Tiny Battles

Lately, I feel like everywhere I look on my social media outlets I see moms that are nailing it; happy kids, smile on their faces, loving every minute of what’s taking place.  I hate those mamas.  No, not true- I love most of them very dearly and admire all of them.  Lately though, as a mom, I feel like (excuse my French!) A. F*cking. Mess.  Seriously, I’m a disaster.  I’m in desperate need of that guy that does voice overs for the Johnson & Johnson baby wash commercials to tell me I’m doing a good job (you know the one!).  However I could not star in said commercial with said voiceover, nor could my kid.  For those commercials to do their inspirational duties the people should look like my social media tribe not like it looks in my house lately:  yelling, frazzled, frustrated, sometimes crying mom and pouting, shouting, hands-on-hips, humphing child- no one enjoying the others company very much. 

I’ve gone back to work and the working mom gig is upon me with a vengeance.  I wake up earlier than I need to for the fear of running late, get ready as quietly as I can so I don’t wake Kennedy.  If I wake her, I have to multitask getting ready and attending to her which inevitable leads to me rushing around and running behind, getting frustrated with her when she gets frustrated with me for various reasons.  I leave her with Sean’s mom for the day and unwind on my way into work-just in time to get wound back up at work.  I usually battle some form of traffic, get Kennedy from my mother-in-law’s house, and drive home while she asks me, “What do you want to do fun when we get home?”   Knowing we usually have something to do that she will no doubt think is the exact opposite of fun; I avoid answering her questions and the whining and tears that will follow until we make it through the door.

Then the fun really begins. 

I ask her to do something-put away a toy, sit at the table for dinner, eat just a tiny bit of what we’ve made, take her bath, let me brush her hair- and she loses her mind and then I lose my mind and down we spiral.  It usually ends with her going to her room, but not before I’ve yelled, then remember to count her, but end up yelling when she just counts back at me.  The grand finale is when she tells me she just wants Sean’s mom because all I do is yell at her.  Then I lie in bed and wonder what damage I’ve done with her.  Really.  Long-term memories are now being formed in her little mind and I am really nervous about what will be getting stored and how I will look to her when she remembers.

 I don’t want to battle her.  Not a four anyway.  I know what is coming down the road- that I was preparing for eventually but I grossly underestimated the toddler/preschool years.  

This past Friday, I lost it.  A very good friend and co-worker of mind just happened to ask a small-talk question about my little girl and I just lost it.  I was a crying mess.  I love my kid, like in an I’ve-lost-a-child-and-know-how-precious-they-are kind of way.  But the truth is I am struggling lately.  I feel this immense amount of guilt sometimes because I feel like a mother in my shoes shouldn’t complain about her only surviving child.  My friend, calm and collected as it is, put it very matter-of-factly, “you have to schedule time with her,” she told me.  “Give her ten uninterrupted minutes, no phone, nothing.  It will make a difference.”  And it did.  We played hockey outside, laughed at Snap Chat selfies we took, and read a few books snuggled in her bed.  No tears, no yelling.   And then I felt even worse.  All this kid wanted, no, NEEDED from me was ten minutes and I hadn’t been giving her that?  I mean, COME ON.  And who has to schedule in time for their child in their day?  This lady, right here.   And so I’ll do it.  All of the tears, from both of us, that could have been avoided if I just remembered to put everything else on hold for 10 minutes; work, housework, grieving, Sean, all of it.  Because I have done my best to keep my head above water for my baby girl this past year and a half but I owe her better than I’ve been giving.

I caught a few smiles on our trip to Long Island, but they were few and far between and I was reduced to taking a picture of her sleeping (after she had a melt down and passed out).  Now I know what you are all thinking, People only post pictures of the good times, the smiles.  That’s all fine and well and I know deep down that, for the most part, is true but I need to find a gaggle of hot-mess moms that post pictures of their mom-fails.  Now that’s my tribe.  In fact I may be their long lost chief.

We’ve got some fun planned for the weekend and I’m hoping for a few more smiles from all of us. 

Gotta run….my ten minutes is calling.