Maybe I’m a masochist, but I’ve always found something super fun about watching scary movies, despite then being a jumpy neurotic scaredy-cat of a mess for the next couple of days. I’ll swear I’m brave enough to watch it, but then afterward I’ll have to do a running leap to get into bed just in case there is something lurking in the shadows down there that likes to eat bare ankles. I’ll leave every light on in the house always, and feel pretty certain that any faint creak the house makes means a serial killer/zombie/monster I didn’t even know had been invented yet is about to get me. I’ll be poorly rested and on high alert for days, all because of one scary film. Good times!
Luckily for me, these days I don’t need a midnight showing of a slasher flick to scare the bojangles outta me. That’s what my kids are for. Heck, I don’t even have to leave the house to be poorly rested or on high alert anymore. WOO HOO! Thanks, kids!
Here are some of the things they do that terrify me on a regular basis and keep my pulse racing:
1. Walk down the stairs in a way that sounds like they are falling down while holding a cash register full of rolled nickels and knives.
2. Make no sound in the next room. Nothing at all.
3. Skip over catching things like the common cold, and go right for the Black Plague/anything that requires quarantine.
4. Smear brown substances on themselves and around my home that look like poop…but is it?! I’m never quite sure.
5. Sleepwalk while saying things that only demon-possessed murders do in the movies, then ask me to lie down in their bed with them once I get them back into their bedrooms. Then they throw their arm around my neck as they sleep. OF COURSE THEY DO.
6. Creep into the bathroom and yank aside the shower curtain with something shiny in their hands, á la Norman Bates.
7. Innocently ask what the punishment would be if they accidentally pressed some buttons wrong on the Smartphone I had no idea they swiped from my purse and have been playing with for the past hour.
8. Cause me to look like an extra from The Walking Dead by the end of the day, so each time I catch my reflection I reflexively reach for a machete.
9. Save her own hair clippings in a plastic baggie like a serial killer keeping a trophy.
10. But don’t worry: It’s just so my daughter can clone herself someday. BECAUSE THAT KIND OF THINKING DOESN’T MAKE ME NERVOUS AT ALL.
11. Think it’s hilarious to not answer me when I can’t find them in a store and they’re simply standing behind a rack of clothing two yards away.
12. Only climb on things that like to toss children from them and crack their heads open like delicate little eggs.
13. Silently stand in front of me with tousled hair and all twitchy like the girl from The Ring as I’m waking up each morning. (Seriously, this one will never ever not terrify me. EVER.)
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