Poor, poor, pitiful me

I’m going to preface this entry with a disclaimer, in case the title did not already give it away: it is currently my time of the month, the dark cloud has descended above my head (picture Grumpy Bear from the Care Bears), and Chicken Little is peeking around the corner. Thus, you can imagine the tone of the remainder of this message.

My best friend once said, “Stay at home moms are so unappreciated.” I think that’s true. I think that statement can also be expanded to include working moms and, well, moms in general. If you’re a mom, chances are highly likely that you’ve experienced some lack of appreciation from one or more sources.

Your children don’t count, and this is why: if you provide a loving, safe environment for them to grow, then they live, breathe and exist within the surrounding of “unconditional love.” If they are younger than 10, this tends to mean that they can make demands and seemingly unreasonable requests and even stick their tongues out at you and you have no recourse except to uncover some form of novel punishment, which tends to become a guessing game to find what sort of discipline works on any given day. This is where I currently live, so I’m going to speak from this perspective.

Okay, so your children don’t count, but everyone else is fair game…including beloved family members and friends…yes, even – dare I say it??? – spouses.

Let me clarify. I am NOT speaking for my husband, I’m merely suggesting that there may be times that one spouse tends to feel unappreciated by the other. I’m sure, at times, my husband feels very unappreciated. Heck, he is outnumbered by females in our house. Not a safe place to be all the time. So I am only speaking for myself here, and how I am currently feeling.

Mom. Motherhood. Mommy.

These words are endearing, right? They conjure up images of the baby suckling the breast, cuddled in the mother’s arms, sweet expressions oozing from the mother’s face, hearts dripping out of that dark cloud over Grumpy Bear’s head, yadda, yadda, yadda.

Socially speaking? They also imply that no one is more patient than the mother, a mother never speaks loudly, a mother never yells, a mother never cries (unless she is weeping tears of joy or tears of sorrow for the pain her child or loved one is experiencing), a mother is the most gentle and loving soul on the face of the earth. Our Mother Mary in the flesh. “Gentle woman, quiet light, morning star, so strong and bright. Gentle mother, peaceful dove, teach us wisdom, teach us love.” 

Funny enough, even grandmothers can forget that they were mothers at one time. Although I believe that their “forgetfulness” is really a desire for you to be better, for you to not make the same mistakes that they may have made. Really though, mistakes are going to be made. Cuss words are going to be said, and then repeated, often, by your kids. Even your toddlers. And if they use them in the appropriate context, even better. You can silently give yourself a high five because you know you want to.

Here’s a dose of reality that we moms understand fully, but society is slow in coming to terms with: a mother is a constant figure in the life of a child.

Mommy is the first word that is uttered by a child that wakes up in the middle of the night. It is the mommy that is sought out for cuddling purposes. More often than not, mommy is called when a child is sick at school. Mommy is going to make the snack and she’s going to slice the apples and make sure that there is no skin on them. Mommy is going sing, mommy is going to play dress up, have tea, and then facilitate story time. Mommy is going to find projects to work on that include paint, crayons, markers, glitter and lots of messy stuff. Mommy is going to make sure that naps are taken. Mommy is going to put the plates in the dishwasher after dinner. She is going to immediately fix everything that breaks with tape and glue and maybe thread, and watch it fall apart within minutes only to do it all over again. Mommy is going to make everything better.

And…

Mommy is going to get yelled at and have doors slammed in her face. Mommy is going to be called “stupid.” Mommy is going to be told “I don’t want you anymore; I want daddy” (dads will be told this too, but it usually starts with mommy). Mommy is not going to be listened to. Mommy is going to be ignored. Mommy is going to hear “I hate you” more times than she will ever care to admit in her life.

And mommy is going to break down at some point, abandon her wits and argue back. She is going to yell. She is going to be irritable at times and her impatience is going to seep through. She is going to wish she were on a beach anywhere, ALONE, with a killer body, drinking a cocktail and smoking a cigarette.

