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Messy Mornings, Hospital for the Holidays, & Landing on 'Lucky'

Writer's picture: Morgan BarrettMorgan Barrett

Updated: Jan 12

The coffee in my mug grows cold as I finally sit down at our kitchen island to drink it. I made it an hour ago, but I've been busy. The digital clock on the stovetop tells me it's 9:09 AM; I just cleaned up the kitchen after making the kids pancakes (I finally figured out how to make them without smoking up the whole first floor). It's about the only space in our house that is tidy and free of Alder's 'drivers' - toy cars, planes, tractors, dump trucks, racers, etc. that lovingly litter nearly every square inch of every room. It's an organized mess to him, though. He knows each driver: what it looks like, its special features, its 'family members', and... precisely where it should be located.


a pile of kids toy planes sitting on a chair
This isn not a random pile of kids' toys. This is Alder's 'flying things' family.

At the moment, Kory is stealthily trying to tidy up some of the clutter while Alder is distracted by a show about dinosaurs. I predict pandemonium once he comes out of his TV trance and realizes daddy has messed with his mess.


As has been the pattern lately, the twins woke up together at 1 AM last night, screeching (that is not exaggeration) for mom and daddy. Descending the stairs carefully together, Alder continued on to our bedroom and crawled into our bed with Kory, snuggling up and falling back asleep immediately.


At some point Winslow woke up and joined me on the couch. My wake-up call was her whispering to me that she peed in her sleep on our shared couch-bed; so upstairs to the bath we went at 7 AM. Good morning!

Winslow, having been woken by her brother, was a little more disoriented, needing some mama snuggles on the kitchen floor before deciding that curling up on the living room chair looked as good a bed as any. While she slept there, I slept on the couch next to her (Alder is skilled at turning our king-sized bed into a twin, leaving me no option but to find other sleeping arrangements). At some point Winslow woke up and joined me on the couch. My wake-up call was her whispering to me that she peed in her sleep on our shared couch-bed; so upstairs to the bath we went at 7 AM. Good morning!


A mom, child, and cat snuggling together on a recliner
After I got home from the hospital: Snuggling with Winslow & Hobbsy

...unloading the dishwasher, loading the dishwasher, feeding the dogs, letting the dogs outside, letting the dogs inside, wiping butts and flushing toilets, switching the laundry... All the things.

This morning I was (naively) hoping for maybe a half an hour to myself to slowly wake up from a shitty night of sleeping on the couch by making a latte and reading my book, but the pee situation promptly shattered that illusory idea. What happened instead (after the bath) was the more typical 2ish hour marathon of tag-teaming twin 4-year-olds' wants & needs with Kory: Turning on kids' shows, refereeing arguments over who gets to pick the show, fielding requests for more 'delicious pink' (Winslow's name for water + fruit punch Mio) and 'special water, special ice, and special orange' (Alder's name for water + orange Mio), unloading the dishwasher, loading the dishwasher, feeding the dogs, letting the dogs outside, letting the dogs inside, wiping butts and flushing toilets, switching the laundry... All the things. Until everyone was finally settled—for the time being—and I could sit and write and enjoy that cold coffee I made hours before.


A dad and daughter folding laundry together
Kory and his little helper folding laundry at the kitchen island

With the exception of one day (last Thursday), the kids have been home from school for 22 days. Winter break + 4 snow days as a result of a 2-day blizzard = a total breakdown of our normal routine. Toss in there 10 days of me being laid up on the couch with fever, chills, cough, body aches (what I assumed was influenza) followed by a 5-day hospitalization (during the week of Christmas, no less) via the ER to treat the actual culprit—pneumonia— it's been... an interesting month.


But.


But.


The messes strewn across the whole house? A little crazy-making, yes. But they are little worlds that Alder has created. They bring him joy. They are a representation of this phase of life we're in. I look around and feel contentment knowing that our house is a home. A place where our kids feel comfortable and safe. And those little messes are a part of making this house their home.


A child watching TV in a messy livingroom
Alder and his organized messes

The 3 weeks with the kids out of school? Yeah, it's frustrating trying to work from home while having two little chicken nuggets who have needs and endless requests of "will you play with me?" But Kory and I both work from home. We have PTO. We have understanding and compassionate bosses who care about us as people and as parents. Kory and work together as a team, sharing the labor of running a home and raising littles.


The 2+ weeks of me being the sickest I've been, maybe ever? It sucked, truly. For all of us. My body hurt, I had no energy, I wasn't able to contribute much to work, to the household, to helping Kory with the kids. I was out of commission. That was hard and I felt guilty; there were some speed-bumps in Kory's & my communication. I cried. I missed Christmas. But I had a bed (and heated blanket, bless!) to rest in. I got the care I needed. I got better. I'm back to 100% now. We made it through.


I look out our windows at the snow blanketing the open acres that surround our warm, loving, safe home. I know how lucky I am. There are wildfires ravaging Southern California right now. People have lost their homes, lost their lives, lost everything.

I look out our windows at the snow blanketing the open acres that surround our warm, loving, safe home. I know how lucky I am. There are wildfires ravaging Southern California right now. People have lost their homes, lost their lives, lost everything.


A stone house in a snowy landscape
Our home <3

I look at my children, playing pretend, with wild, unbrushed hair and mismatched outfits. They are safe, happy, fed, sheltered. I know how lucky I am. Bombs have been raining down on the people of Palestine for over a year now. I know people personally whose children have been critically injured, 'collateral damage' in a genocide we're calling 'a conflict'.


I don't need to invalidate the challenges we've come up against over the course of the past month by shrinking them in comparison to the horrible suffering going on all over the world. But I know that perspective is important. And ultimately, we are lucky.

I know that suffering is not a competition. I don't need to say, yeah, it's been a rough few weeks, but so many people have it so much worse. I don't need to invalidate the challenges we've come up against over the course of the past month by shrinking them in comparison to the horrible suffering going on all over the world. But I know that perspective is important. And ultimately, we are lucky. We are lucky to be able to complain about trying to juggle work and taking care of our kids. We are lucky that we have the safety of our home to retreat to in the face of inclement weather. We are lucky that I was able to get the healthcare that I needed to recover from pneumonia as a person living with CF. We are lucky that Kory was able to take PTO to care for the kids while I was gone. And that we had support from friends and family. And, and, and.


I hope, in this season of life, that you're able to feel lucky, too. Whatever that may look like for you. May you also, at the end of the day (or the end of a particularly shitty night of sleep), land on lucky.


A family posing with the snowman they made in front of their house
Olaf & the fam

—Morgan

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