Did Today Really Just Happen?

So I wrote this like two months ago and forgot to post it. Deal.


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OCD Nightmare #1: Visiting My Doctor. I had an appointment to go talk to my doctor about where things stand with my mood meds. I stopped seeing my psychiatrist ages ago, because (1) he was kind of a doucher and (2) I found out miles too late that he wasn't an in-network provider (O HAI SEE YA $600), so I just thought I'd see my regular MD, since we were really only dealing with medication here, not talk-therapy. But that means I have to go sit at a regular doctor's office amongst all the sick people for a minimum of 25 minutes before I'm seen, because they're always late, and my pits get sweaty, and my blood pressure rises steeply, both from the long wait (which pisses me off immensely) and from being around ill people. So I had the pleasure of doing that today, seeing my general practitioner for a followup appointment. She was on-call today, too, so she was extra late and THEN had to take an emergent phone call halfway through our session, so I sat there, BP at a good 180/100, certain I was actively in the process of catching a cold as I sat there waiting.

OCD Nightmare #2: The Prescription. After explaining to my doctor that nothing we've tried so far has even touched my OCD (and I'm on a laundry list of meds 8 mile long), I burst into tears and confessed that I feared nothing would ever work. My doctor said, "Well, it depends on how far you're willing to go." I asked her what she meant, and she actually--this actually happened--she actually said, "There's electroshock therapy." I was like,

She said, "It sounds medieval, but for stubborn mental or psychological issues, it can really work."

Hang on. I need a glass of wine.

OK.

So I was like, "Motherfucking electroshock therapy. R u srs." She was srs. She was dead srs. I was all, "Does it...hurt?" She kind of explained how it worked and I was like, "Um...can I just have some motherfucking Buspar instead?"

She prescribed the motherfucking Buspar.

OCD Nightmare #3: We Take the Kids to Their Doctor. Both tots needed shots today: Naomi needed her second flu shot and her first pneumococcal shot (we delay and stagger vaccines, but we do vaccinate), and Maya needed Hep A #2 and Hep B #2 (we're waaaay behind on those, oops). So we had the joy of waiting around in the pediatrician's office, where I think my blood pressure was by now 200/120 from waiting so long, steam by now roiling from my ears.

And I was in panic mode, since Maya had her hands all over everything--the handles of the chairs, the table, the fish tank. And Naomi kept wanting to touch my purse, and I was like,

NOT THE PURSE!!!

We waited forever, and finally we got called in to the actual doctor's office where we could wait some more. But at least they had Purell, so we could use some of that, which lowered my BP to a fine fine 170/90, I'm sure. Finally the medical assistant came in, the kids got their shots, which they took like pros and neither one  cried, and we were done. Thank God. Then, when I was putting the baby in her carseat, I bumped her head on the roof of the car and she burst into sobs. FML.

OCD Nightmare #4: Dinner. Then, the plan was, we were going to go eat at Applebees (I know, we party like rockstars up in here), but we pulled up and (1) saw how crowded the parking lot was, (B) realized it was 5:30 on a weekend night, and (iii) my anxiety inexplicably and immediately went through the roof, so instead we went next door and got some food poisoning Subway instead. Much better.

We go home and eat our food poisoning Subway and try to get Maya to eat some soup, but she is basically doing this at the dinner table:

I can only assume it's from the vaccines. She's doing weird shit like dipping her fingers in her soup and zoning out, which isn't normal for her. So after trying to get her to eat for an hour, we give up. We're calling it bedtime, 2-1/2 hours ahead of schedule.

OCD Nightmare #5: Poop. On a Hot Tin Butt. So, if you recall, Maya suffers terribly from constipation. It's truly terrible--it's gotten so much worse, and she holds in her poop so long that when she does go, it's truly like beholding the site of an assacre. Blood, shit, bloody shit, the whole nine.