And eventually, after all is said and done, Mommy is going to turn on Elton John’s “Sad Songs Say it So Much,” hide in her closet, fold up into a ball and shed sorrowful, pathetic-but-much-needed tears of pity for herself. Because sometimes that’s all a mommy needs to recover her strength and do it all over again.

Tell me lies, tell me sweet little lies

Little white lies. I find myself telling them to my three-year-old all the time recently. This is mainly to avoid a barrage of questions and the resulting thirty minute conversation about one thing in particular.

Here's an example. (Although they hit my lips so frequently now, finding one example in this churning sea of lies that I've been rafting on could be difficult. But since this one just happened, it's fresh in my mind.)

Camille stuck a bunch of stickers on our wooden credenza the other night. I let her. Because she was intensly into it and because she was quiet for about 45 minutes. Shortly thereafter, I put both she and her sister into a bath, ran into the other room, quickly removed all of the stickers before they left behind the impossible-to-remove-residue, and then tossed them into the trash. This was like two nights ago. Nothing was brought up about the stickers last night.

So this morning, Camille sits down to eat breakfast, and all of a sudden, "Mommy, why did you put your stuff on top of my stickers? I can't see them."

And the sea swells. "Oh, you know what happened honey? When I put my stuff down, I accidently ripped all of those pretty stickers, and there wasn't anything that I could do to save them so I had to throw them away."

Now, here's a golden opportunity for a life lesson, right? I could have talked about how it's not really good to stick stickers on anything wooden, or any kind of furniture for that matter, as sometimes the stickers don't come off, they leave sticky residue behind, they can discolor furniture, etc.

But no, I've discovered that the little white lie has the power to bring everything to a close right there.

I used to think that it was important to tell the truth to Camille and talk about why things were the way they were. As a matter of fact, one of those last conversations that I had with her was earlier this year regarding her pacifier.

She was trying to quit the binkie and was struggling. I explained to her that she was going through withdrawal. She asked what I was talking about. So I attempted to explain what the heck withdrawal meant and found myself explaining what smoking was to then explain what it meant to quit smoking, how it feels, and how this is all described as withdrawal. All the while explaining that smoking really isn't good for anyone, I'd prefer that she never do it, but that, at some point in the future, she would have to make that decision for herself.

????

So the little white lie. It's great. It's easy. It saves me some brain power.

And I figure I've got at least six more months to use it before she's onto me.

When is one more never enough?

I suppose one more is never enough when you’re eating Pringles or Lays potato chips or blueberries…mmm blueberries. Or trying to get in one more minute of sleep. Or hunting for a new pair of swanky shoes. Or if you’re Kenny Chesney, it’s when you’re drinking tequila. It’s endless.

Here’s the thing: for me, one more child is never enough. Whoa! What?!

This stretch of time shortly before the Fourth of July all the way through the lucky 13^th of July is a sorry, sappy and sore time for me. No, that’s being a bit dramatic. It’s not like this every year; only some years, like this one. Sometimes the events of this stretch of time 16 years ago slap me in the face just like it happened all over again. It’s amazing how death and dying can seem so distant and foggy one day and so real and raw on another day, even years later.

Let me bring this back around for you:

On the afternoon of July 3, 1995, I found myself seated on the lawn of my uncle’s house in New York with a look of total disbelief as the ambulance jetted off to the Albany hospital carrying the motionless body of my oldest brother, Matt. This memory is so vivid in its every detail: how the grass felt under me, how the air wasn’t quite stuffy hot, but wasn’t cool, and the faces of my two remaining brothers. I remember looking at my older brother, Jon, both of us staring at each other in total shock. I remember thinking, “What the f--- just happened?”

I’m going to leave that memory right there. Suffice it to say I was left with this one, distasteful - yet defining - thought that I’ve continued to carry in the back of my mind: my two remaining brothers. And it didn’t, and still doesn’t, feel like enough.

