Tag Archives: mother

Best Mom Ever

Posted on by
13

As I type this my kids are nearly 100 miles away from me. I’m not talking in the figurative sense – as in I’ve reached some awesome meditative state and/or plugged them into Sprout and I’m looking at the bottom of my second glass of wine – but in the literal sense. As in they are an hour and a half away from me. Sounds pretty good, right? Wait. It gets better. Very, very early tomorrow morning, T and I will get up (happily) and hop on a flight for a 5 day trip to Puerto Rico. No kids. Just us.

The point of this post isn’t to gloat over my amazing luck, but to give a massive shout out to my spectacularly awesome parents. Not only are they looking after the kids while we’re away, but as a gift to T for his last birthday, my mom gave him enough airline miles to get us our tickets to PR.

So, if you want to know what the best mother on Earth looks like, that’s it. She’s the mom who takes her kid’s kids, and sends her kid and husband away for a vacation together. Don’t bother trying to be the best mom in the world, that spot is already occupied by my mom.

Thank you, Mom!!!

Give me Some Space, Woman! (er, Bunny)

Posted on by
21

Nicole over at Ninja Mom started a meme called Character Assassination Carousel, in which we get to have our revenge on the children’s books we hate but are forced to read over and over again. She kicked it off with a letter to Shel Silverstein in the voice of the much aggrieved tree from The Giving Tree. Next to ride the carousel was Kristine from Wait in the Van who wrote a hilarious and scathing attack on Love You Forever. Now it’s my turn and I’m a little pissed because those two already wrote about my most-loathed books. Fear not! I have enough vitriol to hate more than just two books!

I’m the type of person who needs my own space. I’m social (a little), like being around people (honestly, I like very few people), but really need down time, alone time, me time. I’ve always been very independent. Basically I’d be fine on a deserted island and probably wouldn’t resort to personifying a volley ball for company. I’ve spent a good deal of my life trying to get away from people without hurting their feelings, with mixed success. It’s not you, it’s me. (Are you wondering where I’m going with this?) All of this is to say that I sympathize so much with the little bunny in The Runaway Bunny.

I know, I know, this is a much-loved classic. What kind of mother am I to criticize Margaret Wise Brown? Meh, I hate this book. The poor little bunny just wants some space! But his mom does not get it. At all. Not only does she want to be with him at all times, she wants to smother him. She just can’t hear her poor little bunny’s pleas for freedom and independence. It begins with the little bunny’s declaration that he is going to run away.

“If you run away,” said his mother, “I will run after you. For you are my little bunny.”

That’s right kid. I own you!

RunAway Bunny

Clearly, this bunny wants to get a little distance between himself and his suffocating mother bunny. The book continues with the little bunny thinking of different ways to get the hell away from his psycho mom. He wants to be rock on a mountain, but the mother bunny threatens to become a mountain climber. He decides he’ll become  a boat and sail away from her. But she one-ups him by becoming the wind so she can “blow you where I want you to go.”

That’s right kid. I own you. Can you imagine being this mother bunny’s boyfriend and trying to break up with her? She has crazy stalker written all over her. You just know she’s perfected the ominous-love-note-made-up-from-letters-cut-out-of-magazines trick. Sheesh! No wonder there’s no daddy bunny. He probably had to get a restraining order.

Here she even disguises herself as a tree so he unwittingly lands on her when he's a bird needing to rest. Holy psycho!

Being that he is just a little bunny, his crazy mother (totally resisting the urge to bring Blossom and attachment parenting into this…) can out-think him in her attempts to hover over him for always. Outmatched, he finally gives up. You can almost hear his hope dying as he realizes that he is stuck with her.

“Shucks,” said the bunny, “I might as well stay where I am and be your little bunny.”

I give up. You own me.

Poor little bunny.

Next month Beta Dad, whose blog is worth checking out if for no other reason than the awesome header picture, will be riding on the Character Assassination Carousel. I wonder what book he’ll skewer?

