And the awards go to...

I read all of your stories in one sitting, and the overall effect was remarkable. In the beginning I was sort of shaking my head (in sympathy, not in judgment—well, mostly), but by the fourth page I was cackling at even the worst parental slipups. It’s a good thing Henry isn't here, because if he were he would surely ask what I was laughing at, and I would be forced to answer, and then he'd be in therapy for an extra ten years. My mother found great joy in the stories of children in peril, he'd tell the court-appointed social worker, who would write BAD MOTHER on her notepad and hand him the jumbo box of Puffs Plus.

Hello, I got off track. As I was saying. The stories you've shared fell into a few categories, which I will outline below.

I'm glad to see most of my readers are not believers in corporal punishment, but it seems that many of us have our moments of weakness. There were stories of pinching or the occasional slap, always followed by hours of unremitting guilt. I was recently talking to a friend who mentioned pinching her child in a moment of pure rage, and I responded, "Oooh, the pinching! Sometimes you want to pinch 'em!" with maybe a little too much enthusiasm. Me, I often fall back on the holding-the-hand-real-hard technique. Of course this is usually in public, and Henry likes to scream "YOU’RE HURTING MY HAND" and then dissolve into the pavement. I don’t recommend it.

That being said, the I Don’t Care Who I Hit award goes to Kelsi, who issued quiet threats to one child while pinching the other in order to beat a hasty retreat from Target. Truly, I know that parents of twins everywhere are toasting Kelsi right now.

In other news, many of you parents are still suffering guilt over their children’s injuries. To which I say, pshaw! Those scars give them character! Whose child hasn’t rolled off a bed or off the couch or out of the…refrigerator?

You people are strange.

The Sickening Thud award goes to Em, who in a fit of pique pulled a blanket out from under her daughter. Says Em: "I can't remember if I knew she was on it or not, I was just being pissy and stompy and a huge asshole. All I remember is her little feet going out from under her." I love this image. I mean, I'm horrified by it. Tsk, tsk.

Honorable mention must go to Sarah's 14-month-old falling from the third shelf of the, yes, refrigerator. What was she doing in the fridge? You do know you’re not supposed to put them there, right?

Then there are those of you who are still shouldering the emotional burden of not realizing how sick and/or injured your children were. There were asthma attacks, stomach flus, and too many broken bones to count. And to heap guilt upon guilt, while your children were bravely enduring their misfortune, you criticized their behavior. Who said you could have kids?

The best of these stories was from lb, who wins the Quit Your Whining award. Her POOR DAUGHTER was having a hard time riding her bike:

"I remember one memorable time when she begged and begged to ride the bike to the park, only to crash into the curb every couple of yards. LOOK UP! I yelled. Watch where you are going! LOOK UP! Quit watching your feet! LOOK OUT FOR THE CURB! I was furious and I just couldn't understand why she couldn't do something so simple as steer the stupid bike!! By the time we got home I was so frustrated I totally yelled at her and actually threw her beloved bike into the garbage can right in front of her.

Turned out that she was blind in one eye! No depth perception! And poor vision in the other eye too! She couldn't see past her feet! Makes it hard to steer! Hahahahaha! Oops."

LB’s daughter is fine now, by the way. At least PHYSICALLY.

Many of you have provided your children the tools they needed to curse like sailors and/or behave like two-bit thugs. Who could forget Bikini's son slapping his ass to "Love in an Elevator" or Angie's 2-year-old cursing out slow drivers? Not me! But the Holy Shit award must go to Sharon, for giving her child an empty (small) liquor bottle, only to find out that he brought it to school and showed all his fellow kindergarteners how well he could drink. Congratulations!

Now, some parents feel guilt over parenting moments that I think are triumphs. The That'll Learn Him award goes to Aimee, whose son kept unbuckling himself while she was driving. "After several pleas and threats to get him to rebuckle, in a fit of Mommys-going-to-teach-you-a-lesson-about-keeping-your-seatbelt-buckled I slammed on the brakes. He went flying forward, hit the seat, and fell face first on the floor. And, in my Mommy Rage Moment, I said, 'See, that's what happens when you unbuckle your seatbelt before we get home.'" Brilliant!

