Uncontrollable Air

For weeks and weeks and weeks - even months - I have been working effortlessly and unsuccessfully at helping McKenzie stick to her manners when it comes to belching. I don't so much mind if she lets a big one go in the house among family, or even very close friends, but she truly has a gift in being able to summon up a burp at almost any inconvenient time. I have been embarrassed at supermarkets, restaurants, guest's houses, church meetings and libraries. After the latest embarrassment scene at Chick-Fil-A a little while ago, I started being really tough on her: not allowing loud burps anywhere...even in our home, until she could learn to control it.

So while we were finishing our bedtime routine a few nights ago, when she literally bent in half to help force the air through her vocal chords at a faster speed, I lost my cool a little. "MCKENZIE!" I exclaimed, "How many times have I told you NOT TO BURP LIKE THAT? If you feel a burp coming, try to make it as quiet as possible...not as loud as possible!" Very frustrated, I told her to go turn the light off and that we would only be singing one song for bedtime.

She did as she was told and then climbed up into the rocking chair that Carson and I were already sitting in. She settled in, Carson was still wiggling around, and I started to sing their favorite song Goodnight my Angel. Well, I didn't get two words into it before Carson's little elbow dug right into my stomach causing me to sound something like this: "Goodnight mwaaaaAAAAAAAAAA" No, no...not a scream...a burp. A loud, long, completely unexpected burp.

This was funny on two levels: number one, I am not a belcher - at all. I very, very, very rarely have air in my stomach, so my children have probably never really heard me burp like that before - I don't remember the last time I have heard me burp like that! I even have this weird issue with my esophagus that makes the mere physical act of burping a little challenging (and, I know what you're all thinking...but it doesn't come out the other way either...)! And, number two, it couldn't have been 60 seconds since I had bawled McKenzie out for doing the exact same thing!

We laughed, and laughed, and laughed, and laughed in the dark that night. Serious, throw the head back, laughing. I couldn't get through the song, McKenzie literally had tears streaming down her face from laughing so hard, and Carson kept saying, "Mommy, why you go: MWAAAAAAA?" Making us laugh harder and harder and harder.

Oh, the joys of motherhood! I guess everyone needs a little uncontrollable burping every once in a while - expecially if it leads to so much uncontrollable laughter!