Remember in my last post how I was reminsicing about my sweet babies and how they're growing without my permission. Well, I'm completely over that today. 100%.
It all started on Thursday night. Chad got home late from work, my parents had dropped off a load of furniture to store here, and everyone was wound WAY up. So bedtimes were like 2+ hours later than they were supposed to be. By the time I crawled into bed, it was about 11:30 which is an hour and a half past my own bedtime. The last sound I remember hearing was the rattle of Chad popping a benadryl because something had gotten to him. That was the last sound for about 4 minutes, when all of a sudden, I hear Jack screaming and wailing. I quickly got him and put him in our bed, and I'm pretty sure it was night terrors of some sort. He was cantankerous and not to be calmed. I finally turned on disney junior and rolled over. About an hour later, his eyes were good and glazed over, so I turned off the tv. He promptly went to sleep right in the middle of my pillow. And from there, all 3 boys were in and out of sleep for the entire night. No one was sick. There was nary a boogie man to be found. Yet they all needed my attention in the middle of the night. The only time I got solid sleep was from 2a-3a. That's an hour folks. That's also about 8 hours less than I normally get/ need.
I should've seen the signs. This is so abnormal that I should've kept us in pj's all day and started a fresh on Saturday. Shoulda, coulda, woulda... that's all I can say about that.
So instead, I got up Friday morning on an hour of sleep, and got the 3 boys dressed. Gabe had gone with his Granny for a week-long staycation to end his summer, so it was just me and the littles. I decided breakfast prep was beyond my abilities and offered up Cracker Barrel instead. But no, they would only hear of donuts, and quite frankly, I wasn't in the mood to coerce about which type of sugar they were going to be getting, so I gave in. The was bad decision #1, because taking a dieting donut lover who is desperately trying to lose baby weight to Krispy Kreme when the light is on is like taking an alcoholic to an open bar. It wasn't pretty.
Next, I ran a few errands- took back a picture to Homegoods, mailed at package at the Post Office, ran to the bank, and fed the baby in the car. None of these are for the faint of heart if you're a mom to a 3 year old, a 2 year old, and a newborn. Namely because of those ages, approximately zero of them can buckle themselves and load themselves in and out of the car. But I had a little touch of "I am woman, hear me roar" and "can't nobody hold me down" going on, and I told these errands what was up!
Then I showed up at the Regal movie theater. (Insert laughter here). The plan was to meet 4 other girlfriends and their 8 children and see "Turbo". We had bought our tickets early, planned to arrive before the show started to potty and get popcorn and were all excited for the show. (It's ok if you're still laughing.) My girlfriend Jolynn who is pregnant with #4, and has a 4 year old, a 3 year old, and an 18 meh old even said to me, "you're lucky you still have one in the carrier". I just nodded and smiled because I was under the impression that this was going to be a good experience. I'm an idiot.
We went our own way when we got into the theater-- going potty while everyone got snacks. By the time we were in the snack line, it was long and my little guys were really excited and running amuck! I ordered a medium popcorn for us all to share, a medium cherry coke for me and Jack, and a small fruit punch for Max. $17 dollars and 95 pounds of sugar later, we headed into the movie. I had the baby in his carrier on one arm, my diaper bag on the other, a bag of pop corn, and a huge coke in my hands. Max was behind me with his cup, and Jack doing his waltz behind us. But Jack has never been to a movie before. And he's kinda skittish right now. And we entered the theatre once it was already dark and after the loud previews had started... Jack flipped, but I had no hands to help. So I went up to the middle, set the baby down, and then snacks and bags, got Max in his seat and went to rescue Jack. I got him comfortably settled in my lap, the popcorn helped him calm down quickly, the baby was on my right, buckled in, freshly fed and changed and ready for his nap, and Max on my left. I was sweating, but breathed in a sigh of relief- we were here, it was a cute mom-moment, and I was relishing my boys.
This lasted for 4 minutes.
Then the baby, my angel baby who never fusses, lost it. And I don't mean started with an easy fuss and worked his way up-- nope, he freaked! I got him out of his seat and moved to the end of the aisle to bounce as quickly I could... and it didn't help one bit. All of a sudden, the theatre of about 40 people morphed into 400 people and then 4000. I was dying. So I set the baby down on his blanket ON THE STEPS and ran back to my bag that was positioned behind Max to help him sit upright and hold the seat down and grabbed my Moby Wrap. The baby loves to be tied to me and it would certainly put him to sleep. During this, Jack decided he was going to the end of the aisle with me and nonchalantly picked up the full-to-the-top huge cherry coke that happened to be bigger than his head and dropped the entire thing. The whole theatre gasped- all 4 million people, and it had nothing to do with the movie. At this point, I was covered in cherry coke, Jack was covered in cherry coke and very upset that he had nothing to drink and my baby was on the floor at the end of the aisle, screaming his brains out.
I grabbed them as fast as I could and ran out of the movie. Without Max. Without my bag. Without my phone. Without my keys. Without the baby's seat. When I got out in the hall I just prayed that Max was ok and that he didn't feel abandoned although that is what he must certainly was! Now of course he was sitting right behind my girlfriends and his little friends, but he's my shy one who only likes to talk to me, so I just pictured him weeping silently. When I got outside, I put the baby back on the floor, no joke, to put my wrap on, and got the baby in it and waited for his instant settling. It never came. I bounced and walked and swayed and held the paci in his mouth, and still he cried. And honestly, I still have no idea what was going on. I eventually crept back in to check on Max with my still crying baby and saw that he was fine and ran back out. Jack was following along, and really as happy and complacent as could be, even though the circumstances were much less than ideal. We walked up and down every hallway, pointing to movie posters and discussing whether each person had a grumpy face or a happy face. We found squares on the floor to leap over. We used the mirrors on the ceiling to talk to and fake laugh at... and yes, we were the only ones in the whole lobby. The movie started at 11:45 and so at 1p, I asked the ticket attendant when Turbo was going to end, certain that time was almost up. He responded "at 1:35". I almost gave him my baby and left. Forever.
I was stuck. Stuck to the floor because of the cherry coke. Stuck because I had none of the things necessary to get me to my car and back to my house. Stuck because I didn't have my phone to call in back up. And stuck because my first born was still in the theatre (with all of my stuff!) enjoying the movie. I couldn't feed the baby to calm him down because there was no where to sit and no leash to tether Jack to me! I couldn't get the stroller because it was locked in my car. And I couldn't go back in the theatre for fear of my fellow movie goers who might not appreciate paying for a movie with the soundtrack of a screaming baby to go along with it. If the baby would've calmed down for even just a few minutes, I would've gone in and retrieved everything and ran away. But instead, I had to put my big girl panties on and continue bouncing around an empty movie theatre hoping my baby would fall asleep while trying to entertain a very busy 2 year old.
Finally, with 10 minutes left to the movie, the baby fell asleep. By this time, Jack was beside himself with his need for popcorn and of course I had nothing, so I couldn't buy him anymore and he was dying for a drink. So I decided to tiptoe back in and see what would happen... the baby stayed asleep... Jack got his rations... and I leaned back in the seat just in time to........ see the credits. When the lights came back on, and I collected my stuff, I apologized to Max for leaving him and he said "it's ok, I didn't say one word while you were gone." He also said it was the best movie he had seen yet.
Thanks for rubbing it in.
And as I drove home, I went over ways in my head on how to do it better next time. Where to position people, how to manage. I planned and thought and planned some more. Until it dawned on me. There will NEVER be a next time. I hope everyone enjoyed the last movie they will ever see in the theatre.
And by the way, my shoes are still sticky from the cherry coke incident.
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