Not Glad to be Home.

I almost can’t bear the fact that it’s over. Planning this trip took over my life for basically 4 months. From vying to get  reservations at the best restaurants on the park property, to scheduling Fast Passes for 11 people, to watching the weather report like a hawk to ensure I packed the proper sweatshirt to tee shirt ratio, I did it all. At one point, I had my alarm set for 2 AM so that I could get a reservation at the Be Our Guest restaurant that only allows you to book exactly 27 days before your arrival. And I was NOT getting shut out. People wait in line for 3 hours to get into this joint. I woke up, booked that shiz and went back to sleep. I made team tee shirts for each family/ couple in our group with character and team name,  appropriate fonts relating to the character on each shirt. This was a job, man. I had spreadsheets and timelines and a countdown calendar to inform me, down to the hour, how much longer we had to go. Sophie knew how many sleeps she had until Disney World. I sent daily emails to our family with a different Disney feature. I was on point.

We left on Saturday afternoon, as per my scheduled hourly breakdown, but we almost didn’t make it out because the snow was coming down so quickly. We sat on the tarmac for about an hour and a half, after de-icing. When we finally landed in Orlando, it was about 7PM and almost 10 before we got dinner. But whatever! We were in Disney World! Finally!!

We stayed at the Coronado Springs which is awesome and enormous. E-norm-ous. We had a room in Ranchos, which is about as far from the front area as you can get, but we’re spry young things, so it was fine with us. We got to stroll along Lago Dorado every morning on the way to breakfast.

Day one was team shirt day at Magic Kingdom, where we arrived on time for each scheduled fast pass. It was 80° and sunny. We skipped past the 100+ people waiting in line at Be Our Guest, and checked in for our reservation. where we sat in the Grand Ballroom. Our pre-ordered food arrived on time and was delicious. Sophie especially liked the “West Wing” room of the restaurant, and gave each of our family members a private tour. We did agree as a group, however, that as lovely as it was, it was the park’s biggest disappointment. Not that it was bad, because it was quite wonderful, but the build up and the 27 day advance reservation made it seem as if it was going to be life changing. It was not. We had dinner at the Polynesian Village Resort’s Kona Cafè. It was delish and I would eat there again in a heartbeat. But I love the Polynesian something awful, always have.

Day two was Epcot, and it was an equally lovely weather day. We separated our group (the people without kids needed a little break, we insisted), after our scheduled Fast Passes, of course. Mission: Space is never a let down, ever. I have a soft spot for Living with the Land, so while the big people went on rides, my sister and I took the littles on that. Soarin’ makes me silly-happy, as does Spaceship Earth. Matt, Sophie and I ate lunch at the quick service in Japan while the others found their favorites. At one point, while Soph was sleeping, we met up with my other sister and her boyfriend in Italy. We watched a weird performance with guys in tights throwing flags at each other. It was cool, but way too long. I drank a wine flight from the Italian wine shop. I was a little foggy by the time we reached our reservation in Germany. I don’t think dinner was as well received in our group as we had thought it would be. Matt and I generally eat until we are gagging when we eat in Germany. This time, not so much.

Day 3 is Animal Kingdom day and “Everyone Wear your Mickey Shirt Day”!, and the weather is slowly turning colder. We braved the Kali River Rapids and immediately changed into warmer clothes after we peeled off our soaked shorts and shirts. We traveled through DinoLand, Africa and Asia before arriving at our Fast Pass. Expedition: Everest is maybe one of the greatest roller coasters ever, if only for the sheer amount of work that went into the whole surrounding areas. The ride itself is pretty bangin’, too. I’d go into detail, but you don’t want me spoiling it for you, do you? That night, my sister took Sophie and Matt and I headed to Monsieur Paul in the France Pavilion. It is the cuisine of Chef Paul Bocuse, the most decorated chef of all time, in all the world. He has had 3 Michelin Stars for all of his restaurants for the last 48 years. His son Jerome is the Chef de Cuisine at Monsieur Paul, and we were not disappointed. We each used 2 of our table service credits on this meal, and I would have spent more. It was a gorgeous restaurant, with fantastic service, and wondrous food. It was a glorious date night. After dinner, we returned back to our hotel for drinks with Alice, my friend of 20+ years who now lives in Orlando, and I get to see once every two years or so. It was a late night, but I went to bed with a full belly and a happy heart.

I’m realizing now that if I go on like this for each of our days at the park, you will have given up and gone back to reading The Onion. I better wrap it up.

