What's that on the ceiling?

It was past bedtime and I was completely exhausted after 11 mindnumbing hours at work followed by a one-hour commute home in pouring rain. All I wanted to do was crawl under the covers and pass out. However, my children had other plans. I finally climbed into bed when there was a knock on the bedroom door. My three-year-old son, Dalton, wanted a drink of water before he could go to sleep. This was his nightly ritual and I was trying to ignore it, thinking if I ignored it, he would go away. Unfortunately, three-year-olds don't work that way. They are incredibly persistent about getting what they want. Dalton wanted a drink of water and he wasn't going to go away until he got it. So, I relented and got out of bed to get the water.

Now, back in bed, I could finally get some sleep - or so I thought. My husband, Will, worked at night and I was outnumbered by the children four-to-one. For the next hour and a half there was an endless parade of children at my door - crying, complaining, tattling and one nasty nosebleed. All I wanted to do was get some sleep so I could go to work the next day without looking like a zombie or falling asleep at my desk. So, I decided to lock my door and not answer it unless I heard what I call the "blood cry". Mothers know the different kinds of cries their children produce, and I don't spring into action unless I hear the one that indicates the shedding of blood. In my book, everything else is just crying wolf.

It was 1:00am, and although I could hear the faint thud of something bumping the wall, the kids were all now in their rooms and the house was relatively quiet. Knowing that I only had five hours left, I turned on a small box fan to block out the noise and drifted off to sleep.

6:00am arrived too soon and my alarm went off like an unwelcomed explosion. I reluctantly rolled out of bed and decided to get ready for work without waking up the kids before leaving the house. My mom was on her way over to babysit so Will could get some sleep after working the night shift. She arrived just before 8:00 and I was ready to walk out the door when I decided to check on the kids to make sure they were all still alive. Walking quietly down the hall, I carefully opened the door to the boys' room. They were both sleeping like angels. These were my favorite moments of any day - watching their angelic faces as they slept. It gave me a feeling of quiet serenity and hope that they would grow up to do great things.

On this morning, as I watched them sleep, I took one last look around their room. The blinds were down and the curtains were closed so it was dark, but I noticed something unfamiliar on the ceiling. Straining my eyes in the dark, I noticed that it was in several places on the ceiling. This seemed very odd, so I decided to turn on the light, despite the risk of waking the boys from their sleep. It took a moment to figure out what I was looking at because it was completely out of context, but then it dawned on me. It was poop! My two beautiful angel-faced boys had been up during the night throwing poop on the ceiling. (That probably explained the bumping sound I heard during the night.) These were not small poop stains or remnants of poop. They were full-blown three-inch logs hanging from the ceiling. I couldn’t begin to imagine what they were thinking at the time. How do two small boys decide to throw poop on the ceiling in the middle of the night? What goes through their minds that motivates them to do something like this? Did they have a contest to see who could poop the biggest and make it stick, and more important - did they wash their hands when they were finished?

Whatever it was, I didn’t have time to stop and think about it or to clean it up. If I didn’t leave now, I would be late for work. So, I turned off the light and decided to let sleeping boys lie. Will was on his way home and he could clean it up before going to bed. I was off to work – for my mental health. http://www.momicrelief.blogspot.com/