The merry month of May: ‘Geriatric’ parent looks back on one hectic day with her kids

I’m an older parent. When my first child was born, AMA was written on my medical chart. This didn’t stand for the American Medical Association, which one would assume, but Advanced Maternal Age. When I had my daughter AMA was “upgraded” to Geriatric Pregnancy.

Was I wrong to think that label was exceedingly unkind and really had overtures of mean girl? I think not. But the nurse who I asked about being called geriatric looked me up and down and said with a smirk, “Well, you’re a lot closer to being old than young aren’t you?”

I stifled the curse word I wanted to call her and chose to ignore her remark. But that doesn’t mean I forgot it because it’s been 24 years and here I am still talking about it.

But let’s move on to why I’m going deep about being an older parent. It’s because I recently got into a conversation with some young moms about how the month of May sucks the lifeblood out of you as a parent.

This is because May is crammed full of super fun (as in not really) activities that threaten a parent’s sanity. They include a myriad of school projects that all seem to be saved for the last month of school, field day, school performances, and, of course, graduation ceremonies that have seeped into happening for almost every single grade level.

As these moms were regaling me with all the stuff they have to do, I told them I understood because, you know, been there and done that. They seemed astounded to learn that May being the month of doom for mothers wasn’t a new phenomenon.

I took their surprise as an invitation for me to share my own experiences. It helped that there was the briefest moment of a conversational pause that enabled me to eagerly butt in.

I went with the biggest story I had. The day my daughter had a book report due that required her to make a 3-foot puppet of the main character in her book. My son’s invention convention creation was also being presented and judged, and it was field day followed by an evening all-school choir concert performed by grade level — which meant you, as a parent, were going to be there for hours.

This got the response I wanted: audible gasping, which, of course, was all the encouragement I needed to keep on talking. So, I went deep on details, like the book report puppet’s voluminous yarn braids that got stuck in the reclining seat mechanism of our minivan on the way to school, which required me to yank out the puppet’s hair, resulting in my daughter crying because her Laura Ingalls puppet was now bald.

My son’s invention convention went smoothly until a mom got in an altercation with a judge and they had to usher the kids out of the cafetorium for their own “safety.” I stayed to watch because, you know, why wouldn’t I?

During the field day festivities, a bear with her cubs (this was on the West Coast) sauntered onto the playground and mass hysteria ensued.

Then at the school concert three kids, all from the same family, vomited on the risers into the audience. (Their mom said it was probably due to some “iffy” fish tacos they ate.) Due to the smell, the concert abruptly ended but not before the odor caused two more kids to throw up.

When I was done with my true-life tale from a yesteryear mom, the other women were silent, which I took as a compliment. Because there’s nothing this geriatric mother likes better than a little shock and awe directed her way.

Reach Sherry Kuehl at snarkyinthesuburbs@gmail.com, on Facebook at Snarky in the Suburbs, on Twitter at @snarkynsuburbs on Instagram @snarky.in.the.suburbs, and snarkyinthesuburbs.com.