The Locked Door Caper

I have to confess: I had my first real Mommy Meltdown.

It all began when I went into Elianna's room to change Selah's stinky diaper. It was nasty, let me assure you, so I was concentrating pretty hard. I had started to get dressed, since we were meeting Grandma for an outing that day, but the diaper had taken priority. So I was wearing my PJ top with no bra, and a long denim skirt. (Yes, there is a reason for sharing these icky details.) Okay, so that's the set-up. I am dressed in a very odd manner, trying to hold my daughter (who is doing an alligator death roll on the changing table) still enough to avoid her flinging baby poo all over the place. Then Elianna runs in and slams the door shut. She plays around in the room, running around and making all kinds of racket. Normally, I don't mind her energy level, but for now I asked her, "Honey, Mommy is really busy right now, why don't you go play out in the living room." She didn't stop running, "I can't. The door is stuck."

"What do you mean, stuck? Why can't you open it?"

"Because I locked it."

By now I had Selah clean enough to get her down and walk over to the door as calmly as possible. Yep, she had locked it. From the outside. All three of us were trapped in her room! AARGH! So, I did the calm rational, mature thing. I hollered. "Why did you lock the door?!? How am I supposed to open it? Blah, Blah, Blah! " (That's all she hears, I'm sure...)

Elianna rolls her eyes and looks at me like I'm an idiot. "Pull on it weeeely hard! It's just stuck!"

So here I am, yanking and rattling the door as hard as I could, trying to pull the hinge pins out (an impossibility considering they had been painted over about 57 times since the late 1960's), growling all the while, "It's not stuck, you locked it! It doesn't matter if I pull WEEEEELY hard, it's not going to open!" She opened her mouth to give some more advice, and I cut her off, "You know, just don't talk to me right now. Mommy is very angry with you." I know, I know, I'm a mean mommy. All I could think of was that we were already late, our oxygen level was dangerously low due to the fumes from the toxic diaper, and I had no idea how to get out the door. I finally had to accept that I was NOT getting out the door. The only other escape route was... the window. Now, they say that truth is stranger than fiction, and that is the story of my life. You see, her window overlooks my garden, which you would ASSUME meant a fairly nice place to drop if you had to climb out the window. Unfortunately, a few weeks earlier I had noticed a strange vine growing out the middle of my variegated hosta, directly under her window. I hadn't pulled it out, not wanting to disturb my hosta, so it had spread up the side of the house and in a neat patch around the hosta. Right outside the window. The strange intruder? Poison ivy, which I happen to be severely allergic to. So, I have to try to get out the window without actually touching the side of the house under the window, or landing on the ground under the window. My only option is to try to reach my deck railing (Which is a couple feet away from the window) and climb directly from the window sill to the railing. In a skirt. And in a PJ top I don't care to share with my neighbors. I poke my head out and make sure no one is looking. Elianna gets nervous, "Mommy, are you leaving us in here?" I resist the urge to tell her, "Yep, I'm leaving and you can live in there and think about what you've done..." Instead, I explain that I have to try to climb onto the deck, go back into the house, and unlock the door. She starts badgering me with a barrage of questions, and again, my meltdown continues, "DON'T TALK TO ME I AM STILL ANGRY WITH YOU!!!!!" She backs off, and I proceed with my stunt work. I hike myself up onto the window sill, then stick a leg out and hook it onto the railing. So, I am straddling my house, one leg in the window, and one leg over my deck railing, in a skirt, and I think, "Great, now what!?" I keep a sharp eye out for my neighbor, who fortunately never came out. I finally manage to drag myself out the window and collapse on the deck without touching the poison ivy. (Which is still growing there quite happily, I might add.) I stomp around to my porch, and suddenly I remember, I don't usually unlock my door in the morning! I realize that if I didn't, I am locked out of my house, and my daughters are locked in their room. Yes, that means I will have to climb back INTO a different window to get back in my house. I run over and with some kind of primal roar I jerk on my back door, which was unlocked. (Maybe it unlocked itself in mortal dread at my approach, but for some reason, it was unlocked already!) I stomp back to Elianna's room and open the door. She yells, "Hooray! Mommy fixed the door!" I just kept up my rather loud lecture on the dangers of playing with the locks, my allergies to poison ivy, and many other topics that she was completely disinterested in. I felt really bad later, since I am not a "yeller" and felt bad that I had thrown such a fit. I went to Elianna later and apologized for being so loud, and she kept asking me, "Mommy, are you still angee with me? Mommy, be happy, don't be angee!" I hugged her and assured her I wasn't angry anymore, but at the same time, don't EVER touch the locks again. Oh, and just to be safe, I'm sticking the key on the doorjamb.

P.S. We did eventually make it to Grandma's for our outing to Urban Toddler, and I took some cute pictures. When I get them uploaded, I'll post about our trip. So, yes, this story does have a happy ending.