I’ve noticed something. My fellow Momicillin writers and I seem to joke an awful lot about losing our minds. How many stories here have joked about ending up in a straightjacket, a padded room, a personal bouncy house, or a dementia ward? (Answer: Too many.)

I find this vaguely disturbing.

Is motherhood really pushing us to the brink of sanity? Why do we joke about it so much unless there’s a nugget of truth in there?  And why is it mothers who bear the blows to the brain? (I don’t think I’ve ever heard of a dad joke about ending up in a locked ward, pruning miniature bonsai trees after Junior gives baby sister a mohawk.)

Why us? Why insanity?

Maybe somewhere, deep within one of our X chromosomes, is a crazy gene that is just waiting to be activated with enough simultaneous brain stressors.  Like, I don’t know, giving your two small children a “double bath” and watching as your toddler son actually pees on your oblivious daughter’s head. Completely hypothetical.

And she has no idea but you SAW the arc hit the target.

Totally imaginary.

And it happened at the end of a LONG night of whining, tears, and tantrums (not yours, theirs).

Those added just for effect. Never happened.

And you really had a lousy day of work and got your only pair of nice pants wet (by rain, don’t be gross.)

Oh, and you just noticed a new zit. Perfect. Love how your face is accumulating imperfections at the speed of sound these days.

You know, something like that.

Pretty soon, you are laughing hysterically at seeing the pee before pulling yourself together to empty and refill the tub and wash your daughter’s hair. (Or just wash her hair in that very diluted pee water as the imaginary case may be.)

I’m just thankful that we mothers have such strong brain resiliency, we can bounce back from these mental insults and still face each new day with all our marbles. And live to joke about it.