More Reader Suggestions: Fun With Bodily Excretions

Elizabeth over at Parenting Pink Blog suggested that I talk about poop because it's ALWAYS funny. I tend to disagree that it is 100% always funny, since I have run into some rather unpleasant experiences involving poop, however, I do agree that MOST of the time, it's funny after the fact. As parents, many of us have run across these particular situations, and there is a phenomenon I would like to explore here that encompasses our gradual desensitization to things of a disgusting nature with or without the involvement of bodily fluids/excretions.

10 years ago, I didn't mind changing diapers or having a baby spit up on me. But now, after seven years of parenting, my tolerance for the grody and revolting has skyrocketed to the point that sometimes it is mildly disturbing. Who would ever have thought that I would think nothing of picking up a nugget of poop that has rolled out of a diaper onto the floor and sinking a two pointer with it into the trash can--

SWOOSH--

--And then being proud of myself for making the shot, not completely sickened that I just PICKED UP POOP with my hand. I mean, yeah, I'll wash my hand and everything, but there's no need for the HAZ MAT suit. It's just baby poop, right?

When my stepson was almost 2 years old, he decided it was a good idea to redecorate his room. With paint? No. Markers? No. You guessed it, he artistically covered his entire room (and himself) in sticky, disgusting POO.

This was my first truly vulgar experience as a parent and all I can remember was stepping into his room to get him from his nap, the smell wafting to my nose and then the scene before me registering sickeningly in my brain. POOP EVERYWHERE.

Yes, people, I cried. Literal tears. Like. A. Baby.

I had no idea what to do in such a situation. Do I tend to the baby slathered head to toe in fecal matter or first attack the new brown decor of the room? Could I do this without throwing up and how exactly did I accomplish this without getting any on myself or anywhere else in the house?

Needless to say, an hour later, I was still crying as I scrubbed the poop out of the carpet and off the walls while the baby sat in an empty bathtub, naked as a jaybird, completely pleased with how much of a reaction he had gotten from his young, inexperienced stepmother.

It almost made me run screaming from the apartment to never return.

But I stayed. And I experienced a plethora of even more repugnant events and excretions, so that by the time I had my daughter five years later, I could deal with all kinds of bodily fluids without so much as a cringe.

For example, do YOU know what to do when your kid's nose is running and you don't have a tissue? Why, you have two perfectly good hands, why not use those? Yes, my friends, you wipe those boogers with your hand and then use a good hand sanitizer to kill the germs. That's why God gave us hands, you know. Moms have to be resourceful and use whatever's "handy."

And now I can't even imagine the amount of poop that has been on my person in the past few years, and I don't blink an eye. Poop on my hands, under my fingernails, and even an unfortunate incident in which it ended up in my hair. Big deal. I have had worse things in my hair, if you know what I mean...

Finally, we come to the dreaded of all the bodily fluids, the mother of excretions and I think you know what I am talking about. Yes--BARF. My least favorite thing in the WHOLE world. Literally. Like, my personal hell would be vomiting in a cave full of vomit. I have a PHOBIA people. I am not even kidding.

BUT...

when it comes to my daughter, my flesh and blood, I will cup my hands under her mouth to catch the puke coming out to avoid it splashing on her clothes.

UN-FUCKING-BELIEVABLE.

That is how much I love my daughter and how programmed I have become to managing her bodily fluids and excretions. I won't even think twice. I am the commander of the poop, the master of the vomit, the goddess of boogers.

I handle it all, and most of the time, it does not phase me one bit.

So if you have learned one thing from this whole repellent diatribe, it is this:

If you ever meet me in person--you might not want to shake my hand.

Just sayin.