When I was pregnant, I had a theory. I figured you only have 10 months to literally eat what you want. There is a short window of time that you can make random requests to friends, family and complete strangers and actually have them accomplished. You only have so long before people will again expect you to carry not only your own bag but now the 75 lb. diaper bag belonging to the 30 lb. baby carrier you are also lugging around. So my theory? Milk it. For everything it’s worth. For as long as you can.
Unfortunately, my protégé has adopted my philosophy as her own. Now Brynna Grace Johnston will not stop playing after falling head-first from the ottoman onto a toy train. She will not pause even after 35 unsuccessful attempts to jump from the chair to the coffee table to the sofa. She won’t even admit defeat after cracking her head on the pavement trying to play soccer with the big boys across the street. But let her Daddy be out of town (which has been more often lately than not) and all bets are off. She will milk a sad face until even she laughs at herself. My strong, independent little girl suddenly can’t walk down the stairs without being carried or put her shoes on without help. She must be rocked to sleep and sometimes even then, somehow ends up in our bed. She makes the divas of Real Housewives look like amateurs!
Every now and then, there is a perfect storm. Sadly for my wonderful, kind, unsuspecting husband, he finds himself in the midst of chaos. This weekend was one such event. Thursday morning and again in the evening, I walked into the kitchen to find Brynna eating bran out of a bag with a spoon. Yes, I said bran. Straight, plain, granulated BRAN. I had to bribe her with pudding just to remove it, and even then, it required some effort. I was pretty sure it wouldn’t hurt her, but I didn’t want to be present when all that fiber started taking affect. (And since I was the only one home, there was no escaping that inevitability.) All was calm and quiet in the Johnston house until just before midnight Thursday night. At that point, BG woke up severely vomiting, proving the old adage - "too much of a good thing isn't good." It would seem that when you eat that much bran, it doesn’t even act as normal fiber. Your body just wants it out – immediately. I’ll spare you the details but for the next 6 hours, we nodded off, woke up, cleaned up, changed clothes and repeated the cycle. While I have never done so before, it was so bad, I joined her out of sympathy a couple of times. (Or maybe that was smell, not sympathy. Either way, it wasn’t pretty.)
Poor David came home from his business trip and spent the weekend doting on people. Call me immature, but I milked it. I took him up on his offer to finish the laundry and bed remaking. I let him take us out to dinner and take BG to the park Sunday so I could nap. Unfortunately, not to be outdone, Brynna pulled out all the stops on her “I Missed My Daddy Because I Love Him So Much” show. Audiences in the DC metro area are still discussing her performances at eating and shopping establishments.
So...Will I say I love my husband yet again? Yes. Will I say I won’t milk it again next time I have the chance? I can’t make promises I can’t keep…
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