Please vote for me by clicking the banner below – it’s a Karma thing.
Vote for me @ Top Mommy Blogs - Mom Blog Directory

Why my Kids Don’t Know the Alphabet and Hit Your Kids

Posted on by
34

Why should my kid know the alphabet? Because “the man” says so? Well, fuck the man. I don’t like the letters C, P or U so I’m not going to teach them to my kids. If they decide, at some later date, that they do like those letters, then they are free to add them into the alphabet, wherever they please. My children are special small people and I believe they know what’s best for themselves.

That’s right. My kids know what’s best. That’s why L has cookies for breakfast and is allowed to use the stove. If he burns himself, which I doubt he will, he will learn organically that placing his face on the element is a poor choice.

S does not like her carseat. She’s 1.5 now and old enough to know what’s best for her. I don’t give a shit that “the man” says it’s the law. Laws stifle my children’s freedom to develop at their own pace, into whomever they please. So I allow S to climb around the car freely as I drive. People are shocked by this and want to take my daughter from me. It’s not their fault that they feel this way. They harbor long-standing resentments towards everyone because they were made to share as children, and are still trying to seek retribution for having to give other kids a turn with the shovel in the sandbox.

I don’t stop my children from hitting your children. Confused? Don’t be. If my child wants to hit yours, yours probably deserves it. By not forcing my child to keep his hands to himself, my child will learn the natural way that hitting does not gain friends. Your child is free to walk away from my child. I am not willing to shove nonviolence propaganda down his throat just to please judgmental parents, society at large, and the children mine are beating on.

I don’t discourage my children from putting forks into outlets or drinking from the toilet, if they feel so inclined. Those might not be my choices, but they are not me. They are free to make their own choices, even if it means that I will suffer the heartache of mourning the loss of my electrocuted toddler. At least she had her freedom.

I don’t have to conform to your ways because I’m not going to send my children to school. They won’t be forced to confront society until they are adults, or whenever they decide they are ready to move out of my home. At that time, they will have the maturity to navigate the world on their own, because I’ve let them navigate the world on their own since the day they were born.

I’m not judging you for kowtowing to “the man” and sheepishly doing random things like teaching colors just because you’ve been told to. (If my kid wants to call blue red, then that’s his creative right.) I’m not better than you just because I’m not stunting my children’s individuality like you are.

I know I’m really cerebral about this stuff, but that’s just because I’m really freaking smart. Smarter than you are. But that’s OK.

Wondering what this is all about? Check out Blossom’s latest. I probably should have encouraged you to read that first, but I thought it would be funnier this way. I really don’t see my post as much more outrageous than hers.

Blossom says, “I have heard people say that those who force their kids to share, be polite, and excel on adult terms are really just creating children who are monkeys…” Really, Mayim? You’ve heard people say this? What people? Where? Well, I’ve heard people say that those who force their babies out of their vaginas are really just birthing children who are witless losers. I would never push my baby to come out if she didn’t want to. Just because by our “adult terms” we could both die if I don’t push. Why force your baby to enter the world that way? If my baby wants to be born, she’ll come out on her own. She knows what’s best for her.

Please vote for me by clicking the banner below – it’s a Karma thing.
Vote for me @ Top Mommy Blogs - Mom Blog Directory

Living with the Enemy

Posted on by
17

My family is a unit, here to support and love one another blah blah blah blah blah. That’s all true, but in day-to-day reality, for all intents and purposes, they are the enemy. And no ordinary enemy either. My children are super-villains. My husband my arch-rival. What? That’s not how you’d describe things in your home?

The super-villains adeptly lure you in to a false sense of security. They use their (evil) big eyes, their (evil) cherub faces, their (evil) giggles, their (evil) little hands held tightly in your own all to entice you to let your guard down, to reveal the chink in your armor. They want to know your kryptonite. (Yes, for the purposes of this post I am a superhero, what of it?)

Turns out I can be brought to my knees begging for mercy by 8 or more consecutive hours of constant noise. That is this superhero’s weakness. And L knows it. S is probably onto me too, but L knows for sure. Now I live in fear: what is he plotting? How is he going to use my weakness against me?

So far, he just keeps perfecting his attack methods. He knows all sorts of noises, some are better (worse) than others at breaking me down. When his voice gets tired, after maybe 7 hours or so, he knows that banging an action figure against something hard again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again…. will bring about his desired result. Evil, I tell you.

