Nope, Not A Balloon

Sigh. It’s my daughter. She has an air leak apparently, a big one…at least I think it’s only one.

My daughter wasn’t always this way, no siree. In fact, she used to be sweet, kind, and very helpful. I often wonder if she’s still there beneath this ugly mask of a teenage girl.

Don’t get me wrong, she has her moments…well I think they’re genuine moments…sometimes, and I love her, but I’ve certainly missed the sweet little girl that she once was. You know, the one who used to thank me for being the bestest mom ever, offering a hug and a snuggle when and wherever she could. And now, now I’m the world’s absolute worst mom and apparently comparable to the plague unless I have something that she wants, or can obtain because I have a car and it goes to the mall.

What did I get myself into?

Maybe she’s a bloody pirate? I had no idea that there was gonna be a pea soup spitting demon waiting in the wings shortly before she turned 13. Ermagerd.

Yeah, we all have our beautiful little babies and enter the new world of diapers, bottles (breastfeeding), and have our very first up-close and personal encounters with the puzzling nights of little to no sleep. This is followed by the often cute, small human years full of endless snacks, questions, and Dora/Diego. And now, for me anyway, I’m into the teenaged girl years. Cue the horror music.

These are the years full of boys, clothes, makeup, drama, cell phones, social media, TikTok, Snapchat (not Facebook apparently, according to my daughter it’s for old fucks and Boomers…what the ever-loving hell kind of bullshit is that?), chewing gum (her life now depends on this, which is my fault, and now it seems like some sort of MacGyver tool for teenage survival), hand-drawn dicks in Sharpie marker, and all-nighters. Going back to the disrespect about old fucks and Boomers, I swear, back in my day, if my mother ever heard any of us mutter anything like geezer or old, she would’ve dropped our asses like a piping hot Hot Pocket fresh from the microwave. The woman had a wicked, tooth shattering roundhouse (yes, my mother is a very talented woman…and scary as hell sometimes…like most mamas). And how hot is this Hot Pocket I speak of?

My past was very different

Well, if you grew up in my household, we’d often lock those bitches in the microwave for a solid 5 minutes and run away to take (or leave) a piss before it was ready. Our Hot Pocket priming time was set for longer because we’d usually have to run down from the second story shitter to the main floor half-bath to get a roll of shit paper with our pants down around our ankles, which means that yes, we were completely bare-assed, and that takes time. None of us asshole children would ever change the roll, nor help when summoned or begged. So those Hot Pockets, they be hot I tell ya.

Although I’d heard of this phenomenon of teenage eyeball rolling and sighing/huffing/hissing, I had yet to experience it, mainly due to the fact that Lola is the first of my 2 children to be of age. I used to laugh at the memes and all of the other hilariously frightening things I’d seen online and thank my lucky stars that I’d never encountered it. I totally thought my kids would never be like that and felt assured that I’d done absolutely everything right and that this would never happen to me or my little darlings.

Boooyyy was I ever wrong. Is there therapy for helping to accept that this is now my daughter? Is there a support group out there somewhere? I seem to be seeking far too many support groups these days and I think I see the reason why many drink in excess…it’s far cheaper and quicker than any other alleged remedy.

Plugging the leak

Initially, I tried to find some way to turn this annoying and startling noise off, but it appears that there is no button or hack to be found and really no sane reason as to what sets it off. Eventually, I turned to chewing gum (the teenage version of a pacifier) and food (specifically, fast food like Mickey D’s) in an attempt to plug off the annoying release, but that rapidly failed when she decided to stop eating here and there. Who do I write to regarding this manufacturer’s defect, I ask? Does anyone know?

As time has gone on, it seems to have gotten much worse, and now includes the use of expletives (my fault), insults, extreme eyeball rolling (one day they ain’t gonna roll back to normal Missy), unexpected crying, door slamming, and long periods of isolated fasting in the dark which will only be broken to raid the kitchen or refrigerator of any and all garbage, long after we’ve all gone to bed to avoid any interaction with another sane human being. In order to go anywhere, plying in the form of promised fast food pick up on the way to and from wherever, must be utilized and I admit, that it is startling to see such a small human devour so much food in one sitting, much like what you’d think a starving, rabid lion would. Scary, believe me, but at least she’s eating.

Do they ever just run out of air, pass out and come to as their old selves? Or do they eventually just completely deflate somehow and this is something that most certainly needs to be sealed? Asking for a friend?

Junior high school drop out, here we come?

Where did my daughter go? Did aliens remove her soul and replace it with some sort of demonic spirit? Who the hell is this human? And is she really human?

It’d be nice if she returned one of these days. Or just snapped out of it. I wonder if amnesia accompanies this because I’d really love to hear an explanation…

Don’t get me wrong, she’s a good kid, or so I’m told, but she’s definitely different when at school compared to here at home. That’s when she actually gets to school. She’s been good as of late, but when the schools shut down and then reopened over and over, she finally decided that she wasn’t ever going back…again, who is this person?