So after trying on the brilliant gown of motherhood, I’ve quickly become sold on the idea of surrounding myself with children. Till the day I die. In fact, I desperately thirst for more children (a wee bit pathetic, I know). I want to reproduce until my body can no longer handle that responsibility. I want, I want, I want…one more.

My husband told me in a heated discussion one night, “One more will NEVER be enough for you!” And it is so true. It won’t. I crave the Brangelina family. Adopted, my own, whatever.

Selfish? Yes. Trying to fill a void within myself? Most definitely. But I want one more.

And then one more after that.

Do You Know the Muffin Man?

For the past couple of weeks, the muffin man has been on my three-year-old's mind. Now, I don't really know the muffin man. Do you?

Camille, though, seems to know him pretty well. And is frightened of him. It started as casually as a simple statement, something along the lines of, "the muffin man is not very nice." I didn't think anything of it, "Oh this must be a silly game that the kids play at school."

That is, until a few days ago when I went in to wake Camille up for school, and she was shaking and told me that she had a bad dream. "The muffin man was trying to get me," she said. Again I asked who the muffin man was and she replied that he was not very nice. 

Now I was getting spooked. Has that ever happened to you? Something your kid says or does that makes your skin bumpy? For me, it's happened when Clara's been on the changing table staring into a corner of the room, the corner maybe slightly above and over my shoulder, and nothing you do to get her to look away works. "What is she looking at? Oh my God, there's a ghost behind me. Okay, just be calm." I always do the glance back while trying to play it cool.

Anyway, I was getting spooked. Who was this muffin man? Is he an imaginary friend of sorts? 

So I did some research the other night. It's a rhyme! Oh! Is that all???!!! I guess he was also mentioned in Shrek a few times, but nothing more than a casual reciting of his rhyme was done by Gingy. So what the hell?

First, I was a bit upset with myself that I did not know this rhyme. I don't mean to brag, but I know a lot of rhymes and regularly recite them to my babies. This muffin man annoyed me. 

Second, I was determined to find out who put this muffin man into my child's head. Was it a friend? Her teacher at school? Here, you have to be careful. I've realized that while Camille asks lots of "why" questions, she still doesn't really get the "because" part. Needless to say, I've been in many circular conversations with her, that have gone on for about five minutes before I've realized that I'm not getting anywhere - slow learner, I am. The trick is to NOT ask her any "why" questions.

So yesterday morning, I went into Camille's room to wake her up for school, ready to kick this muffin man to the curb.

I asked her if she had a good night's sleep, and the first thing she said? "I had a dream about the muffin man, and he was nice to me, mommy!"

Damn muffin man.  

I have a little shadow

Do you have a little shadow today? You know the type. The little clinger that follows behind you as you try to clean up the kitchen, cook dinner, go to the bathroom, etc.

Whether my mother knew it or not, she imprinted the following poem within the folds of my mind as a child. Not only is it one of my most favorite poems, but OH! the therapy it has offered! Learn this poem friends. Recite it to your little shadow. You will certainly find some comfort in its rhythm and your shadow will learn one of the greatest poems ever written.  

My Shadow by Robert Louis Stevenson

I have a little shadow that goes in and out with me,
And what can be the use of him is more than I can see.
He is very, very like me from the heels up to the head;
And I see him jump before me, when I jump into my bed.

The funniest thing about him is the way he likes to grow--
Not at all like proper children, which is always very slow;
For he sometimes shoots up taller like an india-rubber ball,
And he sometimes goes so little that there's none of him at all.

He hasn't got a notion of how children ought to play,
And can only make a fool of me in every sort of way.
He stays so close behind me, he's a coward you can see;
I'd think shame to stick to nursie as that shadow sticks to me!

One morning, very early, before the sun was up,
I rose and found the shining dew on every buttercup;
But my lazy little shadow, like an arrant sleepy-head,
Had stayed at home behind me and was fast asleep in bed.