so much more impressive, doesn't it?  Not if you know it's not a word!

4- JOHN DOE OR MYSELF:  When I worked at a large company, I saw the big cheeses doing this all of the time.  I sent them all an email saying "It's not: Please see John or myself.  It is: Please see John or me."  Not one person changed.  They think adding "myself" sounds so fancy.  Trying to sound fancy is actually making them look like a jackass.  If you aren't sure what to use, follow this rule that my Mom taught me: "Take the other person out of the sentence and see what sounds right."  So, does "Please see myself" sound better than "Please see me"?  Nay nay.

5- IRONY IS NOT COINCIDENCE - The other day I heard someone say, "It started pouring and ironically I had grabbed my umbrella this morning without knowing it was going to rain!"  Oh, heavy sigh.  IRONY is the opposite of COINCIDENCE.  I'm not going to lecture on this one.  Look it up.  I will summarize it with this: IRONY: "The irony of it is that I grabbed all of our rain coats umbrellas this morning thinking we were getting rain and it ended up being a perfectly sunny day."  COINCIDENCE: "I grabbed my umbrella without thinking this morning and coincidentally it began to pour the second I got out of my car."

Five words/phrases that don't receive proper recognition:

1- WACKADOODLE - I have no idea when I started using this term, but it perfectly summarizes a vast number of people I know.  People who are totally out of their minds, yet harmless, are wackadoodles.  I'm sure many of you are reading this and thinking "Hello, pot?  This is the kettle....you're black!"

2- KAJUNGOUS or HUGEANTIC - When ginormous made it into the dictionary a few years ago, everyone and their cousin emailed me.  Why?  Because I used it all  of the time and people made fun of me.  Well, surprise, surprise!  Those peeps at Merriam-Webster beg to differ!  They find it useful.  Pllbth!  Kajungous was a favorite from high school, but Hugeantic (hugely gigantic) really is interchangeable with Ginormous (gigantically enormous).  They just don't know it yet.

3- AGREEANCE - it just flows better than "agreement".  And it does have an air of smartypantsness. It's in the dictionary, but the dictionary peeps are a bunch of snobs who put it in there under duress and discourage the usage.

4- CLUSTERF*CK - I know I'm pushing it with this one.  But who hasn't been in the middle of a project that has gone seriously wrong?  And if you're pissed about the disaster, this one works well.  I often wonder if Obama got into the White House, evaluated the situation in the Middle East and looked at his constituents and said, "Well, isn't this just one big giant clusterfuck??!!"

5- ________PANTS - My grand finale.  My personal favorite.  Einstein was a smartypants.  When Allie gives me the "nnnnnnnnnno!" answer to my requests, she's a freshypants.  I was sick on and off for three months, so I was sickypants.  The bitch who cut me off at the gas station and gave me the finger this morning was a nastypants.  She was a snottypants too.  Love it.

Feel free to add your own personal favorites in the comments!

By the way, my site will have it's own Facebook page as of this week.  https://www.facebook.com/flipsidemom  I'm not sure how well this all will work, but if you would like to "like" it, I'd love it.

In the meantime, here are a few photos from the past few days:

"Just give me one more minute and I'll have this thing working.  And YES, the backscratcher is a necessary tool for this repair!"

"Hello.  My name is Allie.  I'll be your server this evening.  What can I get you?"

"This restaurant stinks.  I'm overworked and underpaid. I can't even read my own handwriting anymore."  

4pm on November 28th....Allie finally gets over her 3 YEAR shyness with her Uncle and sees that he's damn awesome. (Fortunately they play together better than he and I did when we were her age!)

If you clickity click on the banner below, it will seem like nothing happened, but it did!  You can close the window as soon as it opens if you like.  T'anks peeps!

A Weight Loss Milestone.....whew!

I finally have hit the "25 pound" milestone.  It certainly took awhile.  And it was effing brutal at times.

I will never see those numbers ever again.  They are ugly, mean numbers.  Right now, I am creeping up on a number that I haven't seen since high school.  When I get there I think I'll just ease up and linger there for a little bit.

However, Operation Fattypants is not complete.  There will be future assaults on the fat that hasn't left! I think that the lingering a bit at a certain weight will help.  The fat cells will let their guard down.  Then I can sneak attack the sonsabitches just when they think it's over!

