We Got Worms!- My Messy Beautiful

"Pinworms?!?" I asked, totally skeptical.

"Yeah, pinworms. My mom and I saw a program on TV about them. Apparently, an itchy heiny is one of the symptoms," said my friend, Sarah.

I'd been complaining to her about waking up five times that night by my 3.5 year old, who had an itchy heiny, and my 18 month old who had an upset stomach. 

I immediately googled "pinworms in children" and uttered a low, guttural "uuhhhmyyyygaaawwwd...."

I read to Sarah, "Umm... according to webmd... Most people get pinworms by swallowing the worms' eggs. This happens when someone with pinworms scratches around the anus, gets eggs on his or her hands (or under the fingernails), and touches you or a surface that you later touch."

"EWWW!" she screamed.

"Oh, it gets worse--When eggs get on your hands or food and then you eat, the eggs go into your mouth. And they move into your stomach and then to your rectal area. So Henry ATE pinworm eggs? Oh, no, Sarah. OOOOOOhhh nooooooo."

"What?!?" she asked.

"'THE EGGS TURN INTO WORMS IN ABOUT A MONTH! A PINWORM CRAWLS OUT OF THE BODY AT NIGHT AND LAYS EGGS ON THE SKIN AROUND THE ANUS. THE WIGGLING MOTION IS WHEN THE WORM LAYS EGGS, WHICH MAY IRRITATE THE SKIN AND CAUSE ITCHING!!!"

Needless to say, we both screamed, and I hung up to call the pediatrician, but not before texting my Monkee friend, Hollis, an emergency text:

Then, I did what any mom would do. I got in the shower and cried. And I scrubbed myself harder than that time in college when a frat guy threw me in a mud pit filled with mud, beer, vomit, and God knows what else (I don't want to talk about it). 

It was straight out of The Crying Game. Or Ace Ventura: Pet Detective, whichever one you're more familiar.

I wish I could say that this is where the story ends. Henry got worms, we got the medicine-- WAHOO! My messy beautiful! 

False. False, my friend. You should sit down. 

The next day, I took my two viral cesspools to the doctor. First up was Palmer. Palmer had been waking up for the past two nights with icky poopy diapers. Like, seeping out the diaper, all over the sheets blowouts. It was like something out of a crime scene, only instead of blood, there was poop everywhere.

The doctor took one look at him and diagnosed norovirus. According to the CDC,  "you can become infected with norovirus by accidentally getting stool or vomit from infected people in your mouth." 

Are you seeing a pattern here? Because I am...

Next up was Henry. She examined his heiny and gasped at how red it was. (Let the record show, that this is not the first time I've surprised the pediatrician, and it's bound not to be the last).

"Now this, I'm not sure about" she said in her Polish accent, which is not what you want to hear from a pediatrician, fancy accent or not. "We'd better test for pinworms and strep."

SKkkkkkkkkkkkkrt. 

"Excuse me? Strep?" I asked.

"Yes, strep" she said as if I'd just asked her who the cutest New Kids on the Block member is. (I mean, Joey, obviously.)

"I don't...I mean...how do you...?"

"It's strep. Just not in the throat" she replied. "We're going to have to test for both. The lab will let you know in a couple of days what the results are." She handed me a clear plastic tube with a sticky spatula inside it. "The nurse will explain how to harvest the eggs"

I'm not kidding you, people, my jaw dropped. Tears formed in my eyes. The nurse's mouth was moving, but all I heard was 

"At night [Charlie Brown's teacher's voice]
 Flashlight [plane landing]
Spatula on the anus [pin drop]"

I mean... what. just. happened? Norovirus? Strep butt? HARVESTING PINWORMS?

I swear I'm going to reel this story in here in just a minute, but first Ryan and I decided the soundtrack for this portion of our life would best be depicted with "We Only Come Out at Night" by Smashing Pumpkins playing in the background, so if you would be so kind.

Since I had no idea what I was supposed to do with the sticky spatula thingy, I gizoogled it rather than googled it because I felt like if anything could lighten the mood, a little gizoogle could.  According to gizoogle, I needed to:

• Big up tha instructions given wit tha slide. Collect tha sample at night afta yo' lil pimp has been asleep fo' a minute or first thang up in tha mornin when yo' lil pimp wakes up. This is when tha pinworms is most active.
• Don't bathe yo' lil pimp tha night you collect tha sample.
• Take tha slide ta tha lab. Yo crazy-ass childz doctorz crib will call you wit tha thangs up in dis biatch.

