I despise clothes shopping. It’s weird, because I have really strong memories of loving clothes shopping when I was a preteen and I also really remember my mom hating clothes shopping back then. I wonder if her hatred of shopping and my hatred of shopping are linked by the coincidental introduction of a twelve-year-old into the mix.
ME (stupid, stupid me): What about this shirt?
12YROLD: I can’t even say what’s wrong with that one.
ME (angry stupid me): Well, I can say what’s wrong with the one you’re wearing…it’s about to be on fire.
12YROLD: Ugh! Whatever.
ME (switching gears): How about these jeans?
12YROLD: They look stupid.
ME (at least I’m not the only stupid one around here, I’ve now been joined by the pants): What’s wrong with them?
12YROLD: They’re too long. I won’t be able to wear them.
ME (stupid sigh): You haven’t even tried them on, how do you know they’re too long?
12YROLD: Everything’s always too long. You know, because of my condition.
ME (back to stupid): What condition?
12YROLD: Mo-o-o-om, my condition, you know. (looks around and whispers) I have elfilepsy.
ME (nope, still stupid): What the hell are you talking about?
12YROLD: I have elfilepsy! I’ve always had it! I have to take medication and everything, and so nothing fits right.
ME (stupid laughing): oh my god did you just call it elfilepsy??? Bwahahahahaha!
12YROLD: MOM! Stop laughing! It’s very serious and I can’t believe you’re laughing at me!
ME (stupid snorting): I can’t help it! Wait, now I can’t breathe! Really, I can’t breathe! Okay, no wait, come back, I’m not laughing anymore.
12YROLD: I always knew you were mean but I can’t believe you would laugh at me for this.
ME (this will never stop being funny): I’m not laughing at you for having elfilepsy, I’m laughing at you for pronouncing it elfilepsy! And for thinking it’s a disease that makes you short!
12YROLD: What are you talking about???
ME (trying to sound not stupid while dispensing medical advice): It’s pronounced epilepsy, and it doesn’t make you short. It makes you kind of shake uncontrollably and wet your pants.
12YROLD: Oh. So how long have you had it?
ME (she’s so stupid): Watch it, missy! Anyway, really, it doesn’t make you short. And wait just a second…we’re the same height! Why would you think you have elfilepsy if you’re as tall as I am?
12YROLD: Like I said…how long have you had it?
NOTE: It’s amazing how much you can learn to love shopping after that conversation takes place. Sadly, I did actually shake uncontrollably and pee a little bit every time I remembered her telling me she had elfilepsy.
ANOTHER NOTE: Also sadly, she does actually have elfilepsy. I mean, epilepsy. I’m also really kind of embarrassed that she didn’t know what it was. We should probably eat dinner at the dining room table as a family a lot more.
EXTRA ANOTHER NOTE: Don’t bother leaving ugly comments about what a bad mom I am, because I’ll just delete them. In all seriousness, she has the really mild kind of elfilepsy that is completely controlled by her medication, so it’s really not that bad that I never told her about it and that I kept shoving pills in her all these years and she never bothered to ask why I was drugging her. I just thought we were good. It’s a short people thing.
Lorca Damon 
Well, I didn’t pee myself but I did have tears rolling down my cheeks from laughing. That is hilarious! Elfilepsy?!
I dunno, tears sounds more like “confunktivits.” That’s the word he used when he told his mom our baby had gotten pink eye.
That is hysterical!!! peed in my pants reading it.
You must have elfilepsy, too.
Lorca, you and your daughter are amazing people! Not because she has elfilepsy, and you deal with it; but because she has elfilepsy and you can have a perfectly well adjusted mother/daughter ‘god, I can’t believe how stupid you are’ moment like every other parent/spawn on the planet. You (and your kid) rock, lady! 😉
Thanks so much! I do laugh with my daughter a lot, because we have another daughter who is profoundly autistic. We have to have humor in every situation, just to get by. So from time to time I look at the older (elfileptic) child and say, “And you’re the normal one?”
OMG I have ELFILEPSY! For years I have had to call my DH or children to get things out of my cabinet for me. My lifelong dream is to buy pants or a skirt that I don’t have to take home and hem. What is that medication that will make me taller?
Wow, apparently it’s a genetic condition, and I don’t mean the elfilepsy.
It’s little peeks into your life like this that convince me you’re one hell of a mom.
good luck to your princess and her elfilepsy
I don’t know, if I was all that brilliant at parenting would she have still been a) calling it that and b) thinking that it had to do with her height? Seriously, she’s supposedly in the gifted program! How smart can she really be?
very…my kids are so smart they call me dumb
My mum has elfilepsy. It’s a serious condition y’know.
Trust me, I was very aware at that time how serious it is. There’s no one on the planet like a 12-year-old to make you try to take something seriously! Everything is life or death with them!
Brilliant story! And great fun.
You are a wicked, wicked Mom, but because I laughed (and almost choked on my fruit salad) you are forgiven on both counts LoL xxx
As an asideIshbel has developed a mild form of efilepsy too, largely controlled by her pills but occasionally, last night for example, we were sitting ( at the kitchen table) having dinner when she had an attack where she stares into space and her hand, always left one, clenches into a fist and then is scrabbling about in her food when she comes out of it, she has no idea what has just happened, gives me a fright every time.
Awww, poor thing. But sadly, not where I thought you were going with her staring off into space and reaching with her hand. I often do the same thing, but I’m reaching for a knife. The attacks only happen when my husband mentions his mom.
I’m shaking so hard I can barely type this. What do I have again?
I think in your case it might be undiagnosed MAD (multi attentive disorder). It means I can’t concentrate unless there are 50K things going on at the same time!