I spend my time trying to make conversations end. This is not easy. So far, impossible. What if I just don’t answer or respond in any way to his comment? Let’s examine a recent conversation where I employed this method. In the car we were discussing the movie “Beauty and the Beast.” He asked me who the beast is:

me: You know, the one who is a beast.

L: Who? What beast?

me: The guy. You know, the guy. The one the movie is about. The one who is a beast.

L: Which one?

me: The one who is mean and scary at the beginning but turns out to be nice in the end.

L: He’s still mean at the end.

At this point, I realize that this conversation is stupid and is unraveling me. He’s got the last word. I just won’t say anything else and we’ll be done with it.

L: He’s still mean at the end.

L: He’s still mean at the end.

L: He’s still mean at the end.

He doesn’t just say it over and over again. He waits 2-3 seconds between each time. Just long enough for me to think he’s finally finished.

L: He’s still mean at the end.

How many times is he going to repeat himself? Does he think I can’t hear him? What exactly is he looking for from me? I’ll just continue to not say anything. Surely, he’ll shut up soon.

L: He’s still mean at the end.

L: He’s still mean at the end.

Are you wondering how many times he said this until either a) he stopped of his own volition or b) I finally acknowledged him? The answer is 14. He said it 14 fucking times and at that point I was tempted to drive the car into a tree. Instead I decided to give him the smallest acknowledgement possible.

me: mmm-hmmm.

L: Is he still mean at the end, Mommy?

He’s done it. Used his evil powers persistence to trap me back into this asinine conversation. If you’re thinking that this isn’t so bad, multiply this conversation times a day’s worth. He’s up around 6:30 and goes to bed around 7. Do you know how many annoying conversations he can squeeze into that time? A lot.

But it’s not just annoying conversations. I’ve learned that with the Y-chromosome comes a whole host of sound effects. These include (but are not limited to): engine noises, brake noises, gun noises, laser noises, crashing noises, explosion noises, swords-swishing-through-air noises, and fart noises. Add these and the conversations to constant movement and my head explodes. SUPER-VILLAIN!

S is a mini super-villain. Maybe a villain-in-training or VIT. Her sound effects are vastly different and mostly include several unique and distinct whines and cries which she uses to destroy me on a daily basis.

As I mentioned, T is my arch-rival. I compete daily with him to be the one doing dishes rather than putting L to bed, the one “stuck” with S on my lap rather than the one playing some annoying L-game, the one still in bed rather than the one not still in bed. I will run to the kitchen and plunge my hands into raw chicken just so I can say “Honey, my hands are dirty and I think S needs to be changed, could you please do it?”

I live with the enemy. Who will prevail in the end? (That’s easy, totally them.)

Like what you read? Please click the banner below to show your support. One click is all it takes! Easy for you, good for me, we’re all happy.
Vote for me @ Top Mommy Blogs - Mom Blog Directory

So This is What Irish Coffee is For!

Posted on by
16

This morning was more stressful than most. We noticed last night that the house was cold. Nothing unlivable, just a cool 63 degrees. A few pairs of fleece jammies for the kids and extra blankets for us and we all went to sleep just fine. This morning – 53 degrees. I don’t know why, but 53 degrees in a house feels so much colder than 53 degrees outside.

We were frozen and couldn’t be in the house. No problem. Good mommy takes this as an opportunity for a special morning out! We go out for breakfast. The kids are starving by the time we get to the restaurant and I let L pick out a muffin from the display case. He comes back to the table followed by the waitress carrying a cheese danish. OK, so the kids can have a cheese danish. What a fun mommy I am! I feel like I’m winning the morning. We follow-up with some hot food and hot coffee (just for me) and we’re on our way.

Driving down the road where the speed limit is 40, so it’s safe to assume I was moving at 45, a bunch of bad things happened at once. First, I noticed that the cars behind me and in the oncoming lane started honking, and the drivers all slowed down and waved their arms around. At the very same time L started screaming. The car filled with a strange, loud whooshing sound. And it got cold. I glance in my rearview at crying, panic-stricken L and I see that his door is open. All the way open. Wide friggin’ open!