Anyway, someone asked me last week about the most helpful thing I did for myself that isn't being sold on every a diet plan.  That was a stumper.  I had to think about it for a bit.

Then I remembered a letter I wrote.  I wrote it to myself back in July.  My desperate, old self was writing to my encouraged, new self.  I highly recommend this to anyone before they embark on trying "one more time" to get in shape, especially if you've tried a gazillion times like I have.  

It was hard to start, but then I thought, "I need to speak to myself as if I was talking to someone I love and care about."  So, I imagined that the person I was writing to was just that.... someone I love a lot.  Unfortunately, I didn't envision my current self because, well, I didn't love myself much back then as you will soon see.

I carried the letter with me and took it out when Peanut M&Ms, amongst other things, were calling my name.  (Those M&Ms are noisy little bastards.....especially during PMS)  At times when I didn't have it with me, I still heard me reminding myself of this pep talk.  I needed me to kick my ass from time to time and I did.

I'm actually going share the letter here.  I kind of flip flopped on whether I should do this at all, but what the hell!  A few days ago I was giving you my State Of The Breasts rant, so this isn't any more personal than that.

Maybe.

Dear Vicki,

I'm writing a letter to you in the future but when you read this, it will be written  in the past.    I sit here looking into the future with hope, and also with fear of failure.  I keep hoping that the person I become (you, right now) will have the strength to continue through when things get tough.....because I know they will. 

You will feel lonely or angry or sad or resentful and all of these thing will make you want to eat something that isnt part of the plan right now.  You will think of your comfort foods (donuts, everything little debbie, peanut m&ms, pancakes, etc) and something inside of you will say "If I can eat this, I will feel better.  And its just ONE time.  I'll go back to eating right later today."

Here's the thing.  That food will make you feel numb for a little bit.  But then you will feel anxious and depressed.  You will feel like you let yourself down and your body will feel like its growing fat cells as you sit there.  You will be tired, lazy, grumpy, etc.  And you will feel unattractive to yourself and others.

Please dont do it.  I'm begging you not to.  Give us a chance.  Let us have a shot at being thinner and feeling good physically.  Give it one seriously good try!!!!  Please????  I dont want to be like this anymore.  

You are my only hope, so Im writing to you to try to convince you that you can get thru this without that food.  That annoying cliche' is really true.  Nothing tastes as good as thin feels.  Nothing.  That bite of candy or cake feels good for 10 minutes.  Feeling fit feels good ALL DAY.  From when you wake up until when you go to sleep.

You don't want your daughter to have a fat mother.  Not even a chubby mom.  You want her to see your example and strive for that.  You will be able to keep up with her and do things you cant do now with her.  Do it now, for the future, while there is still time to do this type of thing.  As she gets older, you need to be more physically fit to keep up.  Don't get left behind.  

People start getting sick around your age.  Heart problems, cancers, etc.  Losing weight will help prevent this.  Just like quitting smoking helped reduce the chance of lung cancer (and doesn't that feel good to not have to worry strongly about that?) losing weight will help reduce a bunch of other things.

Right now, I look in the mirror and Im disgusted.  Gross.  I see fat rolls on my stomach.  I see cellulite on my thighs.  I see fat hanging over my bra.  My arms are slabs of meat.  I am a fat person.  Look at the photo from the july 4th fireworks.  You look enormous.  

Who is that person????  That's not who I think I am in my head.  Why because Im so disconnected from my body.  My mind still thinks Im a size 8 or something.  And Im a 14 going on 16 in reality.

I feel unattractive and don't want to even be hugged  by my husband.  He is being neglected because I am fat.  How awful to be that way over something you have the power to change!   He will leave you eventually if you keep this up.  Not because I'm fat, but because he feels unloved by someone who pushes him away due to embarrassment.  You CAN change that.

Dont give up!

Does the food taste bad?  Do whatever it takes to get it down.  Its not forever.  Just a few weeks!  You've eaten worse.

Are you bored with the food?  Its just food.  And you are trying to get rid of the importance of food.  If you keep at it, you wont care about how boring it is.

