Bipolar Halloween

The morning started with a cheerful little Punk, excited to be awake and starting a fresh new day! Because it is HALLOWEEN and she knows that means she gets to have enough sugar to make her dear sweet fragile mother want to choke the ever lovin' shit out of her before sending her to her room for the rest of her childhood because for the love of all that is decent and serene will you just sit still and shut up for 5 seconds please!

Breakfast of champions was a healthy dose of sugary goodness in the form of Dunkin Donut Munchkins completely dipped and covered in the tiniest sprinkles humanly possible which are all over the house for some ungodly reason and I think that old Fat Cranky Bastard bought them for the express purpose to hop her up on sugar and let her make a mess so he would have a legitimate reason to bitch all morning about it because he just vacuumed the floor last night dammit and can't you control her and sure I can let's just give her a little more sugar so that is even more possible...yeah, right.

Following breakfast was the adornment of the costume. The beautiful Cinderella dress complete with magic light up wand and beaded crown to make her look like the best damn princess in the whole wide world. The dress had been drooled over for weeks. The indecision to either be a mermaid or a princess discussed with a very patient mommy on a daily basis. The time had come for her shining moment of a definite pick of "I want to be a princess!" I gathered the materials, let her brush her sprinkle ridden face and hands off all over the floor, and proceeded to try and get her dressed only to have her throw the biggest conniption fit and tantrum that she has ever thrown, complete with carpet angels, more snot than any child should be allowed to produce by nature and crying and downright bitching that she couldn't possibly wear this dress because it was too, and I am quoting the 5 year old here, "DAMN ITCHY!!!" and get it off right this instant before I get even more upset and do something you might regret like oh let's see how we can make mommy's life that much better by PUKING all over daddy who is trying to console her and therefore causing the FCB to sympathy gag and puke right back at her. Joy. Rapture. Could my day get any fucking better.

Being the good mom and house cleaner that I am I managed to get everything wiped up and corrected all the while listening to the ranting of a seriously deranged princess who was just not pleased at the itchiness of the costume she had to wear. I placated her with promises of zoo adventures and Dumbo rides and pizza parties with her friends and all the candy she could eat that night when she went out trick or treating. I lovingly and thoughtfully threatened her within an inch of her ass that if she did not stop the insane blubbering and whining I was going to rip the dress off her and throw it in the trash and she would never in this lifetime ride a Dumbo nor eat any sugary substance again. She obviously didn't take me seriously because she continued with the drama parade all the way out to the car since we missed the bus and of course this was all in her evil plans to make sure I attended school with her so she could continue to exhibit my stellar parenting skills/threats in front of the rest of creation.

We got on our way to school, and since I was a last minute addition to the field trip that was planned today for the elementary school kids to walk over to the middle school to go trick or treating I had grabbed what my daughter lovingly refers to as my "pookie" hat (spooky) which is a witch hat that is bedecked with shiny rainbow colored spider webs. BooYah! I was already wearing a black dress, so add a hat and you have instant costume! I was enjoying a morning drive while I was half asleep and dead assed tired from being at the hospital all night with my sister and of course having to get up before the ass-crack of dawn in order to beat traffic so I could be home by 7AM to experience the joys of dressing my out of control maniacal daughter, when out of the back seat I hear that the screaming is down to a whimper and I am starting to breathe a sigh of relief only to be interrupted by the GPS-NavSystem herself that proclaimed loudly and with much malcontent that I was going the wrong way to go to the zoo or the Dumbo ride and that this was the way to school and NO I DON'T WANNA GO TO SCHOOL YOU TURN AROUND THIS VERY INSTANT MOMMY BECAUSE I AM NOT GOING TO SCHOOL OH NO NO NO dribble dribble tears whine snot snot more snot pout.

