Holy Nutsacks!!

Okay - this post may fall into the category of TMI. In fact, were my boy to read this in a couple of years, he would almost certainly say that it is waaaayyyy TMI and die of humiliation on the spot. But as a dutiful blogger, I feel called to share the good, the bad, and the freakishly ugly bits of motherhood with you all.

Plus, this was one of the more disturbing things I've had to deal with recently and I need sympathy, people, sympathy!

Friday morning the kidlet was complaining about the bug bites he had gotten on his boy bits the night before. Of course, he was complaining about this at, oh, 7:30 am...and since complaints at this hour of the morning are generally ploys to get me out of bed at an indecent time I pretty much blew him off. Several times. Over the course of the next two hours. (Yeah, I am that kind of inattentive, neglectful mom.)

The guilt of this may haunt me forever, because when I finally got my butt out of bed and tended to my child, I discovered that he wasn't just being a whiner about two little skeeter bites like I had assumed. There was, in fact, a problem with his bits. A BIG problem with his bits. As in, his bits were swollen to the size of my fist and bright purple/red. ACK!!!

It was horrifying, I tell you, and of course my first instinct was to Freak Out because obviously there was something terribly wrong with my child's scrotum. Being a Mom, though, I couldn't because a Mom's first duty is to stay calm at all times or deal with a hysterical child. And so I did - stay calm that is - and managed to pull off the whole Dutiful Mom thing quite well, administering benedryl and arranging for the emergency doctor's visit, all while continuing to pack for our trip and keeping the chld from losing his mind from the fear that his bits were going to explode.

(Did I mention that we were supposed to go out of town for the weekend, and that I was waiting to hear if my husband was going to be fired from his job? Oh yeah. It was that kind of day).

The whole episode was only made worse by the fact that Kidlet's modesty is finally starting to kick in, and while he had no problem (repeatedly) showing me his parts, he was absolutely mortified at the thought of having to show a stranger (read: doctor). Having had my share of pap smears, childbirths, and brazilian waxes, I totally sympathized but had to hold the line that, no, we couldn't just tell the doctor what it looked like. The poor pediatrician would have to actually see and perhaps touch the horror in my son's pants. Welcome to the humiliation that is life, kid.

Fortunately, none of the conditions that WebMD suggested could cause the Kidlet's boy bits to look so alarming were present...as far as the doc could determine, it was just (just!) a severe allergic reaction to the bites of unknown insects. It didn't even require a shot! A couple of days of oral prednisone later it looks like the Kidlet will indeed live to procreate.

Now if I could only get those horrible, horrible images out of my mind.

(Note: I briefly considered photo-documenting this entire event but decided that even for me decency had its limits. Count yourselves lucky).

MomDork (yes, I'm back)

Yes, I'm back...in all my glory (or something like that).

I have to tell you all that one of my major goals, as a mom, is to totally humiliate my son when he is a teenager. Not that this will be difficult - I'm sure that the mere fact that I breathe will be enough to make him squirm - but, perfectionist that I am, I figure I should start practicing now.

Hence, the MomDork.

Yes, I did go out in public like this. To trendy stores, even...where I got scornfully raised eyebrows but was allowed to browse nonetheless. And where I of course ran into someone I've been wanting to impress with my UberCoolness for a while now. Lovely. At least I made....an impression...right?

My favorite thing about this pic is that it shows the cellulite over my knees. Srsly. Click to enlarge and see if I'm not telling the truth!

I could have lived very happily for years without knowing that.