Day 4 was Disney’s Hollywood Studios, with the Sci- Fi Drive In as our sit down meal for lunch. It’s so cool in there.  We rode The Great Movie Ride (that thing really sucks and hasn’t been updated since the first time I rode it in the early 90s), Rock ‘N’ Roller Coaster is so great,  and id the best coaster at the park, hands down. The Twilight Zone Tower of Terror is possibly one of the best rides of all time, ever, ever (my husband will vehemently disagree with me, but he’s a wiener with terrible taste in rides). That night Liz and Brian went to Jiko: The Cooking Place in Animal Kingdom Lodge for their date night while we had the kids at the Pepper Market Food Court in our hotel.

Day 5 was back to Magic Kingdom with Fast Passes at Splash Mountain (again), Space Mountain (again) and Pirates of the Caribbean. I think we left half way through the day to do more of the World Showcase at Epcot and enjoy our dinner at the San Angel Inn at the Mexico Pavilion. It was wonderful, but I was disappointed that we didn’t get a table in the main room with a view of the water. We kind of got stuffed into a corner. I guess that’s what happens when you have a table for 11.

Day 6 was straight up cold. I wore a tee shirt, a sweatshirt and a sweatshirt on top of that, all covered with a flimsy windbreaker disguised as a raincoat. Sophie and Emmett had the only appropriate jackets. I guess my tee shirt to sweatshirt ratio was off. Damnit. We headed back to Animal Kingdom for some last round Everest riding. We rode Dinosaur, but only because there was no line. I can live forever without riding that again. My nephew, who is 3, lives for dinosaurs, but this ride would have been too much for him. He would have dino nightmares for a month. That night we ate at the Whispering Canyon Cafè, which I had my doubts about, but it was awesome. Maybe my favorite dining experience of the trip. It was so interactive and fun. The kids loved it. It doesn’t hurt that it’s located within the Wilderness Lodge Resort, which swiftly moved its way up to my top choice in hotel if we ever have the money to stay there, since it’s considered deluxe. We rode the boat to Magic Kingdom after dinner to catch our bus back to Coronado Springs. On a not 40° night, it would have been amazing, but it was so cold (and starting to rain), that we just wanted to get back and put on our jammies.

We decided to spend the extra $10 per person and add another day to our park pass. Our flight didn’t leave until 5:15, so we had time. And it was a pretty bad idea. It rained like it was a joke. We were soaked to the bone. We managed to get on Small World and the Haunted Mansion before the crowds piled in, but we should have just stayed back and relaxed, or visited another resort, or something. The bus from the Magic Kingdom back to our hotel took 45 minutes to show up (we had yet to wait more than 10 for any bus, the whole time, but yet, the day we are in a hurry?!?!?!). We missed our Magical Express Bus back to the airport. We had to beg to get on another bus. When we finally did, we had a pretty smooth flight, and arrived back in Newark, where it took them 25 minutes to find our gate-checked stroller. My parents and sister had to wait 45 minutes for any baggage to show up, and when they did, it was so wet that it left a puddle on the rug below. Clothes ruined, souvenirs ruined. It was a shitshow. New Jersey was saying “Welcome back to Newark, effers.”

And here we are. Now it’s over. All of my planning and stressing and calling and waking and spreadsheeting and Photoshopping. Done. We came back Saturday night to 19 degrees and woke up Sunday morning to another 6 inches of snow and ice. School was delayed this morning because the buses were sliding all over the roads. I’d like to be one of those people who says that they are glad to be home (cue wiener husband, again), but I’m not. I want palm trees and 80° and Mickey Mouse.

 

Not Right For This Job

She is screaming and hitting me here while yelling about how she hates chicken nuggets and how she can’t roll her window down (the car is off). 

Anyone who knows me will tell you this: I am not a positive person. I’m not negative, per se, but I am never the one who sees the glass as full. I almost think it’s ridiculous to do so, especially if the glass started out filled. You either spilled it or drank it. Either way, it ain’t in that glass no more. In general, I find positive people annoying. I think of them as flighty or crunchy or just fake. I have no time for fake.

Anyway, today was/ is an exceptionally shitty day, and on exceptionally shitty days, I project that awesome negativity onto everything, including (but certainly not limited to) my parenting ability. I am ready to cash it in, go back to work and rent a mid- week apartment in the city. I’ll come back on the weekends when there are two of us to handle this monster formerly known as my daughter. It is currently 3:04 PM and she has literally been screaming in my face since 9 AM. She has punched me (how does this child know how to punch? I don’t punch her! We don’t play video games, she doesn’t watch me do MMA), thrown things at me and told me she hates me. She has thrown an absolute shit fit in the middle of Macy’s, so loud and crazy that we had to leave the entire mall. She screamed her face off for the whole 25 minute drive. She fell asleep on me while I carried her from the car into the house (20 seconds?), but when I put her into bed, she screams about how she is NOT tired and she is NOT going to take a nap. Bedtime at night takes Matt over an hour because she is yelling about something, throwing herself on the floor in typical tantrum mode. I am at the end of my rope. I can’t get anything done because I either have a child hanging on my body or screaming in my face, telling me she hates me. I understand that its supposed to get better, but are we really supposed to endure this every waking moment? I’m starting to think that maybe I’m not right for this. That maybe someone more patient/ strong/ positive should have gotten this job. No one on earth could ever love this child more than I do, but maybe someone might be better at being a mother than I am.  Is that negative, or just realistic?

