Ya...I've Got No Title For This One

July 28, 2010

I’m not actually sure where this blog is taking me and I’m pretty sure it’s going to be a lot of babbling but I can’t shake this incident from my head or heart. 

We just got back from vacation at a resort up north, our family vacation where we'd have quality time together.  At the resort they have three people in charge of the social programs – Gary, Head Fun Guy!, and Fun Boy! and Fun Girl!  Fun Boy and Fun Girl aren’t really the names written on their birth certificates but it’s what they answer to up at Delawana.  So on about the third day while eating dinner, I suggested we make up fun names like Fun Boy! and Fun Girl! for the whole family because they’re like so fun and stuff.  

Long story short, my name, picked by my kids, was Working Mummy. 

And it hurt. 

A lot. 

But not because they got it wrong.

I try to balance what I do. I work from home but I also take care of my kids.  And staying home with my kids has always been my main priority, it’s the whole reason I’m working from home, so I can be with the kids and still have something for myself. But obviously I’m failing. 

And I know this not because my kids named me Working Mummy, but because I know it in my heart. 

It hurts because they got it right. 

I like to think I’m the mom who hangs with her kids and has fun, but lately?  Lately I haven’t been that mom.  Lately I’ve been the mom whose been snapping at her kids when they dare come over and talk to her while she’s at the computer.  Yesterday my son wanted to show me pictures he took with his digital camera during his bike ride with his dad…and I told him I was too busy, I’d look at them later.  The look on his face as he walked away made me feel sick to my stomach.  And yet I didn't call him back. 

Yesterday was a full workday for me.  My husband was home which means I left him to look after the kids while I stayed in front of the computer for the entire day.  And I did.  Even when it meant sending my son away instead of looking at the pictures he wanted to show me. And when my other son came down to ask me to make him lunch?  I was resentful because I felt my husband should be doing it. Fair or not, it's how I felt.  

If I was at an office outside my home, it wouldn’t have been an issue would it?  My kids wouldn’t be coming in to show me pictures or ask for lunch to be made if I was at an office because they wouldn’t be in my office, would they?  What a good excuse that would be.  But that’s all it would be, an excuse.  Because the truth of the matter is over the past few months, I’ve shunned them away even when my husband wasn’t around to take care of things.  I’ve sent them to watch t.v., play computer games, go read, play outside, whatever....more times than I can count. The disappointed look on my son’s face when I told him I’d look at his pictures later wasn’t the first time I had seen it.  I don’t have the luxury of saying it would be different if I was in an office because I’m not. 

I work from home and I’ve been shunning my kids away to get work done. 

And it’s not just the summer…I’ve shunned them away after school.  I’ve made them eat dinners alone without me so I could get in just one more email or write one more contest.   

It’s why they call me Working Mummy. 

I’m jealous of my husband because he’s the fun one.  While we were on vacation, the kids wanted nothing to do with me, it was all about the daddy time.  It’s partly because he’s not as home as much as I am, I get that.  But the other part is because he is fun.  He’s fun because he can play with them and not be distracted.  And that makes me jealous. 

Even when I’m not working I have a million things going on in my head – I need to make a grocery list, what are we going to have for dinner, don’t forget the laundry and make sure Son No. 1’s shirt doesn’t get put in before you can go over the signatures he got from camp on it with a fabric pen and they don’t accidentally get washed away, and you still need to RSVP for that birthday party. It’s like my mind never shuts off.  I sometimes feel like I carry our whole life in my brain – shoe sizes, pants sizes, who needs new underwear, what they’ll eat for dinner, what will cause a tantrum, I need to run out and buy a new pair of crocs because Son No. 2 wore a hole in his, and while I’m there, buy zucchini to put in the turkey burgers so I can sneak in one more vegetable, and don’t mix the grapefruit with the oranges because no one will eat it and hubby’s down to one last coffee disc so get some more before tomorrow and we need to do the fish burial and buy another fish but first stop at Walmart to get filtered water so it doesn’t die from the chlorine, oh and I'm going out so I need to arrange for a babysitter and...it never ends.   