SO, I figured that's why I needed the flashlight. I googled pinworm images to know what I was looking for and--STOP. Stop. Don't google it. Trust me. You don't want to see this. I am never going to look at orzo pasta the same. 

Anyways, I'm not going to go into too much detail on what happened next, but let's just say that it involved splitting my oldest son's cheeks apart whilst holding a flashlight in my mouth and pressing a sticky wand on his heiny. 

And here's the kicker. I did it all for nothing because SURPRISE!!! Henry had strep butt the whole time, not pinworms. Joke's on you, mom!

I'm not going to lie, I was NOT going to participate in this because I couldn't see the beautiful in this mess, but fast forward to Palm Sunday. 

Ryan and I finally got ourselves to church since our children had exorcised their respective demons. We were enjoying a quiet moment for once (because you KNOW our kids were in the nursery) and my pastor said something that struck me. He said our hour of glory was when Christ was on the cross dying for our sins because of what came after his death. Without the death, there could have been no resurrection. 

It made me realize, that if my life were not messy, I wouldn't see the beautiful. If my kids were healthy all of the time, I wouldn't appreciate their health. I have friends whose children are diagnosed with severe illnesses. Hollis's own nephew just had major surgery and can't walk for months. And here I am kvetching about my kids when some of my friends are desperately trying to have them. Reading some of the Messy Beautiful stories about childless mothers is enough to make me want to shut the front door.

We are all entitled to have moments when we just can't take it anymore, but the more experienced I get at life, the more I realize that it's the moments that bring us to our knees (like digging for pinworms) that make us appreciate the moments that make us jump for joy all the more. It's because of the mess that we can appreciate the beautiful.

But I'm still getting a maid.

This essay and I are part of the Messy, Beautiful Warrior Project — To learn more and join us, CLICK HERE! And to learn about the New York Times Bestselling Memoir Carry On Warrior: The Power of Embracing Your Messy, Beautiful Life, just released in paperback, CLICK HERE!

Shits and Giggles

Last night our friends, Hollis and Ricky, came over for dinner. They come over on a pretty regular basis since they live so close and we all have a mutual dependency on Ryan’s cooking. While he was grilling out back with Ricky, I let Henry loose on the deck since he loves to be outside at any given chance even if it means running away. I told Ryan not to let him run in the yard since neither of us has cleaned up after George since before Palmer was born. 

While Ryan and Ricky were grilling, Hollis was contributing the side dishes and I was contributing empty beer bottles. As 7:30 approached, I knew it was time to start getting Henry to bed. I went out back and said, “Henry! Are you ready for bed?” and he replied, “Yes, Mommy! I’m beat! Let’s go now!” Psych. He ran into the corner of our yard and screamed, “NOOOOO!” So I said, “Ok, five more minutes!”

It was then I noticed the string of grass trailing from his shoes and remembered that our backyard is a minefield. And it’s tiny. So your chances of stepping in dog shit are… hold on… I’m not very good at math… 100%. Henry had undoubtedly stepped in crap and I was the brainiac who put Crocs on him. I asked Ryan if he'd picked up any of the poop out back and he said, "Umm, some of it." Which meant none of it.

After the requisite warning period was up, I went out to ask Henry to come inside. Knowing that he wouldn’t go softly into the dark night, I poised myself for a face off. I would have to go into the minefield and catch him, like he was some kind of greased pig or something. 

After some maneuvering, I caught the little sucker and carried him whilst he was kicking and screaming, flinging shit off his Crocs along the way. Once I pried his shoes off, I saw in horror as he had shit caked in underneath his toenails.

I screamed and picked Henry up and Hollis hurried to help me scrub his feet in the sink. As Hollis scraped poop from underneath Henry’s toenails—

This is why we are friends

--We both noticed that the smell of dog shit was not going away. I started screaming again because I realized he’d sat in a pile of poop and it was now on my arm. Ryan and Ricky came in to see what was going on, and Ryan, ever the helpful one, was quick to shout out helpful directions like, “Dry his feet off!” Because that’s what I’m worried about when I have dog shit up my arm.