Runner-up in this one goes to Lee, whose daughter, on the way to school, was taking her clothes off in the backseat. This was during a snowstorm. So she turned the air conditioning on. "When [we] arrived at school she was down to her underwear in her car seat, her lips were blue and she was covered with goosebumps. She said, through streaming tears 'I'm cold, I think I need some clothes on' so we got her clothes on and went into school." Lesson: learned!

A surprising number of you admit that your toddlers simply left the house and wandered the streets until strangers brought them back home. Invariably these children were naked, which makes it even awesomer. The He Was Here a Minute Ago, Officer award goes to "Embarrassed, and Rightly So," (I don't think that’s her real name) for admitting that she was on drugs when it happened. (Okay, antihistamines.)

One scenario I was sure I would hear more than once, but did not, was the following, as recounted by Dad Gone Mad. "I left a porno in the DVD player one night. The next morning my son pushed play, assuming his Power Rangers DVD was still in the machine." And so, Dad Gone Mad wins the He Was Brave Enough to Admit it Award. (Perv.)

Sadly, there can be only one true winner, and that is Kelley, or rather Kelley’s friend, who was lucky enough to have a friend like Kelley, to share her tale with the world. Congratulations, Kelley's friend: you win the OH NO YOU DIDN’T Award. And I love you for it. Here it is, in all its glory:

"She had been battling with her then 5 year old to get ready for kindergarten in a timely manner. He had even missed the bus several times. One morning he was plodding along at an exceptionally slow rate and she told him that if he missed the bus that day he would have to take a taxi to school. Well, sure enough, he missed his bus and my friend called a taxi. For a 5 year old. And made him pay for it with his own money. Anyway, she sends him off in the taxi (yes, alone!!) About an hour later (an HOUR!), the phone rings. It is one of the custodians at the school calling to inform her that her son needs her to come pick him up. There was no school that day (hence, no bus to miss) and she had just sent her 5 year old alone in a taxi to an empty school! She felt like such an asshole--but he was never late for the bus again!"

The delicious cruelty of it! The taxi! Paying for it himself! Then there's no school! This one is just breathtaking.

Thank you, one and all, for participating. I don't know about you, but I'm suddenly feeling like a very competent parent indeed. I suspect that this feeling won't last through the end of the day.

(Updated to add: did you know that if you devote an entire day to your blog, the rest of your life will descend into chaos? I kind of, um, didn't realize that. I'll be back on Friday, after the laundry is done, the family attended to, and the deadlines completed.)

Comments

[jessica]

oh god. I have not laughed that hard in awhile. thank you!

[Jenn C.]

I am laughing so hard I am crying.

a taxi. Bwahahahahaha.

my kid would think that was an AWESOME adventure.

[jbeeky]

My MOTHER made us take a taxi to school. Or, she would call a taxi and ask the fare and make us PAY HER to drive us. Whenever my husband finds a wayward retail bill I plant my hands on my hips and say "PAY HER. MYSELF. TO GO TO SCHOOL." I should practically be able to claim it on my insurance.

[Alissa]

oh my gosh... seriously tears.

[bigpikchur.blogspot.com]

I am not yet a parent but am going to print this out and file it away in my "FOR FUTURE USE" folder!
Jules
House of Jules

[lapoflux]

Thank you thank you thank you... I so so SO needed this.
On Sunday I took my kids to a party at a bowling alley. My 6 year old stepped on my stockinged feet repeatedly with his horrible pain inflicting bowling shoes. I finally grabbed his arm harder than I should have he, of course, did the yelp of "this crazy woman is maiming me again." I hissed about not stepping on people's feet - in a not too friendly voice. And then looked up to see that the father of the birthday boy had had his videocamera pointed at us the whole time.
Have to go dry my tears of laughter now.

[heather]

OMG I so needed that entry. I keep going back to the That'll Learn Him story and I laugh all over again - I can totally see myself doing that.

[Lisa Milton]

I am clearly needing care from a mental health professional because these are so dear I 1)laughed & snorted, 2)I'm passing this on to my non-blogging friends so they too can laugh at children in peril.