I feel sometimes there’s so much going on in my head that it may explode.  I want to have fun with my kids but I can’t enjoy the moment because there’s so much to remember all the freakin’ time and instead of being a mother I’m just going through the motions.  I’m providing and giving but not really.  I’m not really there.   

I’m exhausted.

And sad. 

And conflicted. 

And jealous. 

And totally afloat in a sea of self doubt.

And wondering what the hell to do. 

Maybe tomorrow I’ll think I’m a good mom. Maybe tomorrow I’ll feel like I have it all together and am doing a good job. Maybe tomorrow I'll figure it all out and be able to be in the moment. 

But not today. 

And my kids know it.  

Today I’m a working mummy who told her son to walk away instead of looking at his pictures.  Today I’m the mom who has a million things in her head and is wondering how she can get them out so she can enjoy this precious time with her kids. Today I’m the mom who’s talked the talk but hasn’t walked the walk.  

Today I’m the mom who’s finally dropped all the balls she’s been juggling.  

Only I can’t pick them up because the tears keep blurring my vision.
 

Vacation Snippets

July 21, 2010

You know how there’s a high pitched frequency that people can’t hear but dogs can?  I think my voice is that frequency because neither my kids or husband seem to hear anything I say.

It sucks following through with consequences when your child misbehaves.  To date I’ve spent three hours in a hotel room with Son No. 2 because of follow through.

Since I’m now a follow-through expert, will probably take up tennis.  Or golf. 

Was looking forward to ten days having hubby as back up in answering all of Son No. 1’s never ending questions.  Instead, he noticed the answer reinforcement and upped the question quota.

It takes approximately seven hours to convince two kids who don’t want to go to camp that camp is funtabulous and not a plot to ruin their entire vacation.

Plus a compromise that you’ll pick them up every day at 1:00 p.m.

Only to go pick them up at 1:00 p.m. after their first day to have them tell you they don’t want to leave.

If you drop your kids off at camp and high five the counsellors while yelling FREEEEEEDOOMMMMMM, your kids won’t think it’s funny.

But every parent around you will. 

I spent 6 hours fretting, 15 hours thinking about exercising, one day of eating nothing but fruit and 20 hours shopping for the perfect bathing suit – one that would minimize my ass, suck in my stomach, lift my boobs and guide people’s eyes away from my thighs.  Then I went to the beach and saw the guy in a speedo.

Thanks to an overly powerful breastfeeding pump and an extremely slow let down reflex, not only do I need to adjust my ass, thighs and arm waddle in my bathing suit, but my nipples as well.*

Funnily enough, chicken cutlet inserts that escape your bathing suit in the pool look a lot like jellyfish.

Not so funny for the person who finds it though.

Even if you have the cutest kid ever, when you see a parent trying to take a picture of their two kids with the magician after the show and your sweet little bundle o’ joy keeps running in and wrecking each and every shot, you may want to just grab your angelic little being for a moment and let the picture be taken.  Then your darlingest procreation can have her chance to meet the magician too.  Like the rest of the kids waiting their turn. 

There’s not enough photoshop skills in the world to get that kid out of our magician photo.

If you go up to the nice girl serving drinks at the restaurant and ask her if the rum-laden fruity concoction special of the day can be taken outside of the pool area to say the park where your kids are playing and she hesitates and says hold on a minute and let me ask and you quickly grab her by the arm and say what if I just lie and tell you I’ll be in the pool area instead, she’ll make you the most tastiest drink in the world for you to savour whilst giving your kids underdogs on the swings.

Rum slows down your moving out of the way reaction time when your kids are on the return swing.

When going to a resort where (a) the whole family is staying in one room and (b) your kids will be choosing their own food from a buffet for breakfast, lunch and dinner, the most important thing you can teach those kids is the courtesy flush.

 

*Forward facing = good.  Off to the side = bad