And to add to this loveliness, I am not eating anymore. I can’t afford/ don’t have time/ cannot bring this banshee into Weight Watchers meetings anymore, so I have been tracking my food on MyFitnessPal. It’s great and it tracks my calorie intake, my fat intake, blah blah. Last night we went to Costco and ended up eating there. Sophie got a hot dog, Matt got that chicken bake thing and I got a salad. I ate 40% of the chicken, 25% of the dressing, no croutons. SOMEHOW I manage to ingest 23 grams of fat. My whole day has got to be under 40 grams, and I just blew 23 ON SALAD? Ok, whatever, so today, while at above mall, I order a grilled chicken sandwich, that also has 23 grams of fat. I took one bite, read that, and threw out the rest of my lunch. I am SO FRUSTRATED (and hungry). I am seriously ready to just eat candy bars and McDonalds and just say fuck it to this whole healthy/ skinny thing, resign myself to being fat. I work so hard, SO HARD and I get nowhere. I am starting to resent my friends who have (multiple) kids and just get thinner. I see pictures of my girlfriends who have 7 and 8 month old children looking slim and pretty, while I look bloated and manly, and my kid is almost 4. I hate having my picture taken. I stumbled across a picture of my friends and I at a wedding pre-kids and I literally started to cry. What I wouldn’t give to be able to look at a picture of myself (or myself in the mirror) and not want to hide.

Anyway. My girlfriend (who thankfully has no children) invited me over tonight for wine and crafts, and although no one should have to deal with me while I’m in this mood, I think I’m going to go. I need a break, I need a drink, I need 40 minutes in the car by myself, listening to the news about people in the world who have actual problems and not me who is just being a whiny baby.

School.

Monday, my baby started school.

It was a week late because she was sick the first week, but all of that is irrelevant now. I have a school kid. I am pretty unsure how to think about this whole thing. On one hand, my baby, my only baby has left me to go to school. For the next 15- 20 years, this little girl of mine will be in school. She will spend more time away from me than she will with me. She will meet other little kids that will become her friends. She will want to go to their houses, to have sleep- overs. She will start to spend less and less time with me. Since I stay at home with her, the last 3 years and 5 months have been all us, just her and I (not to mention the 43 weeks she lived inside of my person). But now. Now is different. Now we will have Jacob and Amy and17 girls named Sophia and Isabella and 6 little boys named Aiden to fill the space previously occupied by Mama. I can’t describe to you how weird that is. I’m incredibly sad about it, for me. For her, I am so excited. I am excited for her to love school, to learn her numbers and letters and how to share with other kids. She will figure out how to do things without me. She won’t need me as much. Someone else will be there if she falls down and hurts herself. Someone else will be there when she learns something. Someone else will be there. I am not sure how to handle that. Since she was born, my whole life has focused on this child. I left my job, my apartment in the city, my friends, my freedom to take care of this tiny person, and now I find myself alone part of the day. I hope that she won’t miss me as much as I miss her, and I hope that maybe I can find some peace in those few hours a week. I hope that I learn how to catch up on the laundry and maybe squeeze in a yoga class or a pedicure. But for now, I am confused and a little bit sad that the little girl who has been holding my hand for the last 41 months has started to pull away.