A note to Subaru manufacturers: you know that little white switch you’ve placed on the inside edge of the door, right at child-height, which turns the childproof locks on/off? Well, guess what? Children can play with it. And, apparently, they do. Maybe consider a different location?

A note to moms: when your kid does something that scares the living crap out of you, just let your natural emotions about it show. Doing so will scare the crap right back out of the kid, who will swear to you he will never ever ever do it again if you just calm down and promise you still love him.

Back home intact and in time for the heating guys to show up. 2 hours later the heat is back on and as I type this it is a balmy 57 degrees in here and rising. Soon I’ll take my coat off and be able to feel my fingers. In the meantime, this is what S has been wearing inside the house:

Despite how horribly unflattering this would be on me, I wish I had a fleece jumpsuit like this.

Under this all fleece number, she has on fleece pants, a long sleeve t-shirt, and a sweater.

Despite more temptation than usual, I have not started drinking.

Please help me get back into the top 5! Click the banner below if you like my blog. You can vote every day if you want to!
Vote for me @ Top Mommy Blogs - Mom Blog Directory

Poop Update

Posted on by
15

I’m sure you’ve all been wondering about and losing sleep over L’s poop issues. I was going to write this great post about how he hasn’t had any Miralax for almost 2 weeks, and he’s been going, without that much of a fight, a couple of times per day with nary a pooped-in pair of undies to be tossed! I’ve been ruminating on this great update post in my mind for the last day or two.

Then just now happened. Just now is not a good mommy moment for me. It’s bedtime. The kid has gotta go. It’s obvious. He stands like he’s gotta go; he squirms like he’s gotta go; he smells like he’s gotta go. So, I tell him it’s time to go.

“NO! I DON’T POOP ANYMORE! I WILL HOLD IT IN FOREVER!!” Out of nowhere. Suddenly tears.

Next comes me trying reason, trying kindness, trying scary-serious voice, trying wrestling and finally giving up and picking the kid up, tossing him into his bedroom while saying (yelling), “Fine! Then you can go straight to bed with no books, no PJ’s, and no brushing your teeth! Your teeth will all rot right out of your head!” Door slams.

He’s upstairs now crying, “Get me out of here!”

I am the best.mom.ever. Anyone want some advice? Come to me! I’m sooooo good at this. I can’t believe that it’s actually my job to raise this child without entirely fucking him up. Clearly, I’m not capable of this.

Hang on, here he comes….

OK, it’s now 20 minutes later. L came down fairly calm. I asked if he was ready to go and he said yes and went. Then asked, “Are you so proud of me?” I told him that I was not. That I would have been proud if he just went in the first place. Mean, I know.

Well, now he’s in bed fully evacuated at least. I suck at this job.

Fragile

Posted on by
6

I saw a friend of mine yesterday with her brand new, less than a week old baby, her third. I asked her how she was and she said, “fragile.” I can’t think of a more perfect description of myself immediately after having each of my babies. I felt like a broken live-wire, with my emotional nerve endings frayed, buzzing and sparking in their new exposed state. The slightest touch or breeze and they’d shock and jolt me. When kindly people came by to drop off a meal, meet the baby, see how I was, I lied and said “great!” when asked.

Here I am, self-proclaimed teller of motherly truths and I perpetuated a very damaging lie to brand new moms. I was not great, not fine. I was a mess and felt like I should not be trusted with this brand new baby. By the time S came around, I knew the baby would be fine, but I was again shocked, raw and frayed. In a moment, I could go from rapturous wonder at my new perfect baby, to despondently crying. My moods shifted on the slightest notions. I was fragile.

I had been told I’d be hormonal. And the few people who saw my emotional flare-ups reminded me that I was hormonal. But this was more, different. I had been hormonal before. Afterall, I just finished pregnancy. But pregnancy is different. It feels transient and thus less real. This felt permanent. I felt crazy. And I hid it.

Of course it was not permanent, and I was hormonal. Slowly my self emerged again, well, maybe a more tired shadow of my self. The fragility gave way to a new brand of strength. An ability to hold it all together, to move forward, to lead myself and my kids through each day no matter what presents itself: days of no sleep, weeks of colic, illness. This is the stuff that makes a mom a mom. It’s not something I could have predicted or had heard about. And even though I experienced it with L, I doubted it when S came along. But it did come back, reinforced and stronger.