I yanked Henry out of the sink, undid his belt and pulled his pants and underwear down in one fell swoop. And that’s when I saw it. Poop Soup. There was at least a half pound of runny poop in his underwear. It was a cauldron of frothy feces. It was not only in his underwear but had seeped up and over into his jeans.

At this point everyone is screaming and I am covered in George and Henry’s shit. I started screaming, “Oh my GOD! What do I do?!?” Because what do you do? Really, what do you do? I grabbed the poop soup underwear with one hand and with a pinky on the other hand grabbed a plastic bag and threw them to Ricky. Meanwhile, Ryan and Hollis have sprung into action and are hosing Henry’s butt down with the sink faucet. I resisted the urge to ask them to close the blinds to the window over the sink because, well, there was shit everywhere and George was circling like a shark waiting for its next meal.  

It took us about an hour to all get cleaned up, get Henry to bed, and finally sit down to eat. Dinner was delicious, albeit a bit cold and overcooked, but nothing a few beers didn't take care of. 


So how am I enjoying this beautiful spring weather today? Picking up poop out back. Ain't that some shit.*

*Oh, c'mon! I had to throw at least one poop joke in here!

Carry On, Warrior!

Six months ago, right after our sons were born, my friend, Hollis, introduced me to her childhood friend's blog, momastery (pronounced like monastery). It was the perfect blend of humor, mothering, compassion, and Jesus. I loved her perspective and became a Monkee. I love everything about Glennon and I have adopted her as a distant mentor mom. (I learned about mentor moms from my other distant mentor mom, Rachel Campos-Duffy. I highly recommend her book for all you SAHMs out there).

Now I never watch TV in the morning because mornings are so crazy up in this piece, but this morning, Glennon was on to promote her book! I had to endure watching Chris Brown, but it was worth it because she was so awesome! Check her out here.

Her book comes out tomorrow and she's going to be at the Books-A-Million in McLean tomorrow! How freaking awesome is that? Stayed tuned for some pics!

That Time Henry Ran Away

In case you've never heard of the term the Arsenic Hour, let me explain it to you. It's the time of day when moms (or dads!) are trying to get dinner on and the kids are on their worst behavior. It's a recipe for disaster, which is why I never go into Arsenic Hour without an adult beverage, especially because Arsenic Hour is not an hour in my house. It starts at 4 p.m. and ends when the boys are in bed. 

Yesterday, was like any other Arsenic Hour. The TV was on. Henry and George were on the lookout for Daddy to come home and both went ape shit when he did walk in the door. (Let the record show that I receive no such fanfare when I return home). I was feeding Palmer. Music was playing. Dinner was cooking. But the balance between order and chaos is always precarious in my house as evidenced by my tale. 

Enter Hollis.

Hollis dropped by to pick up a few things, so we were talking in the kitchen. It's important to note that when Hollis and I talk, it can take hours to have a single conversation. Mostly because we should both probably be on some kind of attention deficit drug, but also because we both have kids and it's impossible to have a conversation uninterrupted. The ADD just makes it more fun because it can take us weeks to finish a single story. We were right in the middle of our third unfinished story when Ryan came downstairs and asked, "Where's Henry?"

I immediately called for George because the two are inseparable. Henry likes to think it's because they are best friends, but it's actually because he's like freaking Hansel and leaves a trail of crumbs, and now feces, wherever he goes. 

When Henry didn't answer and George didn't appear, Ryan immediately flew into Nervous Nelly mode and ran out the door. I, always the calm one, went upstairs to check and see if he was playing hide and seek, but Hollis shouted, "Oh, he's definitely outside!"

I ran out the door and, sure enough, our neighbor Amanda had George and Henry. Apparently, when Amanda was walking her dog, Doc, George burst out the storm door to play and Henry followed. 

What's great about this is that Ryan's reaction was, "Oh! Henry! You had us so worried!" and kissed his forehead. All the while, Henry was smiling at me guiltily. 

So if you ask Ryan what happened, he'll tell you that George burst out the door and Henry followed to stop him. If you ask me, I will tell you the truth. Henry saw George break out and followed suit, probably screaming, "Hey! Wait up, Dude!"

Wait up, Man!