A Case for Home Ec

Since my husband got injured in June (I did tell you about this, right?), I’ve pretty much been in charge of everything that requires moving or standing in our house. I’ve done all the food shopping, the cooking and the cleaning, (which I’ve pretty much done all of the whole time I’ve been married, but Matt’ll help out with the dishes or the floor mopping or whatever), but I’ve also now been tasked with moving heavy stuff and things like mowing the lawn, which I have never really done. I mean, I mowed the lawn in my parents’ old house, but they had a ride- on mower and so that doesn’t count. And so all of this got me thinking: What if it was me who had gotten hurt and was on crutches? Who would do everything then? In seven years together, five years of marriage, and three and half years of parenting, I think my husband has made dinner half a dozen times. He can’t fold clothes to save his life, and the vacuum is a completely foreign object to him. Before we moved in together, he said he changed his sheets twice a year. I’m not lying when I say I almost vomited when he told me that. I vacuum every single day (insane, I know) and I change the sheets once a week. Twice if one of us is feeling sick. I don’t think he knows how to grocery shop. Men generally don’t. You can call me sexist or whatever, but if you don’t believe me, go to Stop & Shop on a Sunday afternoon. It’s pretty absurd. He cannot sew a button back on his shirt if it fell off. He cannot iron properly. If he lived alone, the toilet would constantly have what we lovingly refer to as the “man wreath” on the bowl (you know what I’m talking about. The ever- present ring of urine drops and pubic hair? I know you know). Anyway, I digress. What I am trying to convey is that although it can be very annoying that my darling husband does not know how to do many basic things like this, it might not actually be his fault.

We do not teach our boys to do things like how to properly sort laundry or how to roast a chicken. Because that’s chick shit, evidently. I don’t know about you, but I was 32 when I got married. What are men doing during the time that they are graduating from college and when they get married? Do men in their 20’s eat? Why does my super- intelligent, upper management, highly educated husband not know how to fold a towel? And in the same vein, why do I, the backbone of my household, the woman who can simultaneously potty train a child and make a souffle, not know how to mow the Goddamned lawn? I don’t know how to fix a leaky faucet or how to check to see if the pilot light on the water heater is working. I wrote HTML code for a living for Christ’s sake, and yet I am unable to figure out how to re- set the cable box. I’m hardly an idiot, it’s just that there always seemed to be someone around to “do the man stuff”. 

My girlfriend, who is a teacher, tells me that they no longer offer Home Economics or Shop classes in public school. In a world where we are getting married later in life, and expect our partners to be equals, how can we not teach our kids to know both how to cook and to check the oil in the car? The damsel in distress thing doesn’t work when its 4 am and the car seizes up. It seems almost shameful to me that I have to call my husband or my dad to help me with things I am completely capable to doing. It seems equally as ridiculous that my husband cannot make dinner for three people if it is not frozen ravioli. 

I am thankful to have had a mother who took care of all the lady business in our house when I was a child. Because of her, I am confident in the kitchen, at the grocery store, at the craft store. I just wish my father had showed me how to be more confident under the hood, or at Home Depot. I wish my mother- in- law had taught Matt to use a needle and thread. In the months since the injury, finding myself doing the things that have been previously thought of as his work, makes me all the more motivated to make sure that Sophie knows how to do things previously categorized by gender. I don’t want her to be dependent on her husband or boyfriend or father to do things that I know she can do, but doesn’t, because she’s a girl. 

Another Goodbye.

Today.

Oof.

Today I am trying to feel positive instead of my usual negative. As we speak, my husband is upstairs on a conference call (we’ll get to that in a minute), Sophie is watching Octonauts, and I just finished packing for the night. Once he’s off the call, we will pile, with dog, into our car and head down to my mother- in- law’s pool. We try to go once a week, but this summer has had us on a whole new path. My parents moved to Pennsylvania a few weeks ago, and a lot of free time has been spent driving to them to help them get settled, to help them unpack and so Sophie can see her grandparents. And my husband has been with us the whole time. He ruptured his Achilles’ tendon at the end of June and has been on crutches since. He’s had surgery, but recovery time is long and arduous, and since its his right foot, he also can’t drive. It’s been a trying summer in that respect, because he needs a lot of help, I’m constantly driving him to work, to the doctor, to his parents’ houses and to Pennsylvania. It can be a bit much- I’m not  used to having someone else in the house with us during the week. It kind of throws off the routine. It’s hard to explain to a 3- year- old that even though Daddy is here, he can’t play right now. Anyway, off we go, shortly. Sophie will play in the pool with me and her grandmother, while Matt works in the house. Hopefully, we will manage to convince Sophie to take a nap (fingers crossed), they will all BBQ and have dinner in the yard while I shower and change so I can meet my sister for the night. For a wake. Of an old friend.

I don’t want to go spreading things around, so we’ll call her Lisa. Lisa and my little sister became friends in middle school, 20+ years ago. There was a group of them that seemed to be together all of the time. All of them towering over my shrimp of a sister. They fully embraced the grunge of the early 90s, wearing over sized pants, flannel shirts and overalls, sitting around in someone’s room listening to Pearl Jam and Alice in Chains, smoking cigarettes stolen from someone’s mom. A few of them actually got the opportunity to go see Pearl Jam live, and I was sooo jealous. I remember one of the girls calling my sister to let her know that they got the tickets, and my sister happy- cried for an entire day. They were a hysterical group of kids, always laughing, always doing something silly. Always.