I’m certainly not saying that my life is without challenges and I’m without days when I feel harried, emotional, and like I can’t possibly take another minute. But it passes and I do take another minute. And another after that. I don’t really know what the purpose of this post is. It kept me up until 1:30 AM writing itself in my head. Maybe I just need to publicly acknowledge that I lied to everyone when I first had my babies.

I have a few friends who are expecting their first baby and I hope they read this. It’s just my own experience, but in case you’re feeling fragile in the days and weeks immediately postpartum, know that you’re not alone, you’re not a bad mother, you’re not crazy, and that you will come out on the other end as a bona-fide mom. If you need help, ask for it. And if any twit tells you anything stupid like “it only gets harder from here,” or dismisses your overwrought anxiety, you can punch them in the face and blame your hormones.

Kitty is Depressed

Posted on by
5

Generally, when I think of my role as a mother, I’m thinking of my relationship to L and S. But long before I had them, long before I was even married, waaaaay back in 1999, I adopted a 4-year-old cat from the local animal shelter and thus first became a “mom”. So, it follows that my WTF moments sometimes involve her. Today’s WTF moment is the fact that my cat is on Prozac.

No, L’s defiance and contrary streak haven’t been getting to the cat as well. It’s actually S who was my cat’s last straw. This second child, another insult to my cat’s position in the family, just put her over the edge.

It started as a mystery. When S was a couple of months old and I was putting her down on the floor on blankets or playmats, I noticed a strong pee smell in the area. I couldn’t find the source. Finally, I found a wet spot on a blanket left on the floor. I blamed L. I thought he was acting out as a reaction to the baby and that he peed on her blanket. I got mad. He apologized. I thought that was that.

The pee smell persisted and one day I caught my cat in the act. (Why didn’t L deny the charge?) I could not believe it. This was a cat that had no annoying habits. She never meowed, never woke us up, didn’t scratch, claw at things etc. She was the perfect cat. I brought her to the vet. Clean bill of health. Went home with the advice not to leave baby blankets on the floor.

To compress a months’ long saga into a short one, the pee apparently soaked through the blankets into the carpet and once the smell is there the cat keeps peeing there. I used every cleaning product and concoction known to man. It’s through the carpet to the padding and probably the wood underneath. My only solution will be to replace my carpeting. Bad cat.

Months went by and we lived like this. The cat peed. I got crazy mad. I cleaned to no avail. Finally, I had enough. I brought her to the vet. Went home with the advice to sequester my cat to a different, smaller, area of the house. So, that’s how the cat came to live only in my master bedroom and bathroom. She has almost no human contact during the day. After a month of this, I guess she had enough, and she began her campaign of biological warfare.

As T and I climbed into bed, the cat jumped up and pooped in the middle of the bed. Holy shit. Despite every urge to take her outside and throw her in the woods  right then and there, we decided that what she needed was more attention and affection.

The next two days saw the cat reintroduced to the rest of the house, and to human contact. She was pet, brushed and held. She was around people all day. Surely she’d be happy now? Well, that’s when she peed on the bed and started peeing on the couches. That brings me to today. I called the vet. Prozac is this cat’s last shot. I’ve been feeling horrible all day knowing that soon I might be making a decision to put the cat down. She’s 15 years old, poops and pees everywhere – this is not a cat I can live with, and not a cat that is adoptable. This is sad. Maybe we should both start the Prozac.

So, wish us luck. Hopefully the Prozac will work; otherwise I’ll be facing a terrible decision. :(

New Approach

Posted on by
2

What I’m doing isn’t working. L is not becoming more compliant and cooperative no matter how much I bribe, punish and reward him. I suddenly see that I need a whole new approach. No matter how much I try, and no matter how much I just wish it would work, bending L to my will is just not happening. Somehow, L and I have to work together to get our days going more smoothly.

