You know those rare moments, the ones where you look at a mom with a set of kids that are crazier (in a worse behaved way) than your children, at least at that moment—and you think phew, maybe I don’t have it all that bad. I like mine at this moment. Not just love, because we love our kids all the time yadda yadda, but actually like.

Then, the world laughs, a roar of epic proportions. EPIC PROPORTIONS.

There was this mom at a class I brought my kids to the other day, that had these two kids that were off the walls. The older one even put a parachute over my two girls head, scaring them to tears. This kid was behaving so badly, that it made me feel sorry for his mom—whom I gave the I-get-it-nod to because believe me I understood. Once you are in this mommy game long enough, you have been to that place where you’re the mom with the misbehaving child. We have all been there. But at that moment, I still thought naively, thank goodness for mine.

Then, not too long later, it never is long after, there was the roar of laughter from the world I was waiting for

It was a roar in the form of an “accident” (quotation usage applied because I’m not sure said accident was really on purpose). I was buckling the baby in her car seat when my almost three-year-old-newly-potty-trained-daughter climbed over into the front seat making my “mom anxiety level” start ringing on high alert.

“I am going to count to three, and you better climb back here. One, two...” as my voice was slowly rising for her to COME BACK NOW, while finishing buckling the baby in, I heard, “Mom-eee, I am peeing!”

“Really? I just asked you if you had to go...”

*she looked at me like oh yes mama, say three now*

By the time, I was done strapping the baby in and made my way to the front to retrieve her; she was standing in a puddle of pee-- pants and underwear sopped through. Now, my daughter has had accidents before, and accidents are usually not that much pee. This, this was a puddle. This was not her “usual accident.”

“Great,” I murmured and took her out of the car. I wiped her down with wipes, changed her into dry clothes and undies, and then had to clean off the front seat.

On the drive home, I just laughed because this is SO typical of life. And this, is parenthood defined. None of us are ever in the safety zone. Right, when we are feeling confident, the mess of life comes back to haunt us in the form of tantrums, and sometimes pee on our front seats. But this, this is the beauty of it, how unpredictable and imperfect it is. And the love, the love these little beings have for us, even when they are at their worst is so real and authentic. Anything real, ebbs and flows.

So, world, that night, I laughed back at you, a roar of equally epic proportions, but this was a grateful cackle. Because despite the chaos, thank you world for my full and messy hands and my equally full and messy heart.

This post originally appeared on the author's Facebook . Her book Living FULL: Winning My Battle with Eating Disorder is available on Amazon: https://amzn.to/2O4mJId