So all day long we've been trying to get her to poop, since she hasn't in days. She's been farting like King Fart of Shit Mountain. She's been bent over, knock-kneed, waddling, hand between her buttcheeks, yet claiming she doesn't have to poop. We've been sitting her on the chamberpot every 30 minutes, telling her to JUST FUCKING POOP. It's like potty training all over again. But still she insisted she didn't have to go.

So then about 20 minutes following our fine fine Subway dinner and her two-sips-of-soup supper, she's waddling around again, knees together, butt sticking out, and if I know anything I know there's a duke in there the size of Manhattan. I take her to the potty and lo and befuckinghold, her draws are full of shit. Liquishit. She has sharted at least a half-pint into her favorite green unniepannies, and it has soaked through them onto the pajamas I had put her in. FML SO HARD.

She is hysterical. I am trying not to be, but come on, SHIT IN PANTS. I peel off her jammies and throw her underwear into the garbage. I did not think she could get more hysterical than she already was. I did not think there was a pitch higher than her voice had already reached. I was wrong. When I threw away her underwear, she went ballistic.

"BUT MOM! THOSE ARE MY NEW UNNIEPANNIES!!"

"No, those are your old ones."

"NO THEY ARE MY BRAND-NEW ONES! MOM!!!"

"No, they're your old ones, and they're getting too small anyway."

"THEY'RE NEW AND I WANT THEM! DON'T THROW THEM AWAY! DON'T THROW THEM AWAY!!!"

"The new ones I just bought you are purple and aqua, remember? These are green. These are old. These are too small. And anyway, you shat them. They cannot be saved. They are sullied beyond repair. No one can help these unniepannies now."

"MOM!! MOM! MOYYY-OMMMMM! PLEASE! PLEEEEASE! DON'T THROW THEM AWAY! MOM! PLEASE! NOOOOO!!"

"Maya. I am throwing these underwears out. They have been pooped in and I will not wash them. Not today, not tomorrow, not in this lifetime. You better be glad I am not throwing out the pajamas too, but luckily I grew up broke as a joke in a single-parent family and it had a negative effect on my hoarding tendencies and can't bring myself to toss out a perfectly good jammy. But these underwears are goners."

"BUT MOY-OMMM!! I WANT THEM! PUH LEEEEASE!!! DON'T THROW AWAAY MY UNNIEEPANNNIEEEWSSASSADLKFJSSFJSKDASHJFS:A:JASA;SLKFLL;SKFLSA;!!@@#215%&!"

Ad infinitum. Here she is shrieking, positively shrieking, so loud that I am certain the neighbors knew she had sharted her draws.

The OCD in me wants to just put her outside. Just, you know, just put my child outside, forever. Just not deal with it. Just put her in the garbage with the soiled unniepannies. Just not even deal. Because my kid has shit on her buns. Shit. On her buns.

But I have to deal. So I wipe her down. And if she wasn't falling asleep at the wheel, a full shower would have been in order, but we'll just do that tofuckingmorrow. Today was full of enough shit.

At least there was no semi-automatic ass-spray this time.

Weekend Update

Thanksgiving was nice. We skipped the usual plan (going to my aunt & uncle's house with all the extended family) because they had been sick recently, and we spent the day with my brother and his wife, and my mom and grandma, instead. I'm so glad we did, because everyone who attended Thanksgiving at my aunt's house came down with a terrible stomach flu. Yaaaay turkey and vomit. SO glad we missed that one. But it makes me crazy how that side of the family is ALWAYS sick on holidays and other get-togethers.

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So I've started seeing another psychiatrist. You may recall that my first endeavor didn't go so well--at first I liked him, but then he started rubbing me the wrong way, and when he blamed me for going "quite a long time over our time limit" when in reality his previous client had actually gone 30 minutes too long and he and I were only 5 minutes past the hour, I started questioning my relationship with him. Pus, he wasn't covered by insurance. Oops, forgot to check that one. So I stopped seeing him and just started seeing my regular family practitioner, since all we were doing was managing meds, not having talk-therapy. Finally, this became a little too much for my regular doc, and she cried uncle, and nothing was working even though I was on like 8 different meds, so I started seeing a different in-network psychiatrist. So far so good, even though we're only two sessions in.