I don’t really remember what happened after that. I know that the friendship stayed strong through a good amount of high school. Some of the girls took a different route, adopting a different style, everything from raver to rockabilly, and some just holding on to the hippy- dippy style of their parents. Some moved away, some got married, some went to college. Our parents were far too conservative to really allow us to have our own style or opinion, so we basically took the respectable route: college, salary jobs, studio apartments in decent areas of the city, getting married to nice guys, buying practical automobiles. My parents’ influence on our lives was infuriating as a teenager. I completely get it now.

To make a very long story short, drugs (big drugs) entered the picture at some point, far after my sister and I had lost touch with the group. Occasionally we would hear through the grapevine that someone had overdosed and was in the hospital or was seen strung out in town somewhere, and unfortunately the call would come that someone had overdone it and had died. It has made me very grateful that we had managed to dodge whatever bullet it was that had hit our friends- girls that at one point were so much like us. And here we are today. Attending yet another funeral or wake or memorial for another friend who took the wrong road. I wish I could say this is the first time we’ve been through this. I wish I could say this is the first time we’ve been through this in the past year. But it’s not.

I don’t know if it’s because I am disconnected from that whole scene now, my party and club days far behind me, but it amazes me that with all that we know about this shit, that people (in their 30s!) are still doing it, and still dying from it. I don’t know. I’m not an addict of any kind. I don’t feel left out, necessarily, but I do feel like, maybe, people who have gone through it and have come out, just think I should shut up. But I made a conscious decision a long time ago that I would stay far away from it. And you can call me a goody- goody, or a prude or whatever. But Lisa is dead. I’m not. Nothing in the world is more important than that. It’s so sad, it’s so fucking sad. Maybe it’s because I’m a mother now, but the idea of losing my baby is hands- down the worst thing I could think of. I have no idea how I am going to be able to look her parents in the face tonight. I have no idea how they have been able to cope the last few days.

For the most part, our friends are all clean now. Unfortunately, we don’t really talk to, or about, the ones that aren’t, and some of them aren’t here anymore to talk to. This wake tonight is going to be awful. My gut wrenches just thinking about it. Lisa is at peace now, but her husband, her family, all of us are left to miss her and to hopefully learn about how to live from not only the good examples she left us (she was such a happy girl, she loved her friends desperately, she was so in love with her husband, she saw beauty everywhere, she laughed a lot),  but maybe we can learn from the not- so- great examples too.

I hope your demons have left you now. We honor your memory today, lovely girl.

I’m not dead, I was just making zucchini bread.

I know. I haven’t written in almost a year. I think I ran out of things to say. It’s OK if you say that you forgot about me. I probably forgot about you, too. That being said, I have news.

I grew something. A big something. Six or seven pounds, bigger than my last. It’s a zucchini. And it was huge. Sophie likes to go out behind our garage to our raised garden beds and check on her “zokeenies”. And today we found it, buried under the giant fan leaves of our zucchini plants. We had a bunch of little ones, but today, we found the mutha. That below is a quarter of it.

.

I remember when I was a senior in high school, my mother had this crazy zucchini harvest. Every one was huge, over 2 feet long and heavy. There had to have been 50 of them over the course of the summer. Everywhere I went, my mother sent me with a zucchini. “Hello Mr. & Mrs. Kehoe, here is an enormous zucchini”. “Hello new manager at work. Enjoy”. I hadn’t seen any that size since then. I started to think that maybe I had made up the whole giant squash thing. Until today.

 

Anywho, I didn’t know what to do with this thing, so I cooked some up for dinner with spring onions and shallots, and with the rest, I made zucchini bread. And all I can say is hell yes.

 

I never made it before, but I know how to make bread and cake, and its basically a mesh of those two, so I decided to wing it. And I also decided to make a sweet and a savory version. I usually like savory just as well as sweet, especially for things like this, but honsestly, I’m not even going to give you the savory recipe, because it wasn’t as great as this.

 

You’re welcome.

SWEET ZUCCHINI BREAD

3 eggs

1 cup olive or canola oil

1 3/4 cups sugar

2 cups grated zucchini (drained)

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

3 cups all-purpose flour

3 teaspoons cinnamon

1/8 teaspoon allspice

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

1 cup dried raisins (or craisins or dried fruit or whatever)

 

Preheat oven to 350°F.

Grease and flour two 8×4 inch loaf pans. I used parchment on one loaf and cooking spray and flour for the other. They both worked.

In a large bowl, beat the eggs with a whisk or on a low KitchenAid setting. Mix in oil and sugar, then zucchini and vanilla.

Combine flour, cinnamon, allspice, baking soda, baking powder and salt, as well as nuts, chocolate chips and/or dried fruit, if using.