Thank you, thank you Alice.

[ThePsychoExWife]

OMG, I have never laughed so hard. The bike rider was the best, I am literally crying here. I know I'm late to the party, but I'll add mine for fun. This past Halloween we attended our neighbors party like every year. It's a drink fest, with lots of fun things to do for the kids. As it's right down the street, and our kids are a little older now, we can have a few drinks. I'm not used to having a few drinks, and before you know it, we were at home, where my son turned on the fireplace for me, as I was cold. As I sent them to bed, I crawled up after them. The next morning I dropped them off at their fathers and my son says, "Mom was drunk last night." My ex replies with a smile, "and what did you do to make that known?" Son: "she had to crawl up the steps."

Not shortly thereafter, I went over to another neighbors who has 2 year old twins that are just starting to talk. We often have mommy cocktail hour, with a simple glass of wine in our backyards. Her daughter goes up to her and says "mama, dw, wine" and points to me. I lowered my head in shame ;)

[BookMamma]

OMG.. thank you THANK YOU for doing this. Outside of laughing my ass off I feel so much better about the kind of parent I am. I had been reading too many parenting books and watching too much mommy-war Todat Show segments.

This is a gold mine.

[kelley]

I cannot describe the glee I felt when I got to the bottom of this post and saw that my comment was featured on Finslippy!! Alice mentioned MY name!! I'm so glad I could assist you in feeling more competent as a parent. There are actually more stories that my friend has told me, but I have always thought that the taxi one takes the cake. I now threaten to send my daughter to her house when she needs some tough love.

[Irene]

Holy cow, the taxi story is the BEST EVER! HILARIOUS!!!!! I love hearing those stories that make me feel so much better!!!

[Emily]

Oh my god, I'm laughing so hard I'm crying!!!

[Bad Mommy]

Oh my goodness, the repressed memories that are flooding to the surface with these posts.

The time my 2 year old bit me as I was getting her out of the carseat, and I instinctively hauled off and slapped her. In Public.

The time when she was 11 months old, and my husband had her on his shoulders and she grabbed the doorframe, fell off, landed on the tile and FRACTURED her skull. When the paramedics came? I fainted. I was suprised we didn't get investigated by SRS.

Or how about the time I dripped hot grease on my arm and yelled F@CK!! She used the word for a month. Loudly.

Or when I decided to let her cry it out and she cried for 3 hours and then threw up?

My sister's favorite story is the time her baby monitor got unplugged and she went in to his room in the morning, where he'd fallen out of his crib, and apparently spent most the night crying on the floor.

Oh, good times. I need a drink.

[punchlinewalking]

These made me laugh so hard I cried...and made me seriously rethink parenthood. Thanks for this today!

[Sarah]

Oh my gosh, thank you for giving me honorable mention, if for no other reason than that I finally figured out that I *did* post the comment on your blog.

I always have a bazillion tabs open at once, and I didn't realize that your comments section was pages and pages long, and after I clicked post I couldn't find it and have since been rather worried about which blog I may have randomly confessed to neglecting to notice my daughter scaling an open fridge.

These stories were hilarious. Someone needs to put these together on one of those publish-on-demand sites so that I can give it to my pregnant friends at baby showers.

[Deanna]

Confidential to LB, the woman who threw her half-blind daughter's bike away, I too am blind in one eye and have no depth perception. My parents thought it was a lazy eye, and under an eye doctor's advice, slapped an eye patch over my good eye to "strengthen" the other one. The doctor got a phone call a few hours later from my parents: "Um, she keeps walking into things and falling down a lot. I'm not sure this is working." That's parent code for "bonked her damn head and ricocheted off the coffee table. Needless to say I got hauled in for an MRI that week to determine the actual cause. Anyway, my point is that your daughter will be just fine! Builds character! :-D

[kate]

Simply my favorite fucking post. EVER.

The "Oh No You Didn't" Award: BRILLIANT!!!

[Manic Mommy]

Life Imitating Blog:

Not two hours ago, we were on our way to the pediatrician and HRH dropped his Bionicle in the backseat. He asked if I could get it and RC answered "I Will!" and bounded (unbound) from his carseat while the vehicle was in motion. I could only think of Aimee and slamming on the brakes to teach him a lesson.