He's a slight-framed Indian lad who I'll call Dr. P.

Dr. P has a subtle willowy barely-there lisp, but it makes him all the more endearing. It makes him sound gentle. Our first session was good--he asked about a zillion questions, some of which were incredibly hard to answer (have you ever had suicidal thoughts, have you ever harmed yourself, etc.). But I think it went well. Today, our session was a little tougher, as he doesn't specialize in "cognitive behavior therapy" (CBD) related to my OCD, so besides the usual "how're yer meds doin" chat, we couldn't talk about that much. But it was still good. He is changing up my meds, adding this, subtracting this, and he really wants me to see a therapist specializing in CBD/OCD.

Anyway, I'll be seeing him for awhile, and since you, my fans, are all hanging on to my every word I say, I will let you know if his cocktail of meds works. So far, the one I've been on for months & months now has had exactly NO effect whatsoever. And I'm on some hardcore shit. Again, my body betrays me. Nothing works on me like it does for the typical person. (Hence my SEVEN OR EIGHT MILLIGRAM DOSE (that's 7-8 tablets, kids) OF KLONOPIN, which still amounted to nothing, and a blood test confirmed that it's barely even in my system.) Sigh.

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11/28/11: I've got to confess, I'm sitting here having an actual cocktail, not just a medicinal cocktail, even though I'm on SSRIs 'n "DO NOT MIX WITH ALCOHOL"s 'n shit, because that's just how I roll. Danger is my middle name. Or Al Coholic. Whatever. I'm drinking it from my one and only martini glass, which always makes me happy. Wouldn't this glass make you happy?

And as I typed this, sitting here sipping my Sidecar, my 4-year-old came over and demanded a taste. When she asks for a taste of my wine, I dip a pinkie finger in it and let her lick it off (yay for defying hygiene!), so I did the same with my Sidecar. I said, "It probably tastes a little strong for you, Love," at which point she declared, "I LOVE SIDECARS!!" and wanted another pinkie-taste. MOTHER OF THE FUCKING YEAR OVER HYAR.

Can I get a what what!

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Continued 11/29/11: I had to take Naomi to the doctor today. You know it's bad when I resort to that, since the pediatrician's office is what my nightmares are made of. I sit there in the doctor's office and pray to the Patron Saint of Rugrats that none of the other kids breathe in our direction. Anyway, we were there because the "simple" cold we all caught hit Naomi so hard (hit us hard too, but it affected the baby the worst). We were at the pediatrician's office a couple weeks ago too. This cold has lasted for four weeks as of tomorrow, and it went from a wretchedly bad cough and horrific congestion to a sinus infection and now, from today's diagnosis, a double ear infection. My poor baby. And she's always in such a good mood, even when she has to be miserable. Her whole head must hurt, and she's still coughing all the time and super snotty and phlegmy. This is exactly why I feared her getting sick. This cold didn't teach me "ahh, colds aren't that bad," it reinforced how scary they can be, having to worry constantly about her breathing during the night, etc. So now if anything I'm even more scared of the common cold. This has been a horrible month, and she still has a long way to go. Probably another couple weeks until she's better. So this "cold" and all its complications will have lasted SIX WEEKS. That is hell on a baby and her parents. So sad. So miserable.

Anyway, that's all I got for you. I've been losing my blogging mojo lately. Boo!

Monday Musings.

Do you ever think about the things you touch on the restaurant table, like the salt & pepper or the ketchup bottle or *choke* *retch* the menu, and how many people before you have touched them with God knows what on their hands?

If you never thought about this stuff before, after reading this article, I bet you will.

PS: I like how that person claims to not be a germaphobe. I beg to differ. :) Sounds an awful lot like me when I go to a restaurant...

