Month: January 2017

I’m not going to pretend that these last few weeks haven’t been rough. The murder of a local police officer hit us all hard. The inauguaration of Trump – being full of trepidation and trying to be full of hope as well. And, well, let’s just add some business woes, potty training and two year old stubbornness in there too.

One of the most difficult things we are expected to do (and in fact impose on ourselves) is to pretend everything is alright when in fact it isn’t. It may be a bad day, a bad week or a bad year, but you are going to say “I’m fine” when someone asks you how you are. Unless they are a close friend, they are probably not really interested in your answer anyway.

So when it comes to potty training I continue to say “we’re doing fine – it’s slow, but it’s progressing.” When I actually want to pull my own hair out. A mom at Baby Girl’s school proudly told their teacher that her own baby girl just needed two more stickers on her “potty chart” in order to get the Mickey Mouse waffle maker she wants. I listened silently, and inwardly stunned. A sticker potty chart? A waffle maker? These things HAVE NOT OCCURRED TO ME. First of all, as much as Baby Girl likes stickers, she would not for a second wait until she potties to take charge of ALL the stickers and put them where she darn well pleases. I can see the fight a mile away. No, Baby Girl, you can only have a sticker when you go pee pee in the potty. (I cringe and wait for the WAAAAAWAAAAAWAAAAA scream of all ages). Baby Girl definitely has her own ideas about things. Or if I took her to see a Mickey Mouse waffle maker but we didn’t leave the store with it? OK, well we can for sure actually do that, but to try and explain that she gets to bring it home only when she learns to go pee pee on the potty all the time? I just can’t imagine that this would go over well. But, Hell, maybe it would. I think sometimes that being old and tired limits my ability and enthusiasm for thinking outside the box.

I think I might have to try something drastic, though, with the sleeping problem. Baby Girl wants mama to stay in Baby Girl’s room ALL NIGHT. So that any time she wakes up Mama is right there. This is just a habit, y’all, no nightmares or scared of the dark or monsters under the bed. It is simply another way that she wants to control her environment. I totally get it Baby Girl, and I don’t know how many times I have to explain this to you, BUT I AM NOT STAYING in your room all night. She is way too stubborn and crafty for her own good. I put the door handle thingie on the door so she can’t get out and she rips that thing off in less time than it took me to put it on there. My mother suggests bribery. So in the coming days I will be making a Sleep Chart and filling it in with little stars, I hope. With a prize at the end of a week of staying in bed (or even just one full night). I’m not at all sure this is going to work in any way other than just pissing Baby Girl off even more. I’ve also considered putting a baby gate in her doorway and leaving the door open. I honestly think she’d climb that thing like Mt. Everest though, in about 2 seconds.

And as for being an older mom with her own business where you deal with parents and children – well sometimes you just get downright morose over the whole thing. Especially when something has been festering that just won’t bust open and be healed. And confrontation is not your strong suit. Everyone knows that a riding instructor pours her heart into each student she has. Especially in a very small program. And when there’s a thorn – it really goes in deep. But you smile and say you’re fine, and you do your job and you say nothing. Because, really, what is there to say? Words alone very seldom change anyone’s way of thinking, once a decision or an impression has been made.

Which leads to this whole social media thing. FaceBook is wearing me out. All the politics, the “woman’s rights”, the racism, the protests, the marches, the disgruntlement, even people trying to use FB as a freaking horse vet. (Good God please just call a damn vet!). And for the Love of All Things Holy, just stop already with the “can I get an Amen” (or a like) for this poor creature or whatever. Yes, I believe in Jesus, and No, God is not going to grant me a miracle for professing this in someone else’s Meme. I just want to post pictures of Baby Girl, see sweet pics and videos of kittens and children, laugh a little, and live my life without conflict.

So next time you see someone that might be “fine” maybe look just a little deeper. Maybe try to see the person behind the words. Maybe try to recognize yourself in their troubles. And be kind.

 

As I sat in the chair in Baby Girl’s room last night, waiting for her to fall asleep, I began to reflect on how big she’s getting. There will come a time when she no longer wants me to sit in the chair in her room until she falls asleep. When she will not demand me to Rock! the instant I say “It’s sleepy time!” and continue to demand it all the way down the hall, into her room, into her bed, turn the music on and the lights off. She won’t say Rock! one more time as I lean down and kiss her forehead and respond “I always do.” One of these days we won’t be watching the stars on the ceiling from the ladybug nightlight and we won’t be listening to the strains of Mozart and Bach. A little hand won’t sneak out from under the covers to say “No Mama! Don’t go” if I get up to leave before she’s fully asleep. The Peppa Pig sheets will be replaced by something more grown up and it will be a twin bed instead of an adorable toddler one. I look at the mural of the owl and the tree on her wall and wonder how old she’ll be when she wants to paint over it, and if I’ll cry when she does. And if she’ll roll her eyes at me because I do. Will the chandelier her Grandma bought still hang? What will become of the Dr. Suess framed prints? Or the pink owl lamp her Grandma and I bought the day we learned she was a girl?

