Thursday, January 23, 2014

You don't deserve your kids

I recently received a rather nasty, hateful email through my blog from a reader who said that I was a horrible, rotten, selfish mother who didn’t deserve my kids because I cracked a few jokes aimed at motherhood and I vented about my less than perfect day. This got me to thinking that perhaps she does have a point.  Maybe I don’t always deserve my kids.

Before you panic and send me more hate mail, please let sit back and let me tell you a little story about my day.   Today started out pretty normal, but quickly escalated into a big ole flop of failure.   I was driving across town to pick up my older kids from school. My two toddler boys were buckled into their car seats.  The radio was playing, my dog was happily peering out the window, and all was good in my world.  Then suddenly just like that, something went terribly wrong.  My newly turned four year old for whatever reason, decided that he wanted me to drive in a different direction than I normally do.  A direction that would’ve made it impossible to reach my final destination.  It just wasn’t going to happen, no matter how much he screamed or cried.  Realizing that he wasn’t getting his way he began to kick his feet into the air and scream.  I feebly attempted to calm him down by trying to talk to him in a stern voice.  It didn’t work.  Then I gave him a warning: “You will be going straight to bed when we get home little man if you don’t stop it”.  That didn’t work either.  And finally I just tried to ignore it.  You can guess how well that worked out.

I picked up the older kids and began my drive home.  Apparently my youngest son was just warming up as the screaming intensified and got louder and louder.  I tried to pretend that I was listening to a new screamo rock band. It used to be all the rage, right?   When that didn’t work I silently prayed that Peanut would temporary lose his voice, just until we got home and weren’t confined to a tiny space without an escape.  When that didn’t work, I briefly fantasized about a giant bird swooping down and plucking me out of the window and carrying me away to a land of peace and tranquility, whatever the hell that means. The damn bird could've dumped my ass off at Starbucks and that would've been fine with me. The drive home was painful for everyone but I knew I had to get home as quickly as possible.  It didn't help that I got stuck behind an elderly driver going 15 mph the entire drive home.  Happens to me every. single. time.

I pulled into my driveway but things continued to downward spiral.  By the time the minivan door slid open, my baby Godzilla was in full blown, “somebody kill me now”, meltdown mode.  Suddenly his car seat buckle seemed to be held together by rubber cement and I struggled to unfasten it.  My normally petite, feather weight of a son, suddenly felt like an elephant whom was pregnant with twin baby elephants.

It’s a known fact that every single time one of my kids is going postal, my childless by choice neighbors just happen to be outside to see the show.  They shot me their usual disapproving daggers of discontent and relief that they were able to walk inside to a quiet house, while I tried to pry Gumby out of my van who now had a kung fu, Spiderman grip on the frame of the van.

I carefully removed his kung fu grip, one tiny finger at a time, immediately walked him inside and put him to bed (like I threatened earlier) and then I collapsed onto my bed, still wearing my coat and shoes.  Tears began to fill my eyes and I thought to myself “Why do I deserve this?” I love my kids more than life itself. My kids have always come first.  I turn off my shows so they can watch their annoying kid shows, even though I’d rather pluck out my eyeballs with a fork than have to watch another episode of Mario Bros.  I give them my last piece of candy, even if it’s my very favorite. I sit in long pick up lines at school even though I’m bored out of my mind, and I read them bedtime stories until my tired voice cracks and my tonsils begin to ache.  Am I saying i'm perfect? Obviously not. I think anyone who has read my blog can figure that one out on their own.  There is nothing I love more than to make jokes at my own expense.  But to say I don't deserve my kids because I don't find every aspect of motherhood magical is a low blow and pretty ridiculous.

Parenthood is tough.  It’s not always sunshine and roses. If you have kids then I’m preaching to the choir, but what I don’t understand though, is why it’s not acceptable to vent when we have an occasional rough day?  We should be supporting each other instead of sending nasty grams to someone telling them how they don’t deserve their child because they dared to complain.  I can think of many examples of why some people don't deserve kids.  This isn't one of them.

There is a definite attitude on the Internet that mothers who complain about their children are somehow not worthy or deserving of having kids.  That if we complain, that must mean we don’t love or appreciate our children.  Or worse we post a seemingly harmless vent about something irritating our kid did and all we're looking for is a sympathetic, "Hugs" or "I get it" and instead we're told things like, "Be grateful that your child doesn't have cancer."  Huh?  I must've missed the memo that states only parents who have a child with a catastrophic illness are allowed to vent. Rather we’re supposed to suck it up no matter how tough things get, suffer in silence, cry in the bathroom and tell no one, or share picture perfect Pinterest-worthy photos, pretending to be supermom, when we're really not.