I Like Candy and All, but I Think There's a Clear Winner Here.

So it was my husband's and my 6th wedding anniversary a couple weeks ago. My mom posted this on Facebook for me, asking which gift I'd prefer, traditional or modern.

I damn near shat my pants.

My mother. She knows me too well. And yes, she shares my sick, sick sense of humor.

Hope you guys had a happy Kthxbyegiving and whatnot. xoxo.

Cherry, Bubblegum, or Varicella Flavor?

PHOENIX (KPHO) -
Doctors and medical experts are concerned about a new trend taking place on Facebook. Parents are trading live viruses through the mail in order to infect their children.


My BFF Mandi recently brought this to my attention. People are sending viral infections in the mail. Viral Infections. In the Mail. Motherfucking viruses in the USPS motherfucking mail. Varicella (chickenpox), to be specific. Some people are actually attempting this for measles, mumps, and rubella. Why, God, why? We have vaccinations against these, people! Vaccinations!!

It's like, "here's your 2011 newsy newsletter, the kids are all right, here's what we've done the past year, little Janie is off to school, oh, and here's a snotwad lozenge of rubella. No big."

They are mailing tainted lollipops, wet rags, and clothing, all covered with saliva and the like, whereupon you let your child suck away to his heart's content on a herpes-zoster pop (MMM) or perhaps scrub a nice wet rag covered with mump and pox debris all about your previous poor poor mump- and pox-free person.

My horror is so great I can't even.

Now, I'm sure a lot of you have heard of chickenpox parties, where one kid has chickenpox and mothers choose to get their kids together with the sickie to expose their chidren young so that they get their kids catch the virus and get it over and done with as children, when it's less likely to be dangerous. (The virus can be pretty vile if you catch it as an adult.) There are wildly mixed feelings on this, but it's a pretty old-fashioned idea, especially now that there's a vaccine. Although I confess, this partic'alar one was the hardest decision I made as a vaccinating mother.

Now, the vaccine of course is imperfect. Not only can there be (very very rare) complications like it as with any vaccine, but it doesn't guarantee your child will never catch chickenpox. It just drastically cuts down on any severe case or horrible, life-threatening reaction. Dr. Swanson says "We’re giving the shot to prevent the serious, life-threatening complications that can come along with the virus, such as a brain infection or flesh-eating bacteria in the sores."

Mmm. Flesh eating bacteria all because of a simple childhood illness.

Warning. Warning. Click at your leisure, if you have a strong stomach.

I confess, this was the most difficult vaccine for me to come to terms with. I do understand both sides of the equation here. We personally stagger vaccines and delay them, some by weeks or months (MMR), some by years (like Hep and and B), although we DO vaccinate. I was all about the Pertussis vaccine, for example. Whooping cough scares the living shit out of me. The only vaccine we semi-purposely, semi-accidentally we skipped altogether was Rotavirus, because (1) getting a case of the trots didn't seem like a big deal or worth taking any potential vaccine risk; and (2) we accidentally waited too long and Maya couldn't get it anyway (they're supposed to get it before six months old I think, oops). (She still hasn't caught it by age four, I'll have you know.) But we thought long and hard before getting the varicella vaccine, and finally conceded. I mean, who wants their kid to get a raging case of chickenpox?

I had a terribly bad case as a tiny two-year-old kid. My mom said I was in agony and would just sit there and shake and quake and writhe and sob, itching so desperately but not knowing what to do with myself because I was too young to know how to scratch. Any chance I have to reduce the chances of my child going through that, I'll take. And if she didn't get lifelong immunity and needs a booster in 10 years? Who the fuck cares? If that's the main problems with the varicella shot, that (1) it's not a 100% guarantee and (2) you'll need boosters, wowee, big whoop. And some people say that it sets you up for being prone to getting shingles later in life. I'll have you know what I had about the worst natural case of the pox I could possiblty have and only a few months ago, I broke out in the dreaded shingles. So you never know. It's all kind of a crapshoot, but I erred of the side of protecting my kidlets.