Am I destined to have a grade 8 or 9 drop out? I certainly hope not, but getting her there has been difficult, to say the least. Since they were allowed to go back to school, I acquired a few new jobs, professional time teller, personal life coach and when those fail to work each morning, I turn into a professional teen tamer/drill sergeant (I’m still waiting for my new net and bullwhip to arrive as my turd stick isn’t threatening enough…needs a little more appeal and noise). All are thankless jobs and really, have no influence…I may need to have the principal come by one morning.

Sharpie dicks

I admit that I was happy when Lola found a love of drawing/painting and have done everything I can to help foster it, but I ask, does she have to draw all over her body with a permanent marker? She’s far from 2 years old, so I really don’t understand this. According to her, yes, she needs to use her body as a canvas, and again I ask, why? It’s not like we don’t have paper, cavasses, sketchbooks, or anything else she can use, other than her own skin.

I’ve tried to warn her about drawing with Sharpie all over her hands and arms and the fact that it can transfer to places such as her face during the night, but she never seems to take heed. Dear Lard, I’ve witnessed this nightmare far too many times and it seems to replay in my mind in a never-ending loop. On the mornings when she actually does get up and manages to dislodge her nearly constant, permanently rolled eyeballs (which doesn’t seem to be a problem when in front of a mirror I might add), and she sees a large, freshly transferred Sharpie dick (this is the name I’ve given it) delicately and very clearly inked on her face, I wonder if she considers the connection. It makes me think that her brain has been oxygen-starved from all of the deflating I’ve heard from her over the past year.

I have to say that this is kind of entertaining because it prompts panic and anger aimed at me when it doesn’t wash off…and this is my problem because? I didn’t draw the dick and I didn’t sleep on it, ergo, your problem Honey, not mine. Now go get ready for school. And yes, I take her, dick or no dick.

Dick tattoos on the face…that’s my girl

I know that tattoos placed on the face are much more prevalent now, and I don’t think my daughter would choose (I don’t know if there’s any thought at all going on up there, so don’t quote me on this) to put the image of a dick on her face permanently, but I really can’t comment on her future endeavors. And why dicks? I could think of a million other things that I’d rather draw that in no way has anything even remotely to do with a dick. If this is any indicator as to what’s to come, you’ll easily be able to pick out my daughter, simply because she’ll be the one with a big dick tattooed on her face.

Jeebus. I want to tell her to just draw a fucking flower or something else for once, so that way when I drop her off at school people don’t look at me that way. And now I wonder just what they’re thinking when they give me this look…I didn’t do it…unless she’s telling them I did…which is what she thought the very first time she awoke like this…really.

I swear there’s absolutely zero thought about any of the things she seems to partake in these days. As a matter of fact, I’m waiting for the cheap curtains that probably aren’t flame/fire resistant to light up like a gasoline-soaked rag because they’re constantly in contact with an ever-burning, hot lava lamp. No matter how many times I’ve gone in and shut the damn thing off and moved it away from the curtains, it always seems to find its way back and permanently on, no matter what I say or do. I sleep next to a fire extinguisher every night, just in case.

Kids, like babies, don’t come with manuals

I’ve looked up more information about parenting teens than I have about anything else in the last year, and many who’ve written this information must have a different brand or prototype of teenager because nothing they’ve offered has worked on this kid. I’ve tried everything, and I mean everything. If there’s anything that I’ve done right, this kid’s going to be a very successful attorney someday. Jeebus Murphy, we’re going to have a lot of vicious criminals roaming free, Lard help us all.

I remain hopeful, pessimistically so, that one day, maybe one day, my child will be able to utilize something as simple as a garbage can….wait! Did I just blackout for a moment? Everything just went blank, for like a second. Did you hear that?

That huffing/sighing sound…oh wow, never mind. I think I just had a moment where my eyeballs just rolled into the back of my head and perhaps I deflated a little. OMG! Is it contagious? It must be (I see Caelan has been doing a little deflating here and there as well…Gawd help me)!! Wow, I wonder how much longer before I become as thankless and lazy?

Mom’s Wish List

The fact that I find gum wrappers strewn all about my house, sometimes within a 6-inch radius of a fully functioning garbage can, burns my ass. If that’d been me at that age, my mother (let alone my father) would’ve kicked my ass so hard, that any DNA swab of the inside of my mouth…cheek (if I ever had to take one and I made sure to say my mouth and not my ass cheek, just to illustrate just how damned hard that kick would’ve been) would contain the exact same toenail fungus that they’ve been growing on their nasty assed, ugly hobbit feet for the last 50 years. How bloody hard is it to throw a gum wrapper away? For the love of all things hairy.

Yeah, 2 can play at that game Lola! One of these days she’ll snap out of it…maybe…or maybe not. How much hope does one have to have in order for something to change? Don’t answer that!

Maybe, just maybe, she’ll actually get out of bed and get to school on time, or maybe she’ll shut her lava lamp off one day, or stop drawing Sharpie dicks all over her hands and arms. Right now, those things dominate my Mom’s Wish List, right after a beach vacation, a town fire department worthy of a swelteringly hot calendar, and a maid, of course. Really, I’m not asking for much…am I?