A SAHM Reality Check….

***This blog is already serving its purpose in helping me gain some perspective, and it worked without even having to air my dirty laundry.  I composed the draft of this post shortly after the reality check incident of which it is based, occurred and almost immediately after I did I was SO glad I pressed ‘save’ rather than ‘publish’. 

The first draft was full of ‘whoa-is-me’ and sappy violins… (whining, for those of you who don’t know that one).  I’ve been thinking now, about this post for about a week and the more I think about the reality check the more I find the humor in it!  So, here’s what went down and my new version of the reality check it gave me…   

My moment lasted all but about 1 minute, and here’s how it went. 

I was retrieving the dirty laundry from my closet and emerged from my room, pushing the laundry basket forward with my foot because I was carrying Kaden… we were in  the middle of a day in which he decided that he wanted nothing more than to be pressed against my spit-up soaked shoulder all day.  If he wasn’t there, he was crying.  Except at this present time, he was crying anyway.  I walked from my bedroom through the living room toward the kitchen, shoving along the laundry basket (letting out a little grunt with each push because it was quite full)  and found Gage and Cooper wrestling on the floor over who’s paper airplane was who’s.  I announced to them, very loudly (I had to clear both the volume of their arguing and Kaden’s crying) that I was going to make them lunch.  Immediately my comment was met with lunch requests… Cooper ALWAYS wants chicken nuggets and Gage ALWAYS wants Peanut Butter and Jelly.  These requests continued as I proceeded to walk, but since I always hear them, it was as if the voices were part of my subconscious. And usually I oblige…

…but… as I shoved the overflowing laundry basket forward into the laundry room that was littered with dirty shoes and outside clothes strewn about, and grimaced as I untangled Kaden’s little fingers from the tangle of hair at the nap of my neck, and squatted down for the 39th time that day to pick his pacifier up from the floor after he spit it out, and felt the pain shoot up from my right knee as a result of this repetitive action, and felt the dizzying effects of not eating breakfast overtake me as I lunged back up, and the headache split through my forehead from Kaden crying in my ear (or was it from being woken every 3 hours the night before?), and narrowly missing being pegged in the head by a launched paper airplane, and Cooper whining that he wanted fishies with his chicken nuggets,  and dodging around Gage as he ran into the kitchen to retrieve his airplane thus bumping my hip and Kaden’s leg into the counter (in turn making him cry harder) and then actually GETTING pegged in the head by Cooper’s paper airplane, and finally crunching my bare, desperately-needing-a-pedicure foot down onto a Cocoa-Roo that escaped from someone cereal bowl that morning…

I’d had enough.  The sound of that cereal crunching beneath me was enough to make me snap.  “STOP!” I yelled.  “Just STOP!  Both of your are having whatever I decide you are going to have!  I am NOT your servant!”

They froze.

Even Kaden stopped.

And I froze. I looked from Gage to Cooper, staring hard.  Then, in somewhat of a haze, I scanned my surroundings.  Toys everywhere.  Used burp rags on the floor and draped over the backs and arm wrests of our couches.  Gage in holey sweatpants and Cooper’s hair standing on end and Kaden still in his jammies because he has no long-sleeved clothes in his current size.  Dishes in the sink from breakfast.  Hopeful eBay sales covering the dining room table.  Not a single flat surface space, from our kitchen counters to the TV stand was clear of misplaced things.  The floor needed sweeping.  The carpet needed vacuuming.  The windows needed washing.  That overflowing laundry basket that I began this reality check moment with beckoning for me to deal with it. 

And outside, it was raining.  

Then I closed my eyes and pictured myself at this moment.  Unshowered, no make-up, my hair in a messy, half-falling out pony-tail because of Kaden’s need to grasp it at all times, no bra (why bother when Kaden wants to nurse every 2 hours?), wearing sweatpants and an oversized t-shirt with a soaking wet, from slobber and spit-up, shoulder.   

I felt my face start to quiver and my chest well-up.  And the tears started flowing.  

How did this happen?  I crave ORDER and ORGANIZATION and CLEANLINESS and STUCTURE.  It is by nature who and how I am!  And now, somehow, I have NONE of these things.   

Did I ask for this?  Do I enjoy this?  How can I do this for all the years to come?? 

“Sorry I hit you with my paper airplane, Mama,” Cooper said quietly, beginning to cry himself.

***So that is what happened and at the time I was hitting a wall.  Now, I think about it and say to myself… “That’s LIFE! Get over it!  If a messy house and demanding children are the worst of your issues… you’re pretty darn lucky!” 

I also think it is kind of FUNNY, picturing myself like that… I’m not always such a wreck, by the way.  I do usually shower and put on make-up, and I’ve since started wearing a bra again (or at least a shelf-bra-cami)…

And yes, while the messy house bugs me, it has also brought me to the resolution to obey the constant nagging slogan that runs though my brain of ‘JUST DO IT’.  I walk past a pile of something that doesn’t belong there… JUST put it away!  There are dirty dishes in the sink needing to be washed… JUST WASH THEM!  Don’t let it get to the point of being overwhelmed by it.  But, I tell myself, if you are going to do it, do it well and get it done.  Focus on what needs to be done and JUST DO IT. ***

  

I’ve added these photos because even though I didn’t (obviously) take them at the time of my melt down, I feel like they show a good example of how G&C&K were looking at me when it all went down.  And how they’d be looking at me if I were to read this to them out loud… like they are saying, “Us?  WE are wearing you down? Sorry, mama… but we’re so cute and sweet and there is nothing you’d rather do than stay-at-home and take care of us…”

I feel silly and a little sorry that I experienced the above moment and was so bothered by it. 

I also feel a little silly and VERY sorry that when thinking of scenarios like this, the REALITY CHECK I’ve had can best be summed up by the slogan from the TLC show Jon&Kate Plus 8 pops into my head...

“It may be a crazy life, but it is OUR life…”  So true.