Some days are ordinary.
Some days are extraordinarily ordinary.
And then there are days where you find yourself wondering if someone is secretly filming your family for a reality show.
Today was one of those days.
And the day started at 6:00 AM.
My 5-year-old, who has autism, apparently woke up feeling like the entire neighborhood needed to be informed of some very important information.
Very loudly.
“I HAVE TO GO PEE AND MY PENIS IS HUGE!”
Good morning to you too, buddy. 😂
Nothing says start your day refreshed and peacefully quite like your child making a 6 AM anatomical announcement for the entire neighborhood.
And this was before I had even finished my first cup of coffee.
Which, as we all know, means I was operating at approximately 14% of my normal parenting capacity.
Then came the 10-year-old.
Getting him out of bed became a negotiation.
Then came the announcement that he had decided he simply did not care if he received a zero in gym because he was wearing his damn Crocs.
Apparently, Crocs were worth the academic consequences.
And honestly?
At that point, I didn’t even have the energy to argue.
It was still early.
I hadn’t had enough coffee.
And we had bigger battles ahead.
Like car line.
Because of course we did.
We arrived at school, and my 5-year-old decided that getting out of the car was absolutely, positively, categorically NOT happening.
He planted his 50-pound body directly into the center of the car like he was preparing for battle.
And he was committed.
I tried reasoning.
I tried encouraging.
I tried bribery.
I tried every trick in the parenting playbook while approximately 50 cars sat behind me wondering what the hell was taking so long.
Meanwhile, my child was fighting with every ounce of his strength to remain inside that vehicle.
Eventually, we reached the point where I was pushing him out of the car while two teachers were pulling him out.
There are few things quite as humbling as realizing you have become the main attraction in the morning school drop-off line.
I’m sure the parents behind me were thrilled.
😂
And somehow…
I still had the whole day ahead of me.
At school, the almost-8-month-old apparently decided that afternoon naps are no longer part of his lifestyle.
Excuse me, sir?
I call bullshit.
Because while he may have decided that he has outgrown the afternoon nap, his behavior at bedtime suggested otherwise.
He was an absolute disaster.
Forty-five-plus minutes of fighting me to go to sleep.
Forty-five.
Minutes.
Sir.
You needed the nap.
Mom was right.
Again.
Then, because apparently the universe wasn’t quite finished with me yet, we headed home tonight.
My 2-year-old was happily eating an apple in the car.
Until she placed said apple into the cup holder on her car seat.
And then discovered…
she couldn’t get it out.
Could she?
No.
Of course not.
And naturally, this was not a minor inconvenience.
This was an EMERGENCY.
She screamed for the entire 25-minute ride home like she was experiencing some sort of catastrophic life event.
And I’m driving, listening to this child scream, thinking:
Oh my God. Something must really be wrong.
Nope.
Her apple was stuck.
🍎
That’s it.
That was the emergency.
And honestly?
I can’t make this shit up.
This is my life.
This is motherhood.
This is raising four kids, navigating autism, surviving school drop-offs, negotiating with a 10-year-old about Crocs, arguing with an almost-8-month-old who apparently believes sleep is optional, and listening to a toddler mourn the loss of an apple like we’ve just suffered a national tragedy.
There are days when I look around and think:
What the actual hell is happening?
And then I laugh.
Because underneath all the chaos, there are these tiny moments that somehow become the stories I’ll remember forever.
The 6 AM penis announcement.
The Crocs.
The car-line wrestling match.
The nap rebellion.
The apple crisis.
It’s loud.
It’s messy.
It’s exhausting.
It’s completely ridiculous.
And somehow…
It’s ours.
Welcome to another day in our extraordinarily ordinary life.
Leave a Reply