For those of you who have been following me a while you know we had to travel last week to an out of state Mitochondrial Specialist. We learned quite a bit on our first road trip to recovery. The most important thing we learned is that next time we will sell whatever we have to and we will FLY!
No matter how many times I reminded my kids that this recent trip was NOT a vacation they seemed to get more excited by the second. By the time we woke up on the morning of our road trip to medical recovery located in the armpit of the world (Arkansas) I would swear every time I told them we were going for a Doctor’s appointment what they really heard was we were taking a cruise to Disney World.
It became pretty clear to me they weren’t understanding the English language when I saw a flash of hot pink and white stripes quickly pass my peripheral vision. It was Thing 3 running through the house all ready to go swimming in Disney World wearing only her bathing suit and pink goggles on her forehead. Oh. Good Lord!
It took us half a day to load the entire back end of the Tahoe with an obscene amount of household items, food, clothes, and toys. For craps sake we are only going for 3 days!! The number of bags we had filled with just in case items tipped the scales of being psychotic. At least we could feel comfortable that we brought enough to keep these kids busy enough to remain seated and quiet for around 90% of the trip.
We finally hit the road and I was just about to throw my feet up on the dashboard when I heard:
” Mom, the DVD Player is not working.”
I tried to ignore it because I thought Thing 2 was trying to play a sick joke on me. First of all, the DVD player was only a year old and it was only used ONE TIME! Last year when I traded in my mini van I couldn’t figure out a way to steal the DVD player without them noticing so, I was forced to buy an alternative for one reason. To keep the kids quiet when we had to travel. We bought one of those dual DVD players that attach to the head rests. It did the job last time so, we put it back in the box to ensure our sanity for next time. I had it all covered. Or so I thought!
I bought us a little time by saying we would take a look at it the next time we had to stop. For anyone that has tweens or teens you know this was not even close to good enough. Two backpacks filled with expensive electronics sitting at their feet and they can’t find a single thing to do while they are practicing being patient! NOT! We stopped to try and perform some parental magic but, didn’t have any luck. It was time for Plan B then I remembered all the nonsense crap we packed. We dug out the tablets, Ds’s, Ipods and jumped back on the road.
This is when Thing 3 decided she had enough. In the loudest growl possible we hear:
“Oh Man……NO NETFLIX?! ”
The Ipod touch doesn’t have internet in the car……..
This is when Thing 3 decided to take repeating herself to a whole new level! She started reading all the road signs which we had no idea she could do! As my husband would get on an exit she would be reading a sign from across the highway:
“WRONG WAY.”
“DO NOT ENTER.”
At this point I think it would have been better to hear Are We There Yet? We were so confused we didn’t know what the hell was going on! When we left the house we were practicing basic site words. Now, we were searching all over the make sure we really weren’t headed the wrong way down a one way street. Add this to the fact that Thing 2 had to pee at every rest stop we saw. The kid saw a cool fish in a display case at the first rest area and now he claims he has to pee at every blue sign he see’s!
All I can think in my head at this point is RCA, your gonna pay!!
In between road sign shout outs we heard “When are we gonna be in Arkan-sauce ?” a few thousand times! When we finally got there you would think my kids would’ve crapped out right away. NOPE! My kids continue to surprise me with the amount of stamina they have. It’s 3am and Thing 3 is hungry.
I should have known that was coming since her blood work the next morning was fasting.
7am came faster than I could have ever imagined. The only thing I have to say about that is someone PLEASE tell me what in God’s name is the point of putting a coffee maker in a hotel room if you are NOT going to supply cups??
COME ON!!
The blood draw was as fun as the car ride. We had to beg, plead, and eventually bribe with a $20 doll that had arms so flimsy she’ll be an amputee in less than a week! To add salt to the already open wound I had to listen to some extra large loud mouthed lady try to sound off with parenting advice in regards to forcing Thing 3 to walk in gracefully for the labs.
Please do not ever underestimate the volume of attitude that can spew from the mouth of an under caffeinated, tired, skinny white girl traveling with 2 tweens that have not eaten yet! WRONG MAMA. WRONG DAY. I didn’t put much thought into my response. I just reacted. Too many times I have been mad at myself for not speaking up. Not this day. Not this trip.
There wasn’t much else that seemed to go as previously planned during our first out of state road trip to recovery. By the time we got in the car to go home I would have done just about anything for a little peace and quiet. So, when the kids wanted to stop on the way home and fight each other in the gas station parking lot I thought it might induce quiet time in the car! Usually when siblings get mad at each other they stop talking!!
Not my kids….
Thing 3 showed Thing 2 who was boss pretty quick.
Give me ten boy!! There wasn’t much a fight here!
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