Stir this into the egg mixture. Divide the batter into prepared pans.

Bake loaves for 45 minutes, plus or minus ten, or until a tester inserted into the center comes out clean. Muffins will bake far more quickly, approximately 20 to 25 minutes.

 

 

 

Battle Scars

A friend posted this on Facebook this morning, and it got me thinking. If you don’t feel like reading it, it basically says that as mothers, we are our daughters’ biggest role model when it comes to weight and body image. That scares the shit out of me.

My body image is in the toilet since having a baby. In my opinion, my body image is in the toilet because my body looks horrible, so I don’t actually think I am unjustified in thinking that. But apparently, I am wrong. Look, I don’t want to make this a post about my actual body, even though I am going to talk about it. I’m not fishing for compliments, I’m not looking for editorial because I am thinnner/ heavier than you. I have issues with my post- child body, and I know a zillion women who do too. This is my struggle.

I never had weight issues. I never had body issues before having a child. I wasn’t the biggest fan of how I looked in shorts, but I think that’s just because I’m not the biggest fan of shorts. I was 108lbs before I got pregnant. I ate whatever the hell I wanted, I smoked a pack a day and went out for drinks with friends a few times a week. My stomach was flat, my ass was high. I am only kind of kidding when I say that my husband married me for my butt. It was a spectacle to behold. Now its in my socks. My (bigger) boobs make me nuts and my stomach flops over my waistband. My thighs rub together so violently that I have lost many a pair of jeans to inner thigh holes.

I joke about it, but it affects every part of my life, every day. My husband will find me in my underwear staring at myself in the mirror grabbing and pinching and squeezing parts of me that were not there before. I don’t want him to look at me, nevermind touch me. It makes me feel awful that I shy away from my own husband. He watched me give birth. He watched a baby get pushed out of my body, but I don’t think he can handle 12 extra pounds? We have had many, many conversations that begin and end with me in tears, disgusted with how my body looks, how I think he thinks my body looks. I remember throwing on a bathing suit for the beach and not thinking twice about it. Now I hem and haw for hours about which is the least hideous looking. I have sat on the sand in jeans while the rest of my group runs on the beach in their bathing suits. I am so self- conscious and afraid of judgement that I sabotage my own good time for the sake of vanity. I understand that no one is looking. I understand that I am not 25, and child or no child, I am getting older and my body has, and will continue to, change. I know that this body made and carried and delivered the most amazing child. I know that each pregnancy leaves battle scars on your body. I know that my body is strong and capable. But I don’t care. I want to be skinny again.

I’m sure you are saying “Well then, do something about it”. Which is comical. I was on Weight Watchers for a year. I lost 13lbs. I ran 3 miles every day, even in the winter. I have run four 5K races (my 5th is this Saturday). I have done Insanity. I have done kickboxing. I have done it. And I’ve done everything long enough to know that they weren’t working for me. And I have since hired a personal trainer to hopefully help me figure out what it is that does work. So, I weight train. And I do heavy cardio. And I train for my 5k. I’ve been told to ignore the scale and focus on my clothes and how I feel. And I still feel like a fat shit.

Could it be that I have Body Dysmorphia? Could it be that I am still a hot piece of ass and everyone sees it but me? Nope! I know my body fat percentage is high(er), and that I need to work at it to get back to where I was. I sit here, 12 hours from leaving for our beach vacation, almost in tears over what bathing suit I should bring that will cause the least amount of friction (literally and metaphorically). I just see these women who have 2 or 3 kids looking like they never were pregnant. And it frustrates me. I work so hard to look the way I want, and two years later, I’m still not there. Will I ever be? Will I even be satisfied if I ever do hit my old weight again? I don’t know. I just know that if I am the biggest influence on how my daughter will see herself, she is in big trouble. I would be so sad to think that she ever would judge herself the way I do. I don’t want her to gauge her self- worth based on how thin her thighs are. But apparently, I think that’s acceptable for me? Where did I go wrong? How do I fix this? How do I project the idea that who she is as a person on the inside is more important than the number on the scale? She is the most perfect thing I could ever imagine, and so I need to start being more positive about my body and my self- worth so that I don’t pass this on to her. It would break my heart to know that she doesn’t see how amazing she is. No matter what size she is.

 

Another.

 I am the mother of a two- year- old. Yes, I know, we’ve already discussed that. I am the mother of a two- year- old and only a two- year- old. Not a mother of a two- year- old and a six- month- old. Not a two- year- old and a five- year- old, not a two- year- old with one on the way. Just a two- year- old. And the questions are rolling in again. I know, I’m no spring chicken. I will be 36 this year, and yes, I know, that’s not old, but it is kind of old to talk more kids. Yes, it is. Don’t tell me it’s not. I will already be 50 when my current child graduates high school and don’t even get me started on how old I will be if and when she ever decides to get married.

