Count the Bad Mommies

Monday, June 9, 2008

Some homework from me at last...

Hello Ladies,
I am emerging from my lovely vomit hued cocoon of work and readjusting to married life to fill everyone in on the daily soap opera. I can't remember when last my life felt "normal", can't remember my last unmedicated day, can't figure out where bliss became chaos and I became a slightly shorter and less attractive version of the incredible hulk. Running the risk of offending pretty much everyone else on the planet, how is it that my "new mother" friend can complain constantly about how hard her 9 month old is, how difficult her life is since having him and how she is run ragged? She hasn't worked in just over a year, she isn't studying, she has a maid and a wealthy husband, she laughs about how incensed she is when some audacious moron visits her before 15:00 and expects her to answer the door... Yes, I am PMSing, but is she absolutely insane?
I know its all relative, or at least, the reasonable garden gnome buried deep in my concious brain does, but the selfish bad day gremlin wants to rip her head off and stab out her eyes with a highlighter.
One...Two...Three...Four...Five...Six...Seven...Eight...Nine...Ten.
Still not calm.
Rinse, Repeat?

We recently got to four, and, after giving myself a healthy pat on the back for surviving working [and as close to single as one can get while wearing a wedding ring] motherhood thus far, I had a great moment a few weeks back where I realised that we had finally escaped from the fire eating goblin known as the "terrible two's", she may still be cheeky as hell but this is about as close to human as she has gotten to date. I can have a conversation with her now, and "why" actually has a purpose beyond switching on the smoke button hidden behind mommy's ears. The darling husband has arrived home, for good this time. She is still wetting the bed, still climbing into my arms in soaked pyjamas at 3 am for snuggles. I still get pee'd on four nights out of five, she still has nightmares, she still has abandonment issues, the scientologist raised husband is still refusing to consider medication even though she bounces off the walls, sleeps 4 hours a night and literally grits her teeth so hard she has begun to grind them down out of focus frustration, but you know what? Four is fantastic, the little pyjama clad monster who begs for seven bedtime stories also sings to me on Saturday mornings to get me up, sits on my lap while I go through article ideas, tells me my label samples are beautiful, and begs me to print Marilyn Monroe Benday Dot designs on all her old clothes before I make charity drops "so the things are beautiful for those other kids"
Little miss "new mother" can have her issues, she can have her maid to take her new baby so she can sleep all day, and a husband to sleep in the spare room with snookums all night, I have a child who knows that everything I do is for her, that when mommy is a little too tired for round eight of Peter Rabbit, it's real, and all round - I think I do okay.

2 comments:

AngelConradie said...

wow, you have had a busy time!
hang in there... i'm still waiting for my replacement sitcom-script-writers wand after i broke mine, otherwise i'd wave it for you immediately!

shrink on the couch said...

some people are clueless, have no idea how good they've got it. no matter how much people right down the street are struggling, they've "got it worse"

and.. some of my worse memories of raising toddlers have to do with 2am "peed my bed" wake up calls. no fun at all. hang in there.