I REPEAT: I don't even want my kids licking "clean" saliva off a lollipop. what has this world come to?

Anyway, I digress.

It's totally up to you whether you want to get the vaccination or not. I understand both sides. But you might want to skip the tainted-lollipop 2001 Chickenpox Internet Party approach. Just a word of advice you might want to heed: "It is a federal offense to mail infectious agents in the mail." A FEDERAL OFFENSE, people.

So keep your germ-lollies to your self. Criminy. It's on par with sending Anthrax through the mail. Would you ever do that? I didn't think do. So listen. I don't even want my child to suck on your pristine disease-FREE saliva-covered sucker, not to mention your sucker covered in a viral infection. So please keep your herpes zoster and your rubella to your DAMN selves, thxusovmuch.

Fun Friendly Phobic Fact Friday!

The Five-Second Rule Revisited.

A study in the April 2007 Journal of Applied Microbiology found that salmonella could survive up to 28 days on a dry surface and be transferred “almost immediately on contact.”

Throw that shit away when you drop it! Or else don't get salmonella and other nasties on your floors. Whichever.

And Now to Answer Your Burning, Burning Questions!

chesea asks:

1. Is there anything about your OCD that you'd miss if you woke up tomorrow and were suddenly cured?

Well, not if I were cured of my actual FEAR of getting sick. But if I were cured of my "germ awareness," I'd miss that, because I happen to think it's actually a really good thing to be as aware of germs as I am. That's part of why my disorder is going to be so hard to "cure"--simply because I think that it's right and good to be so aware an conscious of germs. I know germs ARE on the things I think they're on, and I think it's best to avoid them if possible, or wash after coming into contact with them. So to answer your question, hell no I wouldn't miss the terror at hearing someone cough 8 mile away, and the absolute panic with which I'm bestricken when I come to pick my child up from preschool and I hear one of her little friends let out a huge sneeze, I'm but I would miss being aware of certain germs so that I could avoid them and be as clean and healthy as possible. If I were TOTALLY cured of this, I would probably get sick more often with both colds, tummy bugs, and who the hell knows what else. Hope that makes sense.

2. Can you feel ANY effect from those medications? Are they helping at all?

Honest to God, no. Not with regard to the OCD/anxiety aspect, at all. I'm taking some meds to help with irritability/atypical depression, and I do notice a difference there. (Finally, I don't want to smack my oldest child into next week All The Time. I kid, I kid. Just kidding, I kid about kidding. OK I kid about that too. OK FINE I'm HALF KIDDING ABOUT EVERYTHING YOU JUST READ.) So the meds are working with my OMGRAGE issues, but not even remotely with my OMGOCD issues. I feel absolutely no relief with my anxiety, and that's after taking everything under the sun for it. Hard-core shit, like Klonopin, Xanax, Buspar, etc.

3. How do you feel about natural cleaners (like vinegar instead of bleach)?

Well, I'm undecided. I take that back. I'm not into it so much. I mean, if you're cleaning something the baby's gonna lick, I wouldn't use Lysol wipes. Although I would probably use Clorox "Anywhere Spray," which insists it's safe to use in the immediate proximity of food and children. (It's a super, super mild bleach mixture, basically, and bleach in certain dilute concentrations is extremely safe. Which is why I luuurve my some bleach. Harsh enough to kill shit, gentle enough to swim in and drink.) I always hear what a good disinfectant natural cleansers are, and I suppose vinegar is fairly harsh and kills certain things, but it's not murderous enough for me. For things like cleaning windows? Sure. But if my kid had another one of her poosplosions of semi-automatic ass spray, I wouldn't feel confident cleaning her "drawing weasel" with vinegar. It would be Lysol wipes, then Lysol spray, and some bleach thrown around here and there, all the way, baby.