Anyway, people lurrrve asking about more kids. I couldn’t believe how many people asked us right after she was born when the next one was coming. Are you kidding me? I mean, like days after returning from the hospital. And Baby was not an easy baby. She was littttttle. And she was colicky, and she had acid reflux (she projectile vomited on me several times a day until well into her seventh month), she had Pediatric Hip Dysplasia. If you don’t know what that is, look it up. It’s something they test for at the hospital, and they caught it the day we left. She was in a harness from the time she was 4 days old until she was 16 weeks old. It was heartbreaking, but she’s completely fine now. Thanks. Jeeze, off topic again. So, I am dealing the fact that I have a 5lb baby that doesn’t sleep, doesn’t keep food down, rips my boobs off each time she nursed and screamed incessantly. And some A- holes are asking about another? Child, please.

Fast forward two plus years and it’s happening again. “Are you ready for another?” “She’s being potty trained! Does that mean another one is on the horizon?” “Not drinking tonight? Pregnant?” Nope. And here’s why. For now.

Like I’ve said before, I wasn’t even sure I wanted one kid, nevermind more than that. And when our little chicken was born, it took us a while to groove. She wasn’t so fond of me, I wasn’t so sure about her, until, honestly, she was like a year old. Maybe it was my resistance to kids, maybe it was the post- partum shit, I don’t know, but it was hard, and we had a rough go of it, her and I. Now, we are the best of buddies and I surely cannot imagine life without her, blah blah. So, here’s the thing: I don’t want another baby. I want my own baby back. I want to go back two and a half years ago and relive the whole thing. I want to go back to the day before she was born, knowing that the tiny person I just made was going to be the coolest little chickadee I would ever know. I want to relive her baby days knowing that we would get through it, that I will not (inadvertently) kill her or myself. I look at those baby pictures from the first few months and it absolutely breaks my soul into pieces that I don’t remember them so much. I want to go back in time and go through all of it again knowing that we would be alright in the end. But the fog was pretty thick. Still is, kind of. So, when I see my little lady charging butt (buck?)- naked down the hallway with a towel around her head, I squeeze some Dru Hill lyrics out so I can fit this memory in.

I’m not saying there won’t be more kids. We talk about it, because like I said, I ain’t no spring chicken, and if we gon’ do it, we need to git to gittin’. But for now, I’m taking in as much as I can so that I don’t have to piece memories together with photographs. I want to remember everything. Because Lord help me, if I can’t remember one, I sure as hell won’t be able to remember two. Not at my age…

Noggin Food

Something just recently occurred to me.

I am a mother.

I am someone’s mother.

That is INSANE.

My mother is a mother. My grandmothers were mothers, my frumpy friends who had kids right out of college (and frighteningly, now have middle school- aged children) are mothers. But me? Maybe not so much. I’m just this young hot chick with a kid! Ha. That’s hysterical. I wasn’t even sure I wanted kids, and I sure as hell knew I didn’t want them early on. I enjoyed the freedom of my 20s; traveling when and where I wanted (when I could afford it), moving when I got sick of my apartment, dating the wrong people and staying out until the bars told us to leave.
I got married at 31, and being in New York, that was considered young. Some of my friends didn’t get married until their 40s, some not at all. Anyway, getting married did nothing to change my life, other than I had this person living in my apartment. And I wore a ring. I still traveled (with him and alone), I still maintained my social life with my friends, went to work everyday, and I pretty much carried on as usual. I was hardly going to become a housewife. I never understood how getting married justifies not having a job.
Fast forward to summer of 2010, when two lines showed up on a stick. And although I wasn’t surprised, per se, it was certainly a shock. Adios cocktails with girlfriends. Adios apartment in the city. Adios freedom. And even as my belly grew, I still hadn’t grasped that the thing moving around in my stomach was an actual person. It was still almost a novelty to me. And 43 weeks later in April 2011, when she was born, I still didn’t get it. During the time I was on maternity leave, the company I worked for went belly up. And suddenly, not only was I a mother, but I was a stay- at- home mother.  And shit got real. I was now a NJ- living, CRV – driving, three- size- bigger- pants wearing, stay- at- home parent.

WHAT THE HELL?

