Girl Interrupted

I'm sure all of you with children already know this, but when you become a mother, you lose all privledges of bathroom privacy. Unless Will is asleep or I'm at work, I have a shadow that follows me into the bathroom every time I have to go. He toddles after me and stands right in front of me with his hands on my knees, babbling some nonsense that totally makes sense to him. Sometimes he'll try to unravel the toilet paper, flush the toilet, or get into the cabinets. But usually he prefers to just stare at me with his huge, hazel eyes and try to climb in my lap. So when I am finished, I wash HIS hands too for good measure.

I did have a foreshadowing of this having no privacy thing. It came to me in a dream when Will was about 4 months old. I remember, because I wrote it down. Here is how my dream went:

It was a weekday morning and I decided to go to the grocery store. Craig was home with Will so I could take my time and the store was pretty empty so that was nice. I'm walking down an aisle and suddenly I have to pee. Luckily there is a toilet in each aisle - not like a stall, just an out-in-the-open toilet. The store's pretty empty so I decide to go. Well then I have to go #2 and some how I rationalize that I will be so much more comfortable finishing my shopping trip if I just go. But after I've started, two families (moms, dads, and 3 kids total) walk down my aisle. I'm not embarassed, just irritated that I can't poop in peace. The kids decide they have to go too. I try to explain to the parents (as I sit there on the toilet) that there are toilets in EVERY aisle and they could just use another. But the kids want to use mine, so they form a line and the next one up is standing only about one foot away from me. They start yelling at me to hurry and one of the kids opened a box of penne pasta and dumped it on my head. I start yelling for security and no one comes to help me... Luckily I woke up before I had to wipe in front of 7 strangers.

When I had that dream, Will was obviously too young to walk into the bathroom with me. But even then, I DID always feel rushed whenever I had to go because I had to tend to my baby for some reason or another. So it starts from day one with kids. It's like when women go to the restroom in pairs, except WAY more up close and personal than that. I'll probably never ask another woman to walk with me to the bathroom again... because now I WANT to do it alone.