DId you cheat already?  Well, move on.  Do something to make up for it.  Extra exercise.  Eat less later.  Whatever.  Just fix the problem and get back on track.  I am counting on you.

Go have some water.  Take a walk.  Write.  Read something enjoyable like a kindle book or a funny blog.  Move around.  Do something else besides giving up.  I know you can do it.  You survived a whole mess of way worse things.  You will totally get thru this too!  And when we reach the other side, its going to feel great.  And we will have each other to thank for it.

I love you.

Yourself

Potty Training and Droopy Boobs

Happy Hump Day, people!

Thanksgiving is just 8 days away and Christmas is..... well, it's coming soon.  I don't want to even check the number because it just completely freaks me out that Christmas is coming and I haven't shopped.  I'm still in the brainstorming phase.  There is a list and there are plans, but there's no money, so we are going to put in a little more time brainstorming.

To those of you who are done holiday shopping, I have two things to say.....
#1 - I am sincerely impressed and jealous of your ability to plan, execute and complete a yearly task that, for most people, evokes the desire to get hammered instead.
#2 - Also, f**k you.  I say that with love.

On to other things....

About a year ago we started the potty training process.  Again, we were in the brainstorming phase.  (We seem to spend an inordinate amount of time doing that.)  Potties were purchased, research was done, books were brought home for Allie, pull up diapers were bought, stuff was happening.  I spoke with parents and got advice and took notes.

One thing that I kept hearing and reading was, "She will do it when she's ready."  But did I believe that?  Nooooo.

After all, I was hearing stories about parents who were able to potty train their kids in a week or a weekend or even overnight.  These kids just caught right on and did it.   Poised and precise pee-ers and poopers.

But many of them were doing it because they couldn't send their kids to preschool unless they were out of diapers or they were just tired of changing diapers and felt their kids were ready.  I was really sympathetic to the first group, since a lot of people don't have a choice.  They need to send their kids to school and have no choice but to give a crash course in potty protocol.

Allie was intrigued by the whole process, but she wasn't committed to this new way of life.  If you've been reading this blog, you've seen how seriously she has been taking this so far.  (See It's My Potty And I'll Try If I Want To )  That potty seat spent more time on her head than under her tushy.  It was both entertaining and discouraging.

However, through it all, I kept going back to that one statement. "She will do it when she's ready."

And she did!

Yeeeee haw!!!

Mind you, she hasn't quite mastered it yet, but she's super close.

Out of nowhere she started telling us she was going to use the bathroom.  She even began asking for "Privacy please" as she shut the door in our faces.  Every day she spent more and more time in her "big girl underpants".  I don't know what motivated her, but I'm not going to question it.  I don't want to jinx it again.  We were thisclose to being potty trained in May and she totally regressed, so I know first hand that anything can happen!

I'm so proud of her.  I never thought I could be so thrilled about someone using a toilet, but I am.  There's practically a parade going through my house every time it happens.

Before I go, I have to get something else off my chest.  (Pun totally intended.)

My boobs are falling.

Yes, you read that right.  And I hate to be a downer bringing this up, but I need support right now (again, pun intended).

I know this has been a work in progress for a few years now, but it only really hit me today.  And I'm shocked, to be honest.   I thought I was cheating the system.

WRONGO.

As a teenager, I slept with a bra on because I never wanted droopy boobs.  As an adult, I spent a fortune on bras.  The past few years, I've bought top of the line sports bras to wear while I'm working.  And what do I get in return?  Floppy breasts.  Gee, thanks.

The moral of this story?  You can't beat nature.  The aging process stops for no one.  Not even Joan Rivers or Lara Flynn Boyle.  They THINK they are winning, but we all see how damn scary they actually look while trying to look "young".  Wrinkle free does not mean ageless, peeps!

If you are young and have big breasts, your boobies will be sagging too one day.  So enjoy them while you can.  And start saving for quality lingerie.  Because you're going to need it if you want to make it look like they're still perky at 40.  Or you can get "breast augmentation surgery".  Either way, start saving your dollars.

Enjoy the second half of your week, friends!

If you clickity click on the banner below, it will seem like nothing happened, but it did!  You can close the window as soon as it opens if you like.  T'anks peeps!