Anyway, I have this little person that came out of my body. And I was a little confused. Did this make me a mother? I can tell you, in all honesty, that for a good while, I didn’t really even love her. Doesn’t that sound incredibly shitty? I know! I know! It felt pretty shitty too. Thankfully, I have talked to other mothers about that, and I find out that I am not alone. Now I can’t even find words to describe the ferocity with which I love this girl, but then it was a little different. I realize now that I was in pretty serious denial of a pretty serious case of post- partum depression. Anyway, as I am sure you know, it’s a really crazy thing, having a baby. You find out you’re pregnant, it grows in your person (weird and alien in itself), and then you push it out (or cut out, whatever the case may be), and then your body (and brain) is all fucked up, and then they send you home with it. And you’re supposed to know what to do. When we adopted our dog, the shelter came to our house to make sure that it was safe, and that we weren’t hoarders or junkies before they let us take THE DOG home, but no one came and made sure we weren’t maniacs before they sent us home with A BABY PERSON. And oh, by the way, you are supposed to feed it with your boobs (which in my case was extraordinarily painful), never put it down, and love it for the rest of your life. No pressure. But that is a story within a story. Another day, another day.

So here I find myself 2 years, 3 months and 2 weeks into this mother thing, and I am just starting to accept that the things I do are actually impacting this kid. Maybe it’s because she can talk a whole lot more now and I can understand what she needs. Maybe it’s just because she has the ability to absorb more now into her spongy little brain. Maybe it’s all of the above. It’s incredibly cute sometimes to hear her say things on her “phone” that I would say, but it’s also really frightening that I, a person who probably has no right procreating, am the one feeding her little noggin most of the time. Well, me and that effer Doc McStuffins. I’m no teacher, no rocket scientist, no genius. I’m certainly no saint, and I need to upgrade the brain- to- mouth filter because mine ain’t no good no more. I mean, we are trying to accept that we are old and we have become our parents. That all of the shit we said we were NEVER going to do we are actually doing. Or all that our parents said we couldn’t do? Oh, my kid’s totally going to do that!  Except that Goobers stuff. The peanut butter and the jelly in one jar? My mom was completely right on that one. That shit is gross.

Related articles

• What I Actually Do (thehousewifememoirs.com)

Why is This Shower So F^*%^$%&* Loud?

I shower in fear. Not from Norman Bates or his “mother”. I do not fear slipping and falling. I do not fear soap in my eyes. I do, however, fear the sounds of water. The deafening boom it apparently makes when the droplets hit the tub. The way the splashes must sound like gun shots. The Niagara falls sound that seems to resonate as I soap my arms and legs that inevitably wakes up my napping toddler.

I have not had a shower alone, in peace, since the summer of 2010. Before I found out I was pregnant, before I had to soap up my giant belly to move it out of the way so I could shave my legs. Before I had a tiny infant on the floor in a bouncer outside of the shower while I washed myself in record time, all the while panicking that she could somehow crawl out and drown herself. Before I left her in her crib with a talking stuffed animal and un- rippable books while I shower with the door open, listening for the inevitable sounds of her scaling the sides of the crib, bouncing out, and falling to her death.

She now comes into the shower with me. I angle the shower head down and she takes up the rest of the tub. We shut off the drain and she gets a bath while I shower. It’s a pretty good system up until now, really. She gets her bath crayons and I get to shave. We kill 45 minutes that would otherwise require an activity. And I am out of ideas for activities. God help me when winter comes.

Anyway, yeah. So yesterday, after Battle Go To Sleep was over and she finally crapped out, I went downstairs to do my workout. I was quiet. I waited the requisite 15 minutes post- workout to gauge the situation, and decided it was OK to shower (Its 2pm at this point, so I smell really lovely). And I get in the shower. And I grab the soap. And I’m washing my stomach and

MAMMMMMMMMMA!

MAMMMMMMMMMA! I’M AWAKE! WHERE ARRRRRRRRE YOUUUUU?

Shit. Really? It’s only about an hour into the nap, so I know it’s not time yet.

MAMA? TAKE A TUB?  HO-HEE TAKE A TUB? (she can’t say her name)

Oh God. It’s over. The nap is over, but I am in this shower, and I am not getting out. So I have to let her scream. And it’s only getting worse as I let it go on, but damnit, I need to wash my hair. She couldn’t have woken up while I did burpees? Because I hate those things. Or while I did the dishes? Or while I picked up toys? Nope! She had to wake up in the one moment that I had to myself without doing something that sucks. So I let her go on and on, all the while planning something to entertain her once I get out. Gabba Gabba is on! So when I get out, I just go into her room, put her in our bed, turn on the Gabba and finish drying off. It worked out surprisingly well, and although she didn’t go back to bed, she seemed to be satisfied for the moment. And for that  moment I am grateful. Because apparently, just like being in AA, this parenting thing is one day at a time. And today I will probably smell.