Dan had just returned from his Florida lacrosse weekend — sun‑kissed, relaxed, smelling like turf and freedom — while I had spent three days refereeing small humans who operate exclusively on chaos energy and snack dust.

We’d already had a full day of playing with friends, and earlier I thought I had found my moment of peace. I’d stretched out on a bed, sinking into the kind of quiet that feels like a rare meteorological event… only for two boys to discover me instantly, launching themselves onto my ribs with the enthusiasm of linebackers who heard a whistle. It was the same brand of ambush as the last time — the kind where you think you’ve escaped, only to be tackled by love, limbs, and questionable intentions.

So I declared — with the authority of a woman who has earned it — that I was going to take a hot shower. A long one. A cleansing one. A baptism back into sanity.

I made it to the conditioner portion. Not even the full wash cycle. Just the part where you think, Maybe I’ll shave my legs today, and the universe laughs.

Because then came the knocks.

Tiny. Persistent. Echoing through the bathroom like a horror movie soundtrack.

“Mommy… are you pooping?”

I froze.

I considered pretending I had evaporated.

But no — the interrogation continued.

“I can’t hear you. Open the door.”

“MOMMY ARE YOU POOPING”

I stick my wet head out of the shower like a sea creature emerging from the deep.

“No, sir. I am in the shower. The thing with water. The opposite of pooping.”

“Ok mommy. I need to see.”

I step back behind the curtain, clutching it like it’s my last shred of dignity.

I try to maintain decorum — a laughable concept in this household.

Then he announces, with the confidence of a man entering a boardroom:

“Ok I’m joining.”

Before I can form a single adult thought, that baby whips out his business and pees directly on my freshly washed feet.

My clean feet.

My conditioner‑soaked, hope‑filled feet.

A millisecond later, he’s stripped and airborne, launching himself into the tiny shower like it’s a waterpark attraction.

Decorum?

She packed her bags and left the building.

He runs from wall to wall — which, in a shower this size, is approximately three steps — inspecting corners like a building inspector who has never once visited this establishment.

He discovers my shampoo.

He washes himself.

He rinses.

He is thriving.

Meanwhile, I am standing there like a soggy Victorian ghost, wondering how I became a supporting character in my own shower.

After a quick rinse, I step out.

Not gracefully.

Not triumphantly.

Just… defeated.

Conditioner still in my hair.

Feet still emotionally wounded.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how my “moment of quiet” became a co‑ed prison‑style shower with a toddler who thinks bodily functions are a spectator sport.