[Lisa]

That taxi story not only made me laugh until I peed myself, it also made me a little envious of Kelley's friend, Super Smart Mom Indeed. I would've never thought of that. Kudos to you, good woman.

(My grandmother used to make my dad and my aunt pack their suitcases and go sit at the bus stop to "wait for the bus from the orphanage." How we laugh at that today, I'll never know, but we do. Sick!)

[She Likes Purple]

I have NEVER laughed so hard.

[nate]

Is it too late to share? You may call it "the perils of co-sleeping."

When my daughter was 10 days old, she'd fallen asleep in my arms after nursing (in bed). (Not that it's relevant, but my husband was asleep in the guest bed with our sick dog.) At some point I started dreaming that I was having a fight with someone, and that dream somehow merged with a dream about eating an apple, and in the dream(s) I took a bite of the apple and simultaneously bit the person I was fighting with...and woke up b/c my teeth had made contact. With my daughter's forehead. Just below the fontanel.

She of course woke up screaming. My husband came to help me calm her down, and it took me about 45 minutes to be able to tell him what happened. He still reminds me, almost 5 years later. I can still see her teeny little look of outrage.

Yes, I *bit* my newborn child, because I apparently thought she was an apple.

[Amy the Mom]

Oh Christ, thank you for condensing those comments to these gems. I was enjoying them over the weekend, but there wasn't enough time to read them all. I would have also voted for the taxi story. I now have a solution to get my lethargic twelve year old twins on the goddamn bus every morning.

[Michelle]

Oh man...I am pregnant...you can't make me laugh that hard and not expect me to pee a little. Now i have to go and read all of the stories in the comments.

[Jill (CDJ)]

These are too awesome for words... I'm direting all (four) of my readers to this post!!

[Anna]

Thank you! I had an "I'm a big jackass" parenting moment myself today...and I needed that laugh.

[Sonia]

OMG the taxi one is so awesome. I would be that pissed too. I would yell at the little fart all the way to school, driving him there, in my pajamas, with a baby hanging on the boob though. The taxi idea was good, but on a no school, notsomuch. LOL!

[laurie]

I did the 'slam on the breaks because they are not buckled thing'.... to my husband. My daughter kept saying "daddy you're not buckled". He always buckles up now..anyway when I'm driving.

[Nicole/wksocmom]

Thank you, that was too funny. I tend to block these parenting moments out, so these gave me a laugh and brought back memories :) I so do that hand-holding thing, the kids have not yet learned the "you're hurting me" ploy but do cry and whine.

[MandyMae]

Hilarity!
I happened upon your blog because someone on a blog I now can't remember said it was the best, and they were right! I've now read all the way to the bottom of the screen, however many posts that is, and I'll be adding you to my "What I Look At" list on my new and altogether unexciting blog.

[Mom101]

I think as long as we're giving out awards, you get the one for the most inept parent audience in the blog world. I'm jealous.

This is just wonderful. Do a book.

[SuburbanCorrespondent]

Wow. Just...wow...

[Lacey Jane]

I can't wait to have kids.

(except I obviously can)

When he was about 5, my youngest (of 6) brother stepped on a (rustyish) nail outside and REFUSED to let our mother cleanse his wound. We all crowded in the bathroom trying to convince him. He had tears streaming down his face and mom glanced at all of us in a "okay-go-with-this.." way.

"Dave...Charlie didn't let me clean his foot either."

(my oldest brother- then 12- wailed:)
"No mom! You promised you would never talk about Charlie again!"

(my mom- nodding)
"I'm sorry, Doug. But he has to know. Dave. Charlie was the child I had before you. His foot got infected, he didn't let me clean it, and he died."

(me- then 8, and always the theatrical one)
*starts crying* "I miss Charlie!!"
(wish I could still cry on command)

...needless to say- Dave let mom clean his foot- and believed he had an older brother for a good year or two after the incident.

My mom NEVER wanted kids, and to this day- she still doesn't really know how a "normal," "conventional" parent is supposed to work.