We got to school where my daughter who is usually the first to unbuckle was sitting slumped over in her seat and refusing to not only unbuckle but get out of the car no matter what I offered her now because she knows it was a ruse and I am just a liar and full of shit and she was too smart to be tricked again. I grabbed all the school items we would be needing that day and told her that I was just going in to see all the other princesses and costumes and to see what the only boy in her class (who all the girls are in love with) was wearing and did she want to come and check it out with me and I was met with a pout and an "I don't wanna and you are mean and I don't wanna," as I pried her fighting kicking and screaming little body out of the minivan and dragged her little princess butt across the parking lot where I had to get help and it took two full sized adults to drag the ultimate hell no we won't go protester down the hall to her classroom.

The school looked great as usual for a holiday and was all done up in the Halloween decorations and all the little kiddies looked so cute in all their costumes and my little princess proceeded to continue her tantrum into hour two with even more snot and 20 minutes of complaining to anyone that would listen that she was itchy and needed to get naked and how mean we all were for not helping her to rid herself of the horror that is a Halloween costume. She even tried to convince her teacher (who used to be a nurse) that she had a broken toe, foot, leg, arm, head, body, and needed a doctor, STAT. The teacher asked me if that was normal. I paused in my attempt to wash down a bottle a Valium with a bottle of vodka and nodded at her. (Not really......well, maybe....part of that statement is true. You guess which.)

Once distracted with toys and friends she forgot all about the dress and life got back to normal. Everyone lined up to walk down the street to proceed with the candy collecting. At this point, my daughter had pulled a Sybil, and was completely cooperative and calm. Trick or treating went off without a hitch and the day proceeded as smoothly as it possibly could until it came time to take off the ITCHY dress to which my daughter threw another tantrum because she wanted to keep it on because..."I look too beautiful in it, Mommy!"

Thus concludes the early portion of the bipolar Halloween. After feeding them all pizza and some sugar, the teachers tried to put everyone down for a nap and at that point I made a beeline for the door because I didn't want to be held liable for any wrong doing and was exhausted to the point that any more drama would have sent me to the funny farm. (Crazy? I was crazy once! They sent me to Sunny Hill....inside joke, those who know will get it...) I gathered the itchy dress and my purse and steeled my heart against the tormented cry that came from my daughter when she realized that I was leaving and with the sacred princess dress. She was wailing, "Mommy, please don't leave me!" I am not sure if it was the lack of sleep or the stress of the day but I started crying as I walked down the hall towards the parking lot. Hearing my baby so upset at the thought that I was abandoning her to nap amongst her friends then to wake and play for the remaining 3 hours of the day was tormenting. I wanted so badly to hug her and take her with me, but at that point....I need the 3 hours of "mommy time" to nap and collect my sanity.

She came home hopped up on sugar and has been dipping into the candy bowl already and it is only 4pm. This should make for an interesting evening. I am off to decorate now. I must just keep chanting to myself...

I love Halloween!! no I don't! Yes I do! no I don't! Yes I do! no I don't! Yes I do..........

Edit: I keep having to pick sprinkles out from between my toes. I wonder if this is a collaboration between the Punk and the FCB to secretly and slowly drive me to drink.

2nd Edit: We went out trick or treating tonight. She put on the dress willingly and with enthusiasm. We went down two streets in our three street subdivision. It was chilly and it drizzled the whole time. I was miserable. She was in heaven. We got to the end of the street and turned around and managed to sync up with a little boy in a dinosaur costume. She then wanted to be a dinosaur. I told her next year she could be. We went to one more house. An old lady answered the door. My daughter stepped into her house and proclaimed loudly, "Wow! What a cool house!! It's so pretty! I wanna live here, OK Mommy?"

I apologized to the old lady as she was quickly shuffling out my daughter out of her house. My daughter then proclaimed that once again she wanted to be a dinosaur. I told her again, next year. She then stated in a matter of fact way as she climbed into her little red wagon, "OK then, I'm done trickertreatin and we can go home now."

She might as well have cracked a whip and said, "Home, Jeeves." I was too tired to argue.