Mother Nature is Calling and Calling and Calling

Through extensive research and data gathering, I have concluded that motherhood is a leading cause of irregularity and ruptured bladders.  Ask mothers at any MOPs program, play group, or PTA meeting, “What is the one thing you miss most from your pre-mommy days?”  

Invariably someone will reply, “My time in the bathroom.”
 

Every head in the room nods in agreement and eyes fill with a soulful longing of days gone by.  Days when all the people in their life respected their need to make regular trips to the bathroom, close the door, and allow the gentle urges of nature to be taken care of without interruption or a frantic rush toward fulfillment. 

But motherhood changes all of that.  Once you become a mom the gentle urges of nature must often be ignored until they become angry, screaming calls of the wild that can no longer be denied.

It is a scientific fact that the human body cycles every twenty minutes. If you are hungry, wait twenty minutes and the feeling will subside for twenty more.  If you are tired at 10:00, but can keep yourself awake until 10:20, you will catch a second wind.  If you ignore nature’s call for twenty minutes, the urge will temporarily pass.  A handy piece of information to have when traveling with children, but not so handy for the mom who, due to the many demands of her life, has suffered through the twenty minute cycle at least seventeen times and knows it will be another twelve before daddy gets home. 

Such was my situation one morning a few years ago.  Mother Nature was calling, repeatedly.  She had whispered gently at first, and then slightly louder, gradually  raising her voice to a frantic, feverish pitch that I could not ignore.  The downstairs bathroom was in use, so I had to quickly devise a plan that would allow me to get upstairs.  I settled toddler into her comfy chair with a cup of juice and a Barney video, made a bottle of formula, grabbed the hungry baby and headed toward the steps. Toddler suddenly noticed my attempted get away and ran after me calling, “I upstairs too!” 

So, with a fussing one year old on my hip, I tread at an excruciatingly slow pace behind a two-year-old who took her time navigating the knee-high stairs. When we finally arrived I quickly set up the playpen within view of the bathroom door, propped the now screaming baby up with his bottle, and turned to find that my toddler had disappeared. 

I ran down the hallway, frantically searching until I located her in her teen sister’s room, happily applying make-up. I wrestled the mascara and eyeliner out of her tightly clenched fists, and found myself begging, “Please, just come with mommy so I can potty!” 

I wiped her face in order to prevent lipstick from being smeared on my white comforter, and settled her on the bed to watch the upstairs Barney video I keep on hand for emergency situations. I helped the baby find the bottle he had dropped and then rushed to the bathroom, unzipping my jeans along the way and discovering that the breathing techniques I learned in Lamaze were also handy in this situation.  

The goal was in sight when I noticed that the man in my life had chosen not to lift the seat that morning.  Sometimes I think he hates me.  Why else would he pee on something he knows will eventually touch my bare skin?  Occasionally, I toy with the idea of doing the same thing to the dining room chair so I can enjoy his surprised expression when he seats himself for dinner.

I hurriedly wiped things down and breathed a sigh of relief as the long desired objective was finally achieved.  But alas, twenty minutes had passed and Mother Nature was taking a break. 

My grandmother, God rest her soul, had five children.  I think it is no coincidence that she also suffered from kidney failure.  Even though she spent the last six years of her life commuting to the dialysis center three days a week for four hours a day, it could never have amounted to the bathroom time she missed while raising her little brood. I hope God has rewarded her with an eternity of quiet lavatory time and a resplendent throne of gold.