I love her more for it every day :o)

[SpartanFan]

These stories are validation of the "I'm not the only occasionally crappy parent in the world" feeling that creeps up on me now and again. Wanted to share my own. A couple of years ago, my husband went to a stock car race with his dad and dad's friend. Dad's friend likes to smoke cigars and gave one to my husband and his father. Husband and father don't smoke, so politely stowed away said cigars - in small insulated cooler used to bring Diet Coke to the race. Fast foward to Monday. Four year old son uses small cooler as a lunch box to bring to daycare. At lunch time, he finds the cigar in the side pocket of cooler and wants to eat it, thinking it is either chocolate or a pretzel rod. Mom comes to pick up son at end of day and gets pulled aside by daycare director who produces cigar and relays lunch story to Mom. Mom is mortified but can't help bursting out in hysterical laughter (while simultaneously wanting to strangle husband). Mom leaves with son, incredibly embarrassed, not wanting to even think about what the daycare director thinks about our family.

[Dory]

*laughing*
*falling out of chair*
*wiping away tears*
*gasping*
*laughing some MORE*

And best blog post of the week goes to... finslippy! YAAAYYYYYYY!!!

[Vegas Princess]

I peed my pants. I literally peed my pants reading this. I don't have kids yet but I thank you for all the wonderful tips to try when I finally get some of the little buggers myself.

[kate]

i just tried to explain why i'd broken down in to a puddle of laughing goo to a biochemist/musician ph.d. guy genius i know. it went like this:

katysaid: i miss my kids so much i can't stand it, 2 days left
znthmgreen: you're not fun this way
katysaid: http://www.finslippy.com/finslippy/
katysaid: that's the funniest thing i've read in like fifty years
znthmgreen: finslippy, huh
katysaid: yeah
katysaid: i don't know if you'll think it's funny actually, it's parent stuff
znthmgreen: i bet
katysaid: but omg, i haven't laughed this hard in...ever maybe
znthmgreen: i'll look later. i'm trying to follow some chopin etudes by reading the score
katysaid: ok
katysaid: no worries

wtfever! chopin etudes..whatever that is, has absolutely nothing on this stuff. omg a taxi! that's brilliant. i will keep this forever. and ever.

[Dory]

Oh, and here's my story right below the Calvin & Hobbes cartoon.

[Tammy]

I can't stop snickering. I am so forwarding the link to this post to every parent I know.

It's too late to enter, and I'll be honest with myself and admit my story can't compete with these, but this past weekend I think I may have pulled off a respectable entry in the TWO BIRDS WITH ONE STONE category, in which I proved I'm both a bad mom AND a bad wife.

We'd gone, en famille, to IKEA, which, in retrospect, was a bad idea on the first weekend of the new year when the entire world is full of piss, vinegar, and a jones for home improvement. Sam (age: almost three) ran around like a fart in a mitt and was unusually annoying. My husband (age: 37) was unusually prone to annoyance.

After watching them both battle it out and trying unsuccessfully to mediate, more for my own peace of mind than anything else, and then having them direct their annoyingness/annoyance at ME, I got fed up. My husband took the brunt of my fed-up-ness, and I assumed that Sam was oblivious to what was happening two and a half feet above his head. Turns out he was not oblivious. Which is why, when the family was finally back in the car and heading home, there was a long silence, followed by a piping toddler voice in the back seat, proclaiming, "Daddy is a douchebag!"

[m]

www.attachmentparenting.org.

[cce]

Oh sweet relief, there are other inept, stumbling fools trying to be a parent and doing it just as successfully as I am which is to say with a series of near misses, cruel misunderstandings and a lifetime of therapy.
I am still trying to forgive myself for the time my son was enrolled in an "Invention Summer Camp" and the day of his Invention Convention where he would display all the great things he'd made for an audience of parents coincided with my annual tennis tournament. Rather than cancel my tennis, I coerced My Better Half to attend the convention and blithely went off to hit some yellow balls around on a green grass court. I returned home from my day at the country club to find a million messages from camp counselors on my phone, not only had My Better Half forgotten the Invention Convention but he had not picked the poor kid up from camp either. Camp had been over for two hours. I raced over there to find a crying, crushed little boy whose parents didn't attend his big show and then left him there to suffer the blow for another 120 minutes. He said to me, "Nobody came to my table and I kept telling myself that Daddy was on his way." We both cried all the way home and I'm still in therapy. This was two years ago and I could cry all over again. I suck!

