My shoulders and neck throbbed, my lower back ached. I shifted on the couch uncomfortably.
“What’s the matter?” My husband asked.
“My back killing me. Will you rub it?”
“I guess,” he turned sideways to halfheartedly massage a shoulder.
“Uh-uh. Let me get on the floor so you can reach my entire back.”
I slid off the couch and rolled on to my stomach and took a deep breath. Then I gagged.
“What it is?” He asked.
“Smells like pee. Lemme move over a little bit.”
If smells are windows into our memories this particular smell was a portal directly to the nightmare of potty training three kids for what felt like 10 million years. I crawled over a few inches and collapsed, my face pressed into the rug.
“Ok, now.” I didn’t mean to huff the carpet but my face was smashed against it. “OH MY LANTA!”
“What?” Zeb asked.
“If it’s possible it smells even more like pee right here. What do our kids do on this rug? Just take off their pants and go?”
“For awhile they did.” He said.
“Good lord. Let me move one more time.”
I scooched over and tentatively put my face on the rug.
“Better?” He asked.
“Yogurt,” I mumbled.
“Huh?”
“It smells like yogurt right here…”
“So it is better then?”
“Relatively speaking.”
He massaged for as long as I could hold my breath then I got up off the floor and gasped for clean air.
“I’m going to take a shower.” I said as I swept miscellaneous carpet debris off my legs .
“I thought you already took one.”
“I did. I I’m going to wash my entire body, including my noseholes, in baby wash and think about how sweet our babies were when they were little. Hopefully those memories will help me forget what I just smelled. And I don’t think I’d stand barefoot on that rug anymore if I were you.”
I feel your pain, except so far our rugs only smell like dog pee. I know I’ve got the crazy potty training days coming for me, with a 15 mo and one on the way…and we still have the dog!
I hope you and your family are doing well and enjoying the summer!
Rent a rug scrubber but instead of using just regular soap, add a little baby shampoo. It works wonderfully! It doesn’t get the pee smell out. Just makes the carpet smell like a 9 month old…which is better then having carpet that smells just like a porta-john.
Yes! Parallel lives..even the half assed back rubs given begrudgingly by the hubs.
Bethany Thies recently posted..Organic + Conventional – Big Box Store > Shopping Local = First World Problems
Potty training now while nursing a newborn….Oxyclean w/ H2o in a spray bottle works for us. A huge thank you for Nestle chocolate chips, they are rewards for the trainee and trainer
When we moved out of our last apartment, the owners used one of those UV lights to see if they needed to replace our carpet. After potty training two dogs in that apartment, I couldn’t have been more disgusted to see what the UV light saw. I’m still scrubbing that grossness off my feet. Eww.
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Hysterical! I’m afraid if I got on the floor, I couldn’t get back up. Probably best if I didn’t, because I never thought of how bad it could smell down there.
My wife just told me she wanted us to go to a couples massage class because I give terrible back rubs. The thing is, I have very skinny, bony fingers, and she doesn’t just want a rub, she wants it hard, the kind of hard that would have me squealing and crying like a baby. I just don’t have that much power in my little fingers. I don’t know what people outside the room would think if they heard her angrily shouting at me, “harder! Come on, harder, you big baby!”
Enjoying your blog.
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wow. Can’t wait for potty training. Must take a mental note to pull up all rugs and cover everything in plastic. yikes!
Motherhood on the Rocks recently posted..ALOHA FRIDAY: POOL SAFETY
I have such an urge to smell my carpet now.
I wouldnt recommend it.
Reminds me of the carpet at our previous house. The pee smell was from dog accidents that occurred in the midst of potty training them. I shampooed the heck out of that carpet numerous times with a steam cleaner. Even so I couldn’t stand to lay on it.