This is a picture that was taken moments before everything went crazy. I had a wonderful visit with my good friends Samantha and Dylan at a McDonalds that had a playland. While this picture was taken, Brody and Bonnie were playing great together in the playland, and had been for the last hour and a half. Therefore, in this picture, I am happy. I look tired, and I probably am, but it made my day to see them.
Anyway, what I'm trying to say, is I posted this picture to Facebook, and for all anyone knew, I had a great day seeing my friends. The end. And while that is true, I did enjoy getting to talk to other adults and reminisce about the past, I had a whole afternoon to get through as well, and that happened to not be as lovely.
Shortly after I said my goodbyes to Dylan and Samantha, Brody and Bonnie were still happily playing in the playland, so I took the opportunity to quickly feed Blaire before we headed home. Meanwhile, Brody was trying to wait patiently for his turn on the computer toys that two other boys were playing on. (Why they have those there, I'm not sure..) I was beginning to tell them to start getting their shoes on to get ready to go home, and Brody was becoming frantic because he reallyyyyy wanted to play on those things. We had already been there for over an hour and a half, so we weren't going to stick around to wait for the kids to be done playing so that Brody could have his turn. Both Bonnie and Blaire needed diaper changes. (Yes, Bonnie is officially back in diapers. She did so so well for like a month.) So I pull all three of them into the bathroom. I change Blaire, and Bonnie and Brody are touching the toilet and the sink, and everything else... There was not really anything I could do about it, so there they were, filling up Brody's water cup in the sink, and spilling it out in the toilet over and over again.
Finally I'm done changing Blaire, and I realize I have no where to set her because I didn't think to bring her seat or carrier with me. I'm not used to having two in diapers. So, I lay Bonnie on the changing table, next to Blaire, which both Blaire and Bonnie hated. So that was that. They were both upset and Brody was yelling at me at the same time through all this that he still really wanted to play that game out there.
I got Bonnie changed and put her on the ground. She then decides to take off her boots and she has no socks on, since she ditched those somewhere in the playland earlier. So I'm now holding Blaire, and fighting with her to get her shoes back on because we are in the bathroom on top of everything and she has bare feet! Gah!
I finally get her shoes on and get all the kids out of the bathroom. As we are getting our stuff together to head out to the car, Brody realizes he has forgotten his beloved water cup in the bathroom. After I tell him we can't go back to get it, he has a full blown melt down. He is screaming and he quickly progresses to the level that he isn't listening to anything I am saying. I know I need to just let him work it out, so here I am, standing with a two year old, a screaming 3 year old, and holding a baby in her car seat carrier.
A lady passes by and says, "Wow, he's a bad one!" Thank you.
Brody calms down and we start to head out the door. But then, Brody remembers about the game he never got to play, so he breaks down again, however this time we are half way out the door. So as I'm holding the door, trying to get Brody to follow me, Bonnie is now starting to walk towards the car, and I'm still holding Blaire. I run and grab Bonnie with my other hand, and we all go back to get screaming Brody. I honestly don't know how we got to the car, but we did. I put Blaire into the car, then coax Brody and Bonnie to the other side to strap them in. Brody then gets upset that I touched him too much to get to the other side, and he would like to walk all by himself. He would actually like to go to the other side of the car, where we put Blaire in, and rewalk to his side of the car. I can't let him walk to the other side of the car alone, and I can't leave Bonnie, so I tell him he needs to get into the car now. He won't, so I put him in the car myself, and he is so upset. I buckle them both in and Brody is screaming, which has now made Blaire upset. So two out of three are upset beyond measure.
As we pull out of the parking lot, I notice Brody has gotten out of his car seat because he was so upset that I had put them in there without letting him help. I then pull into the next parking area, and get him out of the car to explain how we need to always stay in our carseat. He also had taken off one of his shoes and socks in the short period of time that we had been in the car, so he is now with one barefoot, on the concrete, screaming his little head off about his terrible life and his cold foot. Finally, when he agrees to stay in his carseat, I switch him into Bonnie's carseat, and her into his, because I know he can't escape Bonnie's carseat.
And we are on the road back home. Gas light. We need gas. We are 40 minutes away from home, so I am forced to stop. I turn off the car at the gas station, open my door to get out, and Bonnie freaks out. (She has been going through an attachment phase, so anytime I go somewhat out of her sight, she freaks out.) So as I am getting gas, as quickly as I can, Bonnie is screaming, and therefore Blaire is screaming more, and Brody is still screaming because he is not in "his" carseat. I finally ask him if I put him back into his carseat, will he stay there, and he agrees, so I switch them again into the opposite carseats. Brody is fine now. Bonnie calms down once I get back into the car, so now all we have is one screaming child in the backseat.
As I pray that Blaire quiets down as we get moving on the road, she doesn't. Therefore, I stop the car in a parking lot, get her out of her seat, and feed her until she falls asleep. As I'm feeding her, I look back in the backseat, and both Brody and Bonnie are fast asleep. So three sleeping babies for the win. Yes.
& there was peace, and there was quiet, all the way back home. However, it always comes with a price. It is currently one and a half hours past Brody's bedtime right now, as I write this, and he is still awake. Eh, it is what it is. I needed that quiet drive home.
Anyway, back to the initial picture I posted on Facebook.. if that was all anyone say, no one would know that my day actually got super crazy if they didn't read this post. They probably would say, "Oh, how nice, Karli got to see her friends today." And while they are right, there is a lot more to the story.
These types of crazy events happen to me nearly everyday. However, it's a lot of effort to write about and explain, and frankly, after they are over, they leave me feeling exhausted and the last thing I want to do is relive the event by talking about them. Therefore, I rarely do. However, this time, as I drove the 40 minutes home, I felt like maybe someone else needed to hear this story. Maybe someone else, who is living a crazy life with crazy kids, could relate and say, "Hey, I am not alone."
You are not alone.
People frequently say to me "I don't know how you do it," when referring to having 3 young kids. And to be honest, I don't either. There are days that I get so frustrated with everything that I know this mom job is one I would have quit over and over again if that was an option.
Thank goodness it is not an option. I know that my kids need me, and know that I chose to have them all so close in age. I wonder if that was a smart decision nearly everyday, but it is one that I can't change, so therefore I just do what I have to do to get through each day. And that is the truth.
Pictures on Facebook don't tell everything. I mean, I post a TON on social media, and I know for a fact that what I post doesn't even come CLOSE to telling the full story. There are a LOT of ups, but probably even more downs, and while I try to be honest, it just isn't possible to be completely thorough with the entire truth.
So, if you are reading this, and have felt that you are alone with feeling like life is really freaking hard sometimes, or hey, maybe all the time, you are not ever alone. This new year, I want to be more real. I want to be more real with the people around me. I have found that the more real I am with others, the more real they are back to me, and I like that so much better than the fake stuff we see all the time on social media. It's just not real.
On the other hand, I get it. I'm sure many enjoy posting the good stuff, because that is the stuff that is exciting to post about, or that is the stuff that we think to take pictures of. I get that too. But just keep in mind that those things are NEVER the full story, there is ALWAYS more because it is utterly impossible to tell everyone everything.
