Looking For Some Potty Privacy Please

   
I have a Strawberry Flavored Pillsbury Toaster Strudel that I'm munching on this morning, along with a fresh, hot, cup of coffee to wash it down.

I think I should have put the setting on the toaster a tad bit higher, as my strudel is more like a pastry wrapped Popsicle than a warm, melted pastry treat.  

It's edible, so I'm going to continue to eat this.

I've got some sniffles and congestion going on this morning.  Just when I thought I was past this garbage after my one day hurl-fest last month, it came back, the sniffling and congestion that is. I honestly thought every germ was forcefully removed from my body after that whole flu fiasco and I swear I thought I even saw one of my kidneys in the toilet at one point and time during my 24-hour weekend hurl-fest. 

*looks over and nods at you eating your breakfast*

"How's those eggs?"

So now I get to carry around either a roll of toilet paper, a roll of paper towels or an actual box of tissue for the next two weeks or so. 

I don't actually have a box of tissue.

I have never bought a box of tissue since I've lived on my own.  I can't remember actually, the last time I bought a box of tissue.  We usually just run to the bathroom, or the kitchen and use whatever paper product is handy at the moment...except a paper plate...I'm thinking that wouldn't feel good on the nose at all, although I've never tried it.  I'm sure in extreme desperation we would resort to the paper plate proxy for tissue, but thankfully I make enough money to purchase our "usual" necessary nose products to take care of any post nasal dripping that should come our way.

Yesterday, while I was in the bathroom, MY bathroom I might add, trying to have some solitude and do my business, my daughter decides she is just going to strut right into the bathroom as my drawers hung around my ankles, shirt hanging over my kneecaps and I'm trying to do my daily duty, and she just starts talking to me like there is a couch beneath my bum instead of a cold, white, toilet.  She's telling me all about how she wants to write a song and she started on this song, but she can't think of words to finish the song and she isn't sure what the song is about it's kind of a friend song, but then it's not, and she wants my help with the song  at which point I tell her with a grin upon my face, "I'm sort of busy here", and she continues the conversation as though she is unaware of the words that just came out of my mouth or the obvious fact of where I was sitting, as she walks towards me and shows me the song that is partially-written in pencil in her Hello Kitty Notepad.

In my head I am cracking up over this. I cannot believe my nine-year old daughter is oblivious to the fact that I would just like to use the restroom in peace. So I look at this notepad and next thing I know her brother walks in, sees me and hops back behind my bedroom wall. 

I am grateful all parts of me that needed covering were covered. 

So now I'm sitting there thinking, "This has to end now."

He wants to know if he can get on the computer because his brother was already on the computer in the morning and he was on it a long time and now my other son just wants his time on the computer, as much time as his brother got.  

Yeah, a whole elaborate explanation without first seeing if I'll even say yes or no.

And yes, my daughter is STILL standing in front of the mirror with her notepad, as she admires her reflection, while he gives his elaborate plea for computer time.

"Are you kidding me???!!!Is this for real?! Are my kids really invading my potty privacy?!"

I thought for sure my youngest twin would be next in line, but I finally told the two I had seen already, "Look I need to wipe. Would you all please leave so I can do that and get out of here please?!"

My daughter is grinning as she tip toes out the door backwards and I ask her to please close the door.

I expected this when they were three and four, not nine and ten. I remember one time, my daughter at around age five or six was sick with the flu. I had just sat down on the toilet, and low and behold she knocks on the door and says she is gonna be sick. My ass never jumped up so fast off that toilet to unlock that door and let her in.  

I didn't get but a sprinkle out of me, but I flushed and hit that door so fast my head spun.   As a parent you will come to realize that it's much better to let them hit the toilet than the floor any day.

I wonder at what age, children realize how sacred bathroom space really is for a parent.  

When do they understand that when you see mommy or daddy in that room, with the glowing light coming from beneath the door that it is not a neon welcome sign for all to enter at will?

If they are sick, that is one thing. I don't care if they are fifteen, if they are sick and need me or as we say in school, "Fire, flood or blood", then YES, YES BY ALL MEANS COME AND FIND ME. 

But if you just want to chat, or you want to know if you can have the last Danimal in the fridge, then I'm sorry dears, but it can wait until I'm done.

If only it were that simple.

I'm sure no matter how many times I ask them NOT to enter my Private Potty Space they will find a way around it. Even if I lock the door, a simple penny remedies that obstacle on their side of the door.

It's a no win situation.

Some day they'll read this when they are older and they will laugh, and they will have kids of their own and they will understand and laugh even more.

For now I will just try and take their interruptions with a grain of salt. Laugh in my mind as I do, because I know one day, they won't be popping up in the bathroom unexpectedly with songs, and stories and requests to do something or have something out of the fridge. 

They grow up way too fast.

I will take a million minutes of interruptions over a million minutes of silence any day.