So, here’s my mission: to create a more peaceful home. My plan? Well, I barely have a clear idea of that just yet. But this will happen. Loosely, the plan involves:

  • trying to see the day and each obstacle through L’s eyes;
  • trying to incorporate him in a way to make things work for both of us, so he feels empowered and respected;
  • trying very, very, very hard not to lose my cool (which, by the way, I lose so often that I don’t even know if I have any left);
  • trying to always be mindful that he’s 3, and that’s why he’s acting like that;
  • trying to have fun and be fun.

I keep hearing that I’m not the only one struggling with these things, so I’m going to share my experiment with you all. I’ll post about my successes and, embarrassingly, about my failures. I’ll tell you what is working and what is not. I’ll let you know if, in a month from now, I’m better able to enjoy spending time with L, rather than constantly counting down the time until bedtime. I’m sick of being irritated all the time. I’m sick of missing out on all the fun we should be having. Consider the new leaf turned. (All of this is very easy to say right now, because L isn’t home. Let’s just see how I do when I’m facing the real thing!)

Bumps and Bruises

Posted on by
5

I’m accustomed to L’s scrapes and contusions. They are an often repeated fact of his life. Several times, every day, the following can be heard in my house:

  • quick pitter-patter of little feet
  • large crashing sound, (sometimes followed by smaller, follow-up crashing sounds; sometimes accompanied by floor actually shaking)
  • a beat
  • “I OK!”

Mostly injuries are limited to minor bumps and bruises. Occasionally a huge egg sized lump on the back of his head. Usually blood is at a minimum except for his string of falls back between about 1-2 years old when he repeatedly put his teeth through his lip. These were disturbing and gross, and probably, retrospectively, needed stitches since I now affectionately call him snaggle-mouth. (But T assures me that this deformity is really only noticeable by me.) Poor L is constantly covered in bruises that I can’t account for. Sometimes I’ll get him up in the morning to find he has a black eye – a surprise to both of us. I think he actually had a cracked rib for a while since he complained of tenderness and had some pale bruising in the area which lasted for weeks.*

But, it’s not L’s injuries I want to talk about today. It’s S. She’s on the go. And, I’m afraid, she’s stupid. She now crawls quickly and with purpose, and pulls up on everything. The stupid comes into effect in her choices of things to pull up on, and the fact that she looks straight down at her own hands while crawling, instead of looking ahead at oncoming objects like coffee tables. The latter results in bashing her head against said objects all day long. The former results in her attempting to pull herself up on objects of questionable stability. Like, say, a can of soup laying on its side which she has just pulled down (narrowly missing her little feet) from the bottom shelf of our pantry.

I’m sure that getting used to L hurting himself was an adjustment for me. It’s so commonplace now that it’s hard to remember if I was upset by each injury early on. But with S, I’m having a hard time adapting. It seems like only moments ago that she was this tiny, screaming bundle, always carefully protected in my arms, in a sling, strapped into a swing moving 35 mph in hopes of stopping the screaming (she was colicky early on). It seems sudden that she is now moving under her own power, controlled by her clearly feeble mind. I’m not ready for her bumps and bruises.

But my attempts at protecting her are futile. She is one determined little baby and she will not be held. She kicks, arches and suicide dives in such quick succession that sometimes I’m lucky to catch an ankle as she flings herself free from me. She isn’t fooled by my constant redirection (literally picking her up and facing her in another direction). If she spies a can of soup she wants to lean on to stand up, she’s damn well going to make it there and stand up. But, oh, Stupid Baby, why can’t you learn that cans of soup roll, and that this endeavor invariably ends with you falling on your little face on the tile floor?

Worse, her injuries aren’t merely limited to her own doing. She also has L to contend with. L, who loves her dearly, but also has an insatiable curiosity regarding cause and effect which leads him to experiment until he learns precisely where the point is where S will cry, where I will get mad. He is a thorough scientist, and although in my opinion he has found this point again and again, he is apparently driven by a surprising need for exactitude in this area.

Hopefully S’s mind will sharpen as she gets older and she won’t be saddled with being dim (and clumsy) her whole life. If not, her dogged determination should get her through school well enough. As for me, I’m not bothering to hope that she’ll stop hurting herself all the time. I’m just hoping I get used to it.

*I did talk to a doctor about L’s rib. He said that it certainly may be cracked, but there’s nothing to do for it, so that was that. Neither L nor I know how he may have cracked a rib.