The next time you see a child having a colossal meltdown in the grocery store because a mom stands firm and tells her little darling no to the 20 lb bag of Laffy Taffy, or you read a post on the internet written by a mom (or dad) who had a rotten day and are simply frustrated and at the end of his or her rope, try not to judge. Be thankful that your day was frustration free. Tomorrow you might not be so lucky.

And whatever happened to screaming Mr. Peanut you may be wondering? He fell asleep in time out and i'm staring at his adorable chubby cheeks and thinking, "Thank GAWD he's asleep."  
As for my internet hater, I wish she wouldn't of remained anonymous so I could've emailed her back and asked if she wanted to babysit.  I’d love to soak in her infinite wisdom since she appears to have this parenting stuff down.




Monday, January 6, 2014

I'm back. Lucky you.

You may have been wondering where I went this past month or two?  Or maybe you're not. Either way, i'm going to tell you. I took the holidays off from blogging and showering (kidding. Sort of).  Why? Because I was so busy baking cookies and spreading holiday joy that I didn't have time to write.  Are you buying this?  Me either.  The real reason is, I simply didn't have anything blog worthy to write about.  Well, that and I have a slight Amazon addiction during the holidays so I was pretty much glued to my laptop ordering more toys for kids who don't need anymore toys.  I made a vow to the husband this year that I wouldn't buy anything with small pieces.  You should've seen his face when our daughter opened up her giant Monster High High School Playset and he looked at me with that "What in the hell is that monstrosity?" look.  I refused to make eye contact with him when the boys started tearing open the Playmobil stuff. I promised after the last couple of Christmases that I would never purchase another Playmobil item again. At least not for our own kids.  Our grandkids will be getting loads of it every single year, along with toys that make noise, stain your furniture and smell bad.  You're welcome kids!

So yeah, I suppose I could've babbled on and on and on about stupid things, but when I babble, I tend to give out way too much personal info and before you know it i'm describing my hemorrhoids to perfect strangers. And I don't even have hemorrhoids so then i'd be blogging without integrity. Slap me. Please.

This morning was the first day back to school.  I couldn't sleep so I was wide awake until 5 am. The alarm went off at 7:30 but I ignored it.  Then a few minutes later I heard a little voice calling out "Mom, come wipe my butt". I tried to ignore it but it didn't go away. It never does.  So I got up. In case you didn't know, unconditional love is crawling out of your warm, comfy bed to wipe a child's butt.  I wish I could say that I wake up every morning and seize the day and stuff, but I don't.  It's more like I stumble into the kitchen in a zombie like state and stuff a handful of Captain Crunch Berries into my mouth.

I was so tired this morning that I actually let my dog chew the legs off our ottoman and bark at leaves blowing by the front window. I will pretend to have no idea how or when it happened when the hubby comes home from work and asks why our black shag rug is covered in wood chips.

I'm pretty sure this long holiday break has caused me to slowly lose my mind.  I loved the Facebook posts over the holiday break saying, "Yay! Now I can sleep in".  Sleep in?  What's that? Seriously those two words may as well be "size zero" in my world. Never going to happen.  Last night I ordered a diaper bag. My youngest child is four and we're not having anymore kids (nor do I want anymore).  Just try and explain that one...I double dog dare ya!

I started a new diet plan before the holidays and actually started to lose some weight.  Then I gained most of it back over Christmas.  We had a glazed ham on Christmas Eve. I have no self control when it comes to pork products.  I will stalk the fridge like a dog (i'm actually worse than our dog) and eat cold ham straight out of the container until i'm so swollen and puffy all over my body from the sodium, that I have to use Crisco to get my wedding ring off. I'm re-starting my diet plan today and i'm pretty sure i'll want to stab my husband in the eye while we're sitting in the Costco food court tonight and he's eating a slice of pepperoni pizza in front of me.  I'm not a happy dieter.  In fairness, i'm not really much of a happy anything in case you haven't noticed.

Now that you've read this, i'm sure you're feeling smarter and wiser (I just misspelled smarter. Thank you autocorrect).  I give up.  Until next time.....