....that schizophrenia is one of the symptoms of teething. You hear about the drooling, yes. The ear rubbing and frantic chewing, of course. Even the loose stools. I thought I was prepared, having anticipated all of that. But then came the sudden, violent mood swings. The happy one minute, screaming the next emotional instability. Call me naive I thought that stuff came later; like in the terrible twos or during the hormonally charged onslaught of puberty.
Alas, I was wrong.
My daughter is possessed. She is tight now in the very throes of teething and let me tell you any little thing can set her off. Putting on her bib. Pulling off a sock. Giving her a Cheerio when the much more enticing fruit puff canister is in sight. I’ve taken to relaxing some rules and offering some bribes just to gain a bit of peace. Whatever she wants I let her play with. Three things that really seem to work: the remote, the humidifier and Victoria Secret catalogs. (Don’t tell my husband about the first thing. And as to the last thing…..well hopefully the unrealistic images won’t scar her for life. I figure in her mind those women with their large bosoms are less fixtures of unattainable beauty and sexual shallowness and are instead something like items on a buffet menu.)
To compound this joyous rite of dental passage, my little girl decided she needed a cold on top of everything else. So along with the copious amounts of slimy drool we also have even more copious amounts of snot. (And by copious I mean astounding.) In between all the chin wiping, Vaseline smearing and oral gel applying my daily list of ‘to do’ tasks includes nose sucking.
I am one lucky woman.
With so much moist DNA free flowing around me I’ve elected to fore go the usual showering and getting dressed routine. I mean, really, why bother. Seeing as how the outdoor temperature is staying well below zero this winter I’m not leaving the house. Especially not with a sick, not to mention crabby, one year old. And what’s the point of getting clean and putting on nice clothes only to be coated in saliva and green shellac a mere 15 minutes later. So these days you’ll find me calming temper tantrums and singing ‘my favorite things’ attired in bandannas, slippers and sweat shirt/pant combos that were baggy on me before pregnancy enlarged them.
It’s amazing my husband still comes home from work at all.
Hopefully the process will be wrapping up soon. Already the milky white and razor sharp edges of those first bottom 2 teeth have surfaced. A lull in the storm (you know, before the upper 2 make their presence known) has got to be not far off. And well, colds can’t last forever. If the amount of readily available mucous is any indication of a body’s ability to fight off germs those suckers haven’t got much of a chance. There’s only one question though. When all this drama is over and I’m no longer cleaning faces and soothing crying spells what am I going to do with all my time. What’s more, what am I going to talk about?