It starts small.  A cover ripped off a book.  Maybe yours, maybe one of your kids.  You shake your head at the shame of this random destruction and vow to be the parent that doesn’t let your kid destroy their house.

Then, maybe they mash some cheerios in the carpet.  Not too bad, that cleans up easily.  Some milk gets spilled all over the table.  Ok, you get it wiped up before it warps the table.  You still feel in control.  You’ve got this.

It starts to build. You notice crayon markings on the wall (aren’t you glad you hid the sharpies!).  Another book has scribbles all through it.  It is one of your books, and even though you have many, it still hurts a little bit.

A plate gets smashed.  That was bound to happen, right?  You notice your bathroom hand towels have weird red stains on them and the counter by the sink has a quarter inch layer of soap on it.  Well, at least they are washing their hands!

Poop gets used as paint to decorate furniture.  You wonder how any human being could be so disgusting.  Then you look down and see the bedroom carpet that was “decorated” with a marker.  You notice pieces of the bathroom wallpaper are missing.  Your bedroom furniture has scratches from hot wheel car tires. More crayon marks on walls.  Blueberries mashed into couch.

All of a sudden you realize your wood floors are full of scratches.  None of your bathrooms have toilet paper holders attached to the walls anymore.  And your living room has a hole in the sheetrock where a plastic tray got thrown at it and stuck.

You yell out, “this is why we can’t have nice things!”

Yup, been there.  I hear ya, sister.  And its not like you’ve been a negligent mother.  These have been sneak attacks, that happen while you make dinner, while the kid is “taking a nap”.  Those few minutes in the morning when you hurriedly throw clothes on nets you toilet paper covering a room.  You let your guard down for a minute because it sounds like your children are playing so nicely together, and a spindle gets RIPPED OFF A RAILING!

We’ve been lucky to not really have the money to buy nice things aside from what we owned prior to having kids.  But the nice things we used to have;  yes, there is a bit of grieving for them.  Each time we throw away something destroyed, spend money to fix or replace something maimed or walk past a new mark of destruction that can’t be thrown out, covered, or fixed, we remind ourselves, “we’ll miss this someday”.  I only wish this period in our lives didn’t have as many crushed, scratched, broken and ripped apart pieces to it.

Tell us about your “we can’t have nice things” moment at sothishappened@bleepingmotherhood.com, or continue the conversation on our facebook page: www.facebook.com/bleepingmotherhood

We guarantee we can relate!