Autonomy for Moms in 30 Minutes or Less

Being a full-time mommy at home puts you into a strange time vortex. I still remember what it felt like to work full time with a baby, and I frequently find myself marveling at how busy I feel as a stay-at-homer. The vortex feels especially pronounced and indescribable when people ask what you've been up to lately, and time stops while you have a conversation with yourself in your head,

They can't all be good days.

     I woke up in a bad mood today. Despite going to bed at 9:00 last night, I hardly slept. Sometime overnight my usually comfy (albeit crowded) bed morphed into a lumpy sac of potatoes and my pillow into lava rock. Co-sleeping with my 6’2” husband, 3 year old and 8 month old doesn’t help. The baby had one of those nights where she needed to breastfeed not several times a night, but actually sleep attached to me, preventing any movement on my part lest I move her and elicit a window rattling howl. This night was heavy on the tossing and turning for everyone (imagine our bed as a rock tumbler with 4 rocks ranging from 20 to 210 pounds), and even included some sudden Rottweiler-like jaw clamps mid-nursing from 2 needle-like baby teeth. The moment the ethereal morning sunshine peered through my curtains, I heard the birds sing and longed to stretch my arms over my head and savor the magic of being alive, but instead I buried my face in my pillow and thought “Ah, %&$!.” 

No worries, I hate personal space anyway.

 

Cool Mom Resolutions

  I was never meant to be a regular mom. If I even had kids, I would be different. I’d be cool, because it’s not healthy to make your whole identity about someone else, especially someone who eats their boogers in the checkout aisle at the grocery store. Flash forward 3 years and there I was, pregnant with my 2nd, unshowered wearing yoga pants tucked into my knock-off Uggs, pushing a stroller to Starbucks immersed in a conversation about home pureed baby food as my former self rolled over in her grave, careful not to smear Chanel mascara on her silk-lined coffin. 

Really, I think I preserved my cool pretty well after my first was born. I went back to work after 12 weeks and was forced to presume the identity of someone who had a life beyond spit-up drenched machine-washables. Things started to deteriorate during my 2nd pregnancy, then got serious when we relocated to Walla Walla where I have the tremendous blessing of staying home with my kids and am relieved of the pressure to impress anyone. I know no one, and my only friends are my devastatingly cool nieces and sister-in-law who are forced to hang out with me at our weekly family night. I’ve lost myself in a wilderness of crusty sippy cups, slobbery baby kisses and the involuntary but perpetual question “why bother?” Why make the bed when we’re just going to sleep in it later? Why change out of pajamas when no one will see me anyway? Why wash my hair when it’s just going to stay in this ugly messy bun? If you’re feeling as clinically depressed as I am after reading that I think the answer is clear…we bother because not bothering means taking up residence right around the corner from a high-dose Zoloft prescription. 

In an effort to restore some dignity and keep some dollars out of Pfizer’s pocket I’m publicly resolving to the following efforts: