Mommy vs. Daddy? I just want to be the Good Cop for once!

Being that I was the first of my friends to procreate, pretty much the only advice we received for the first few years were warnings.
It only goes downhill from here! Just wait until he learns to talk, you'll never be able to shut him up! Good luck getting sleep or going out or doing anything fun EVER again. They will manipulate you and wear you down and make you age and ruin your body and DON'T MAKE ME TELL YOU WHAT THEY WILL DO TO YOUR VAGINA!

It's really a wonder I didn't sew my baby-hole shut after the multitude of frightening things that filled my hormonal head.

Not that it was ALL bad advice though. From people who actually liked kids... or really maybe they just liked ME- I was told that I'd end up loving having boys. Truth. That my kids wouldn't seem half as annoying
as other peoples kids- super truth. That potty training a boy is a pain in the ass- that one is almost literal if you take constipation into account.

Wait a minute- why didn't anyone ever tell me about constipation? Or about the vast colors of the rainbows I would see in the form of poop and may never be able to look at corn the same way? Or that kids still suck at wiping their own asses even years after potty training? WHY? Why would you fill my head with the details of love- which would have come naturally anyway- when important things like CORN POOP and BUTT WIPING are shocks that one should prepare for.

And WHY, pray tell, was I NEVER informed that I would be the "Bad Cop"- pretty much ALL THE TIME? Mean Mommy- which I have learned to occasionally take pride in because it means I'm not letting my kids run screeching around like little hooligans- is also exhausting. I have two boys, but I wouldn't consider either of them "Mama's boys"- not even slightly. Instead, because I am the iron fist, ruler of the land, enforcer of the law in this house since I stay at home. Although Thomas is also "Bad Cop"- he doesn't have to be it quite as often, so even as NICE as I am-the kids run to him at the end of the day and mean ol' mommy is left in the cold.

Bad Cop looks like so much fun in the movies! You get to be the bad ass with the foul mouth who terrifies the ever-living shit out of people and gets RESULTS. It's just not the same when the perp you're giving an ear full and trying to break down is your very own handiwork. Sure, sometimes it's amusing if your kid is just being a spoiled rotten brat and screeching over some stupid piece of shit toy they insist they will ABSOLUTELY DIE IF THEY DO NOT HAVE and you get to tell them no, but after the twelfth time of being told how unfair you are, or that you're being so mean when really you're just trying to do your best and raise them right, and then turdy husband walks in the door and they praise him like he's Kriss fucking Kringle with a sack full of toys in July... well... it gets old. And unfortunately for me, my kids are very cut and dry. Black and white. They are both intelligent (in my own humble opinion of course)- but not very sneaky. Good is good and bad is bad and the inbetween and the why doesn't really matter.

It's not that I wanted them both to try to pit their father and I against each other or when they want something

and one of us says no- but damnit- I WANTED TO BE THE GOOD COP!

There has been a shift in the wind for this seemingly eternal Bad Cop. As the children age, they learn new things. These new things they learn are both good things and bad things, whether we like it or not.

My once non-sneaky kids have become shockingly sneaky. If I tell them no? They run to their Daddy, out of my earshot, and ask him. He says "have you asked mommy?" and of course, they say no- knowing if I have already put the kibosh on it that it's not going to happen. Then they come running back with whatever it is I told them they couldn't have or eat or play with or watch and I have to be the Bad Cop again by telling them that they were ALREADY told no and the shit wasn't happening. Telling them no after they've been told yes after they've been told no INSTANTLY makes you the most evil person on the face of the earth.

Like I said, though, the wind.. it's starting to smell a little sweeter. Not like I'm downwind from a bakery- but the kind of sweet that only comes from standing next to a dryer vent and smelling that amazing aroma of warm clean clothes. Awwwwww shit yeah!

I was sitting in my bedroom, folding clothes or doing something else horribly monotonous and painfully silent. The boys were in the bathroom with Thomas. I'm not going to blame being hard of hearing on old age or anything- but really- I tend not to hear things- so whatever altercation went down, I completely missed it. There was a stage 4 meltdown going on. Alarms were sounding. Bells in the form of vibrating child vocal chords were ringing which perked up my attention- and then I hear, loud and clear, "I'm telling MOMMY!"

OH HAPPY DAY! I may not have had any damn idea what was going on- maybe the kids strung together a complete sentence using only curse words or dumped out a dirty-butt tainted bucket of bath water all over the floor or threw Thomas' cell phone in the toilet- and I didn't care. They were tattling on Daddy to ME! I'M THE GOOD COP!!!

Or... I was for the 30 seconds it took for the boys to get from the bathroom to my bedroom, because I had to do that whole stupid annoying "united parenting front" bullshit and agree with their Daddy- for reasons still unknown to me. Though I can't say it wasn't totally tempting to coddle them like babies and take full advantage of the situation- I didn't.  But it HAPPENED! And that's all that matters! MOMMY IS THE GOOD COP! IN YOUR FACE!
Yeah yeah, I might put up the united front force to the kids, but I laughed hysterically about it to Thomas later. You don't have to be mature all the time; no one ever told me THAT either. Maybe I need new friends.