Why Moms Are So Awesome

Have you ever offered to pick someone’s boogers?  Have you ever caught someone’s puke in your bare hands on purpose?  Have you ever wiped someone’s butt for them?    If so, you are either a very devoted nurse, or a mother.

While I was away on vacation (I use the term loosely) recently, I had an experience that not only made me realize how amazing moms are but also proved to me just how much I love my kids.  I know that we moms often say that we would do ANYTHING for our kids.  Well, we ain’t kidding. 

I don’t even know where to begin.  I guess I could blame it on the fog.  Anyone would go a little bit crazy after spending an entire week living inside a cloud – I felt like a damn Care Bear.  My hair totally lost its mind, that’s for sure – if you are a Friends fan, picture Monica’s hair when she went to Barbados– then double it.  Anyway, a day finally arrived where you could see more than two feet in front of you, so after being cooped up all week I decided to take the kids to the park. 

If I had not been so stir crazy I might have seen the warning signs that this trip was not going to go smoothly.  Before we left Prince was dancing around like he was auditioning for the Party Rock Anthem video while constantly grabbing at his nether regions.  Despite evidence to the contrary, I am not completely stupid, so I did make sure that he went potty before we left.  But when not much came of it, I put his antsyness down to the fact we had been stuck inside so long and set off to the park anyway. 

If you are a mom, you probably already know where I am going with this.  After the 20 minute walk to the park, the second I get Simba out of the stroller, Prince pipes up with “I have to go POOP!”  Now, this is a park in the middle of a subdivision.  There are no gas stations, stores or restaurants in the vicinity.  My only options are to let him crap in his pants or discretely take him into the patch of trees that would be a stretch to call woods.  Needless to say, I went for option B. 

Luckily Bridget was with us so I did not have to take Simba off-roading in the stroller.  I simply took Prince by the hand and prayed that I could find somewhere with enough coverage that the other parents at the park wouldn’t know that I was letting my kid use the park as his own private potty.  I managed to find a little path that led down to a stream that ran through the park, and there was just enough of a bank there to hide us from view. 

I have to say Prince was really great about the whole thing.  By the ‘whole thing’ I mean the fact that I squatted down and held him in a cradle-like position while he crapped on the ground and sprayed me with the pee that sometimes leaks out when doing #2.  He also was very good about letting me wipe his ass with leaves from a nearby plant that I hope wasn’t poison ivy, and he didn’t repeat any of the swear words that I hollered when I stepped in his fresh poop on my way to get the aforementioned leaves.  Oh shit is right.

I never thought I would miss the days when my kids were in diapers, but then again I never thought I would voluntarily wipe someone’s poopy ass with leaves, which by the way, doesn’t really work and just results in dirty fingers and bits of foliage stuck in your arse.  So after I washed my dirty fingers (and shoe) in the stream and made my way back to the park as if nothing had happened, I had my own Oprah-style “ah-ha” moment.  I realized that under no circumstances would I ever do what I had just done for anyone else in the world except my kids.  Not for my husband, my parents, and probably not even for myself.  Just for my kids.  So yes, Moms are amazing, because we love our kids to a degree that some may consider unsanitary.

All joking aside, I hope that I always love my kids the way I do now.  Because right now, it wouldn’t matter what they did for a living, who they loved, or how much trouble they get into – I would always be there for them.  Right now it is really hard to imagine how anyone could hate their kids just for making decisions that they didn’t approve of.  Yes, you have to teach and sometimes discipline your kids, but no matter how mad I get I will always be there for them.  Even if that means wiping their butts with leaves when they’re 30.   

-Wendy