4. Did you worry about using a lot of harsh cleansers while you were pregnant?

I definitely did worry. I used rubber gloves all the time, every time I cleaned with Clorox or Lysol wipes or Comet scrub, and I was worried about the amount of hand sani I used. (I was like, is the amount of alcohol-based hand sani soaking into my system to the point where I'm using the equivalent of taking a shot?) So I worried, but not enough to stop using it. ;) I didn't really use anything with fumes much, or if I did, I would spray it, hold my breath, turn on the fan, close the door, and run, run away.

5. Do you prefer original scent Purell or the green "with aloe" Purell? :)

Original all the way. In fact, I hate those stupid hand sanis with lotion added too. They don't feel astringent enough for me. I don't want to feel moisturized, I want to feel dry and tight and crisp and alcoholed. It's a mental thing. Although as far as scent alone goes, I like Germ-X the best. Smells delish. Well, so do Bath & Body Works hand sanis. But yeah, no added moisturizers for me. It makes me feel dirty and gross.

6. Do you use ketchup/mustard packets when you're at a restaurant? Or do you disinfect them first?

I never really encounter those so much. Just regular bottles of ketchup and mustard sitting on the restaurant table. Oh well, I guess you're right, those packets do some with burgers at McDonalds. Yeah, if I do use packets, I'd def hand sani afterward. Packets of Splenda or sugar are bad enough. Those feel dirty to me too. And I guess I do encounter packets of hot sauce (fire sauce, specifically, because I'm a fire sauce kind of girl) when we go to Taco Bell--I use those and either Clorox-wipe them first, or use them them I hand-sani or wash. Usually because it's the cashier, not the food handler, who adds those to my bag of food, and That's Just Gross.

7. Cloth napkins at restaurants - stressful?

NOT UNTIL YOU MENTIONED IT GODDDD. But yeah, not especially. I suppose they should unnerve someone like me, but...I guess I deal all right with them. Lord I hope they use bleach though. Or color-safe bleach, whatevz. Probably they don't, but it's another one of those things I desperately don't want to give much thought to, lest I develop yet another "issue." Funny enough, I have far, far more of a problem with rolled up PAPER napkins, the kind they roll your silverware in and then secure with a rolly sticky paper thingy. Those, I feel, are super gross, from the napkin itself to the silverware they've diddled and doddled with. Because there's no way they wash their hands first. Ugh. They roll up our silverware at the restaurant we go to every week for trivia night, and I feel like those napkins and that silverware is just foul. I DON'T WANT ROLLED-UP SILVERWARE. DON'T TOUCH MY NAPKIN.

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Excellent questions, ches. Feel free to ask more in our next installment, or any time you wish. :) xoxo.

Janice, the Not So Special Mother, asks:


1. What about people who want to shake hands? Do you go all Doc Holiday and say "Forgive me if I don't shake hands" or just suffer and wash up after? 

Oh God, how I hate, hate, hate shaking hands. Hate it with the fiery fires of hell. I will do it, though. I'm not ballsy enough to be all Howie Mandel and be like, "How about a fist bump instead?" I shake hands, but then my hand literally feels hot with the burning burning germs until I have the opportunity to wash at my earliest convenience, and I don't touch my face or mouth or food or child or anything with my right hand until I can wash. So yeah, I just suffer and wash up later. Maybe after I rise to internet fame and fortune, I will be able to pull a "forgive me if I don't shake hands, dahhling," but for now I just have to deal with it. But it's awful.

2. Also, how about touch screens in public? ATM's or order screens or whatever? Those are totally disgusting.

You are completely right. They are gross. Although everything you touch in person is gross. Pay phones, doorknobs, menus, ATM buttons (touchscreens or not), handrails, everything. But with touchscreens, I use my knuckles. I don't know why it feels safer to me, but it does. I knock the buttons super fast and hard with my knuckles instead of pressing them all juicylike with my fingertips. And yes, I use massive quantities of hand sani afterward, and then go home and wash. ;)

Thank you Janice! Good ones!

mommamaynard asks:



1. Did you nurse your babies? Did you have to sanitize your breast before latching your baby on? How did you handle nursing in public? I would think that nursing would actually make it easier to handle germs then with bottle, were bacteria creeps in every nook and cranny.

