I Shouldn't Be Alive

Hi. My name is Becky, and I am addicted to shows where people face tragedy and certain death and then miraculously survive.

I Was Bitten. Untold Stories of the E.R. Mystery Diagnosis. Monsters Inside Me. I watch them all. Morbid, I know, but what can I tell you? I'm a sucker for a good runner-fell-off-a-cliff-and-shattered-every-bone-in-her-body-but-survived story.

One of my more recent discoveries is an Animal Planet show called I Shouldn't Be Alive. (A better name would be I Shouldn't Be On Animal Planet Because I'm Usually Not About Animals, but whatever. As usual, no one asked me.)

The more I think about it lately, however, I'm starting to thinking that some of the near-deadly catastrophes many of those people have faced are less awe-inspiring than they probably think.

I'm sure a few years ago I would have thought differently.

A decade ago surviving eleven days in the bitter cold snow with no shelter, food, or drink would have seemed heroic. Living through a month at sea in a tiny life raft with no fresh water and sharks eating your shipmates would have struck me as downright amazing.

Now that I've had children, I have to wonder.

Yes, being so desperate that you're considering cutting off your finger just to have something to eat (that seriously happened on the last episode I watched) is pretty horrendous. But, has that boy ever pushed a baby - an honest-to-God, living, breathing human being - out of his body? I would have cut off six fingers if it would have gotten the anesthesiologist there with my epidural sooner.

Sure, sharks are deadly, but what about the gauntlet of knees and elbows I have to survive just to get out of my bed on those mornings when five people inhabit it? Just to be clear, that's TEN elbows and TEN knees. Not to mention ten little projectile feet and hands. Sharks may have sharp teeth, but you'd be surprised at the force with which a four year old princess can smack her foot onto a person's face.

Yes, trying to hike through endless miles of snow in your bare feet must be treacherous, but how about driving with three little ones in the car? Granted, these days it's much easier because my kids are 4, 5, and 7. But once upon a time they were 3 months, 1, and 3. I challenge anyone to find an activity more fraught with peril than driving 70 mph while trying to hold a bottle in the mouth of a rear-facing baby, retrieve a fallen pacifier from the floor for a one year-old, and listen to a three year-old pitch a royal tantrum because HIS CAR SEAT IS IRRITATING HIM!!!

The list of ways in which those car trips could have ended in disaster is endless, but it would undoubtedly include a high-speed collision, a broken neck from contorting my body into positions God never intended, or sudden death from a nervous breakdown. That's possible, right?

I'm thinking they ought to devote at least one episode of that show to me, the unsung hero. If not that show, they could create another one just for stay-at-home moms who had three children in three years (hey, it's my show, I can limit it however I want): I Shouldn't Be Sane!