Already I look back at the days gone by. I remember the agony of breastfeeding in the middle of the night, when she wouldn’t or couldn’t latch on. I remember the tears and the struggle to understand when she wouldn’t stop crying because of acid reflux. The sweet sweet smell of her little baby head next to my cheek. How itty bitty she was and how I had no idea what to do with her. How long it seemed to take for her to learn to sit up on her own, to stand, and finally to walk. When feeding her a bottle was the most precious moment of time. I remember when she started climbing out of her crib and we switched her to a toddler bed and she slept on the floor for months out of protest.

Someday she will no longer ask for hugs and kisses during dinner time. She won’t take my face in her hands and look inquisitively at me and say “Ma? Ma?” just to be sure I’m listening. She’ll stop asking if I’m ok every time I cough, because I do the same thing to her. One of these days I’ll get to take a shower or a bath without her wanting to do it, too, and maybe I won’t even really notice when that day comes. I’ll get to eat without having to share. I won’t have to sneak chocolate when she can’t see. I’ll be at work in my office and she won’t want to be in there with me. She’ll have more important things to do. Someday she’ll want to go ride without me watching, she’ll want the keys to my car. She’ll want her own phone and her own computer. She’ll want to sleep til noon and we’ll have arguments over nothing and everything.

So, Baby Girl, I will be happy to sit in your room every night until you fall asleep even though some days I am so tired myself I feel like crying. When the nights are tough and it takes you an hour to fall asleep instead of twenty minutes, I’ll watch the stars on the ceiling, I’ll play Words with Friends with my Mom on my phone, I’ll listen to Bach and Beethoven. And I will remind myself that with each passing day we get closer to the time when you won’t want me there, or need me there at all. Your room is my favorite room in the house, after all. Every single thing in it, including you, was chosen or made with love and prayers. So go to sleep, Lovie, Mama is right here, rocking.

It’s already the 4th of January and I have not even thought about Resolutions. Who has time for that anyway? Not parents of 2 year olds.

I’m busy attempting to get Baby Girl to sit on a toilet and pee pee. I resolve not to have a heartattack when she pees on the floor instead. I will remind myself that at least she didn’t pee on an indoor play slide at a public facility. (Shout out to GWR! You are my hero).

We’re over here trying to learn not to spit food out in mama’s hand or on the floor when she doesn’t like something and to throw it in the trash can instead. I resolve not to gag over chewed up peanut butter crackers in my hand.

Baby Girl enjoys pulling out toys that I just put away 5 mins ago and strew them all over the house. She will literally follow me around while I inanely pick things up and grab them back out of their assigned locations exclaiming NO! MINE! MINE! TOY! I resolve to wait until Baby Girl is asleep before attempting clean up of any type in order to avoid a meltdown. Hers or mine.

I resolve to buy stock in the Chobani yogurt company and to sell said stock the instant Baby Girl decides she hates yogurt and always has. Which of course will be when the yogurt market is in an upswing (thereby paying for her college education) and I have 1,284 boxes of yogurt in the fridge. Too bad it’s not gold bars. Or chocolate.

When making an effort to do something with Baby Girl’s crazy head of hair I resolve to try to be more patient and empathetic to her pleas of OW OW OW NO NO WAAAAAAA when I’m yanking the tangles out of her hair. As she squirms and wriggles and slides away from my weapon, er, hairbrush. I will more often ignore the rat’s nest on top of her head and discard those dreams of perfect plaits and bob-curls and pony tails.

I resolve to spend more time reading with Baby Girl and taking long bubble baths by myself. I will find more fun things to do with Baby Girl that are not in my own house – thereby reducing the magnitude of the wreck and my own madness. However we will avoid indoor play slides for the time being.

And finally, I resolve not to lose my shit entirely over the never-ending drama that accompanies getting dressed in the morning and getting undressed at night. I know, Kid, I don’t want to get dressed in the mornings either. But not wanting to put PJ’s on at night? Come on! That’s the best part of the whole day! How is it torture for you? It’s just a control thing, isn’t it? You’re just trying to make me crazy, aren’t you? Can you pleeeeaaaazzzzzeeeee make it simple just this one time? Sweetly and silently let me change you? I’ll give you chocolate! Promise. Cross my heart and hope to die. Yeah ok it’s a control thing. I get it. Someday you’ll be wearing a bra. Then you’ll know.