I did nurse my babies. Because I had terrible terrible nursing issues and never produced enough, I ended up exclusively pumping and supplementing, so I only ever nursed in public a few times, and that was with Maya, my firstborn. I nursed at the mall once, and then at a family holiday party another time. I would wash my hands first (like I did any time I nursed or, more accurately, attempted to nurse) and just take her somewhere private or through a blanket over my chest and nurse. Yes, nursing was somewhat easier than putting together a bottle of formula and worrying that the parts are touching a dirty table or something. Although exclusively pumping made everything hell on earth, having to plan around pumping sessions or even bring my pump with me, then worrying about storing the milk, etc. Basically, there was nothing easy about feeding my babies, ever. Argh.


2. How did you manage potty training with your oldest daughter? Did she have any poo accidents you had to deal with? (My friend had to throw her daughter's panties out when she pooed her pants at Boston Pizza, she WAS NOT carrying those filthy things around with her.)

Potty training went very smoothly and easily. Maya was potty-trained within a week. We just stayed at home, kept her naked from the waist down, and had her sit on the potty every 20 minute or something. It all went very easily. Cleaning her little Bjorn potty has been a super gross-out factor to me. I mentioned that here. But, yes, she has had accidents, even *shudder* poopy ones. There was the epic, epic diarrhea all over creation accident, which I documented, and there have been a couple other times when she has pooped in her panties, one time so bad I threw those things away, causing massive outrage on Maya's part. But I was NOT washing those or dealing with them. She has constipation issues and lets things go waaaay too long, so accidents are becoming more frequent now, and I kind of don't know what to do. :/

The one part of potty training that SUCKS is that she uses public restrooms. When we're at a restaurant and she has to use one, I use like 800 toilet seat covers staggered all over the whole damn toilet, tell her 799 times "Don't touch ANYTHING," and have a mild panic attack.


adelerium asks:


1. Do you worry about MRSA? That is the kind of stuff I worry about most for me and my kids, more than random colds or just the grossness of what other people have touched. 

I do worry about it, although not nearly as much as I worry about colds, flu, and other sickness. I'm not sure why. I know it's odd that I'd be more worried about my baby coming down with a cold than a flesh-eating antibiotic-resistant infection, but it's true. The one exception to this is that my husband has a recurring infection in his leg (he has some kind of weird pocket or crypt under the flesh there that just gets repeatedly infected), and I worry my ass off that he's going to get MRSA in it. As it is, he's gotten ridiculously bad infections in his leg before, and they've had to treat it with like three different extremely strong antibiotics and lance it and drain it and pack it full of iodine-soaked packing strips, etc. Wow, way more than you wanted to know. But to answer your question, yes, it is then that I worry terribly about MRSA. But if my kids get a scratch or a skinned knee, no, I don't panic. But if someone coughs in my general direction? PANIC CITY.

Thea over at The Lint Trap asks:


Once your baby is no longer a baby do you think your OCD will improve since a lot of it seems to stem from worry over her getting sick?

I think so, to some extent. Part of my fear is just that she's so little, so young, and doesn't know how to deal with getting sick. She can't clear her nose or throat very well. It's scary and dangerous. I worry about Maya when she gets a cold, but it's nothing like the worry I feel for the baby. I think that will simmer down as the baby gets older. But I don't see myself changing my habits (both normal and very extreme) as she grows, unless I've found effective treatment and I no longer obsess or compulse. Still, I look forward to the day when my little one catching colds isn't such a terrible fear for me.

