Mile High Club
Don’t get to excited – this isn’t a sexy twenty-something stewardess’ blog. This is a mommy blog. So when I say I am a proud member of the Mile High Club, yes I want to insinuate that I have done shocking things in an airplane bathroom and lived to tell about it. However, what I am referring to revolves around a child pooping.
On our flight up to Ohio, the boys were perfect angels. They snacked, read books, watched Frozen. Associate A napped and Associate P made me very proud by going pee pee in the tiny airplane bathroom. Since we were toward the back of the plane, we used the facility at the back. I left the door open and stood in the doorway holding associate A so I could help associate P and block the view of his cute little exposed butt.
As we exited the plane, people complimented my children’s behavior and I smiled, unsurprised. “Thank you. They are good boys,” wanting them to think they were like that all the time.
Unfortunately, it would be an entirely different experience on our flight home. Not only was the plane larger, but it was nearly sold out. There were bad thunderstorms and turbulence, forcing people to stay in their seats for most of the first hour of the flight. We were of course seated toward the middle just a few rows from the middle bathrooms.
Associate A was already a hot mess because his lovie did not make it onto the flight with us. When we removed him and lovie from the car and packed up the carseat to check it, lovie accidentally got placed in the carseat bag. I of course didn’t realize this until we were nice and cozy in our seats, and there was absolutely nothing I could do to get it for him. He must have screamed “LOOOOVVVIEEEEE” for 20 minutes straight, before moving on through the stages of grief over the remainder of the 2 1/2 hour flight.
Associate P then threw me for a loop, deciding that after about a month straight of being obsessed with Frozen and asking to watch it all the time, today was the day he’d had enough. He didn’t want to watch the nice move that would occupy the vast majority of our flight, and keep both his and Associate A’s attention. No, today he wanted to play games on the ipad. If it were just he and I flying, fine. Or if I’d had brought two ipad’s, fine, each kid could have their own. But there is no way I could let him play, without Associate A wanting to try and play. Which just results in Associate P pushing him away and screaming no, and associate A pushing back… and so on and so on.
So I try my sales pitch on Cars and the 3 other feature films I had loaded up ready to go. He wasn’t buying it. We negotiated to Mighty Machines episodes, but I knew that the 20 minute episodes wouldn’t induce the long lasting zombie-like state I was hoping for.
After two episodes, eating every snack I’d brought and sucking down every last drop of water we had, I knew it would be time for a potty break. I asked Associate P if he had to go potty, and he responded “Yes Mommy – I have to go poopies!”
Oh no. Oh God. No this can’t be happening. My child is a poop-at-home kind of kid. He has pooped out in public maybe 5 times SINCE HE WAS BORN. Even as a baby, he’d hold it when out and about, saving the sweet release for the comfort of his own changing table. To make matter worse, when he does poop it is kind of a production. “Hold my hand mommy. Read me another book, Mommy.” It is not uncommon for us to spend 10 minutes in the bathroom when his duty calls.
Complete panic set it….for Him. Once I mentioned the option of potty, it became a RIGHT NOW urgency for his little body. I had no time to panic or think, I simply unbuckled them both and stood up. Associate A was overjoyed to be let free of the seat and squirmed and wiggled until I let him walk, not be carried, up the aisle.
The small size of the bathroom seemed shocking at first. I wanted to ask a stewardess, “Are the regulation size facilities?” or inquire if there was a larger restroom in first class. Alas, there was no time. Associate P wiggles in and he gets to the business of pulling his pants down while I attempt to pick up Associate A and close the teeny tiny folding door.
Associate A is angry and doesn’t understand why I won’t let him stand on the sticky pee covered floor in the tiny bathroom. Associate P struggles with his pants and I struggling with his increasingly violent brother to get a hand free to help pull the britches down and place my sweet child’s bum on the nasty airplane seat. What if he catches herpes??? At this point Associate A is crawling up my body and banging against the walls, door and mirror.
Associate P performs as expected. Straining and pushing in dramatic form, letting farts rip and giggles follow. Begging for a story. I keep insisting there is no time for stories, he needs to do a quick poopie this time, other people need to use the bathroom. “Oh Mommy, you are so silly. This isn’t a quick Poopie.”
By now, Associate A discovered the sink and has put together that there should be water in it. He screams for “WATER WATER WATER” and I cave, and let him start “washing his hands” …. i.e. soak us all with his excited splashes. This has the unfortunately side affect of making me now have to go to the bathroom. Great.
With one arm strapping Associate A to my hip, I wipe Associate P’s bottom and stand him up. I pull my britches down and sit for my business placing Associate A on my lap and with my free hand helping P get his pants up. In a moment of clarity I think about all the times at home I’ve had to pee with a baby on my lap as wonderful practice helping me survive this insane effort I find myself in now.
Associate P begins to wash his hands, which sets off Associate A to wiggle and scream for his turn at “WATER WATER WATER.” With P at my feet I have to hoist Associate A up higher almost on my shoulder in order for me to stand up so he isn’t kicking his brother in the face. Instead his legs are kicking the door and his hands grabbing at my hair and face.
Somehow, I mange to pull my britches up and put the seat cover down. I place A on standing on the seat and then flush. That was a mistake. The loud noise and vibrations set him off into a full on panic cry. I attempt to wash my hands while he tries to monkey crawl back onto my body. I look in the mirror and vow to walk out of here with my dignity. I am going to pretend like no one could hear our commotion. I am going to calmly talk my boys back to our row and sit down like that was the easiest potty break ever done.
I open the door and smile calmly at the 3 people waiting in a line that has since formed, and then try to head up the aisle to our seats. The one gentleman is holding back laughs, I can tell, and the others offer sympathetic smiles back. I’m greeted by a Stewardess who nicely asks if everything is alright, and I tell her I would be so grateful for a few more of those delicious cinnamon cookies if she didn’t mind.
We slouch in our seat and the cries for Lovie begin again. It feels like a lifetime before she returns with the cookies. When she finally does, I sit back and enjoy the peace and quiet as my two little angels happily stuff their mouths. I did it.
As I ponder the ridiculous situation I just survived, naturally I also ponder how impossible it would be to get two grown adults in there together, let alone how absolutely disgusting it would be to actually have sex in an airplane bathroom. I am convinced, more than ever, that the traditional Mile High Club is an impossible dream. However, what I just lived through is reality for probably hundreds of mommies everyday, just trying to take a trip with their Associates. We are the real Mile High Club members!
helped a toddler take his sweet time with a poopie, while holding another younger toddler
what is joy if it is unrecorded. What is Love of it is not shared. – call the midwife
EVPHO 