Ghoulies, Pee and Blueberry Daddy.

I woke up this morning soaked in pee.

Not my pee, thank you very much.  Elly's.  Not Elly, the blogger, either (who, if she has not been peed on, will be soon).  Elly, my 3 year old. 

There are monsters in our toilets now, you know.  This is the worst thing that could possibly happen because I know the terror of a toilet phobia.  I am finally over mine (unless we are talking about snakes in high-rise apartment toilets here, but that hardly counts because we're not talking about that.  Obviously that is different).

None of us can be helped. None of us.

It took me until an embarrassing age to get over my fear of ghoulies in the terlets because when I was a kid, and we went to Frontier Video to rent movies, the Ghoulies movie case was always on display there.  I anticipated seeing that movie case while riding in the back seat of the car on our way there.   Like an attractive enemy, I would seek it out in the horror section; casually so that my Mom wouldn't see me doing it because for some reason she found it annoying.  But I was drawn to it, as if to confirm my fear of evil in the toilet- and I would look at it,  hard, for as long as I could manage.  Then I would walk past and build up my courage to saunter by it again, pretending I totally wasn't scared.  Again and again, I would casually sidle by, staring at the movie cover, eyes narrowing and steady lest the ghoulie with the tiny, wet, black, empty gaze and flashing grin jump from the photo.  I needed to see that movie cover.  I hated that movie cover.  That movie cover was a thorn wedged deep into my 8 year old side.

So I was afraid of the toilet and now it has come full circle and my child is afraid of the toilet.  Hers is thanks to Ghosbusters 2, which she saw at a friend's house.  I'm wracking my brain to figure out a way to help her get over it, but if this child is anything like me (Which she is.   Pretty much exactly), this is going to be a loooooong haul for her.

How do you explain reality to a child who believes wholeheartedly that she has an extra, imaginary friend called "Blueberry Daddy"?  It's weird, right?  I have to explain that Blueberry Daddy doesn't exist to all of her caregivers to ward off concern that her actual father might really let her drive the car and babysit infants, use sharp knives and that she never ever is really allowed to sleep in the dog cages at the pet store and that he has died about 1000 horrible deaths according to Elly.  Car accidents, House fires, diseases, choking, falling off the world.  It's all happened to poor, unlucky Blueberry Daddy.

In the mean time, I have the worst alarm clock in the world.  Will the toilet ever stop ruining my life?