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Thanks, Thea. Thanks in fact to all y'alls for participating in the 1st Annual Ask Me Shit Convention. xoxoxoxo!

Are You There, God? It's Me, Jo.

Now while I'm a big believer in God, and I feel His work must be perfect and holy and righteous and all that nonsense, I can't help but sometimes think, "You know what, Pal? I could have planned this shit a hell of a lot better than You. No offense, Jesus."

Let's think this through for a second.

SEX. 

For example. First and foremost, the nasty. As I've heard it so crudely explained, who runs a sewage pipe through a recreational area? Sorry, but who wants to get all playful and lovely dovey and disover a BUTTHOLE in the way? Nothxyouvmuch. Butts are off limits. If it were up to me, I'd plan the fun and naughty bits as far away from the excretory system as I could. Maybe we'd poop out our toes or pee out our elbows. I don't know. But anything is better than a pee hole one centimeter away from the female pleasure bits, or pissing directly out one's supposed-to-be-sexy manhood. And butts? Don't even get me started. Why are they RIGHT THERE? Why right there? Why is the taint (a.k.a. the watch-your-step zone) only one inch big? So wretchedly unsexy. I want nothing to do with this butt of yours kind sir. I could have designed it better, Jesus.

BOOBS. 

Second, for all your nursing mothers out there, don't your beautiful and glorious and full and perky breasts lose some of their magic when they are scabbed over, bleeding, leaking, aching like the bejeezus, and you cringe if your husband gets withing six American inches of them or if he accidentally brushes by them or you god forbid, have to shower and the water pelts down upon your glorious aching bosoms? Oh I remember the agony like it was yesterday. The last thing you want is sexytime when he's all over those puppies. Not only because you'll soak and spray the bed with your milky milky goodness, but because there is a switch that has been flipped in your head that says, "These are for baby. They are no long for sexytime, at least for 9-1/2 months or more." And if you are anything like me, "I don't want your slobbery lips and/or beard all over my pristine baby feeders. Who know where those lips have been? Sorry honey, just wait a year and we'll be back to normal and you can smother my glorious creamy white mounds of love of with smooches. No big, right?" I could have designed it better, Jesus.

BIRTH. 

Business in the front, party in the back.                

Speaking of bringing forth young, I would have liked things to go the way for humans that they do for kangaroos, for example. A kangaroo gives birth to a very tiny, very immature joey, 2 cm long and weighing less than a gram. I could get used to that. This Joey gave birth to a seven-pound, ten-ounce Noey.  Screw this linebacker, I want a gram-size baby. The baby roo wriggles out of the mother's vajayjay, with the mother's lady bits totally intact, no harm done, no tears, no stitches, no repair, and weasels its way to a pouch where it spends 7-1/2 months attached to a teat. I could deal with that. Rather than a ravaged, savaged, torn-to hell perineum and 19-1/2 hours of hard labor with pitocin and all that shit, followed by a broken tailbone, a second-degree tear, and urinary incontinence that lasted for like 18 months. Bygones.

I mean, joeys are fucking hideous to behold, unless you're its roo mama in which case your fetal joey is the most glorious thing you've ever laid eyes on, but still, I'd rather squirt out a 2-centimeter baby than a 21-inch fucker. I could have designed it better, Jesus.

EXCRETIONS.

Also, as long as we're talking about what we would have changed about the childbirth process if we were Jehovah, I would have made the digestive systen 100% efficient. Like, you take food in, you use it all, there is no need for excretory bidness. Why can't we use every bit of the food we take in with complete efficiency? What's with the having to shit like once or twice a day? Totally unacceptable, Savior Lord God in heaven, Totally unacceptable.

I think You know best about most things, but poop, genitals, birth, and the like, You should have consulted me on. I'm just saying. You should have consulted me.

So dear Jesus, if you're listening, just know that I could have done better than You with re to all things excretory, reproductive, and sexual.

Love, 
Evermore,
Yours, 
In faithful service,
Jo