[AmyinMotown]

Lacey Jane, your story had me howling, literally.

CCE, OUCH. Please tell me your husband feels horrible too. You don't suck, you had good intentions and things still got messed up--and I bet you have missed Not One Thing since then.

Alice, thank you for this. Just this morning at preschool dropoff I was walking in with the mother who saw me completely lose it last week when girlfriend would NOT put her coat on and would NOT stay in timeout and would NOT listen to a thing I said and thought it was FUNNY. One of those days when managing not to scream my head off and slap my daughter, who I love more than anyone in the world, was a moral victory.

I couldn't even look her in the face (although she was quite nice). Good to know other moms have their "not proud of this" moments.

[alice]

Okay, cce just made me cry.

[=^..^=]

I can add two hilarious, I mean, horror stories to your list....

I got a call from the private BAPTIST SCHOOL my two kids attended telling me that I needed to come pick up my 4 year old precious daughter. Oh God. What has she done. When I got to school, the principal could hardly recount what had happened because he was SNICKERING so hard during the telling... Seems my baby girls teacher was going around the room asking children to come up with words that began with each letter of the alphabet. "C" - and a student would be called upon to answer with a word beginning with "C". Well, they made it all the way through the alphabet without incident (shocking, seeing as my little sailor's mouth was in the room for the whole thing....) and the teacher started over. "A". Can anyone tell me another word that begins with "A" ? My Shelby raised her hand with vigor. (The way the principal described it to me, I envisioned Horshack from Welcome Back Kotter - OOOOHHH OOOHHHH OOHHHH - with her hand shaking violently in the air.) The patient teacher called on Shelby. Shelby proudly STOOD (please note, the other children answered politely from a seated position) and answered, "A" - ASSHOLE..... and sat back down. The teacher had told the principal (who was nearly in tears at this point in the story) that Shelby had a look of sheer pride on her face....and I can just hear her thoughts..."HA ! None of you WUSSIES had the guts to say THAT ONE, now did you ?????" Needless to say, I took her home early that day. She and I sat in total silence all the way home. Shelby, silent and smiling, knowing she'd done TWO things well that day = #1 Showing up all of the scardy-cats in her class by saying a word they all surely knew, but were too chicken to actually SAY. #2 Made her parents look like, well, ASSHOLES.

The second story is my son. Oh Lord, my son. In church (yes, this ALREADY can't be a good outcome, right ??) while wrapping up the hymn Sweet Hour of Prayer, the congregation stopped singing. My five year old, however, continued singing. And by singing, I mean - SHE'S GOT LEGS - SHE KNOWS HOW TO USE THEM - he was singing a ZZ Top song at the top of his lungs as the organ stopped playing. And did I mention we were sitting in the front row of the church ? Yes, well, we were. I put a little extra in the offering plate that day.

[amy]

thanks for the time
it was fun to read all the horror! :)
I am now a loyal reader of you many others :)
peace

[aimee]

Fabulous round-up! It made me think of all the funny stories my grandparents and parents tell about big parenting mistakes. We all need to be able to look back and laugh!

[midlife mommy]

I couldn't get through all the original comments. But your synopsis? Priceless. I don't think I've ever laughed so hard while reading a post. Thank you!

[annie]

Oh. Wow. I am in awe. And totally comforted that I am not alone!
Maybe my 16 yr old daughter should read these. To let her know she's not alone either. You know how important it is for teens to feel like they belong.

[Kathryn]

HAHA! Those are absolutely PRICELESS! I could not stop laughing! I mean, I was shocked! ;)
Yes, I feel much better about my parenting now too.
Thank you for putting them into nice neat little catagories for us. I honestly needed that laugh. Ahhh.

[MommyofOne]

OMG. I have had such fun over the past few days reading these stories. Alice, you are now officially one of my favorite bloggers, right next to Suburban Bliss and Dooce. Love your writing!