I'm Not Always Feeling the Rainbows and Unicorns

This has been ruminating on and off for awhile now, but I've been too scared to post it. See, I care a little bit too much about what other people think and I'm afraid people will think I'm a terrible mother and horrible person. But, on the off chance I'm not alone, I've decided to test the waters. Of course, instead of dipping my toe in, I'm gonna just cannon ball into the deep end.

::Splash::


Can I be totally and completely honest here for a moment? Sometimes I just feel done. Not with life or anything, but yeah, kinda with life.

(I realize that given my history of depression this could come across as a very concerning thing and all, but I assure you I have no desire to ::whispering quietly:: die, and I'm fairly certain this has nothing to do with depression. Just, you know, being a responsible grown up.)

Sometimes I feel so overwhelmed with things that are always needing to be done and are never done, and the constant noise and chaos going on around me that the energy needed to avoid Shut Down Mode is almost too much.

It's like those movie scenes where the character is standing still in the middle of a room and they do some sort of fancy camera or editing work where the room and people in it are just spinning around that one character. I am frozen in one spot and everyone's voices turn into Charlie Brown's teacher. "Waw, waw, waw. Waw, waw."

Can I be real here and admit that I am so incredibly tired of repeating myself 71582398 times that dirty clothes go in the hamper and garbage goes in the garbage can and please clear your dishes and pick up your toys and get in bed and no you can not have a snack right before a meal.

I can not stress enough how much I love my daughters, and how my heart explodes and cries and hurts with love for them. I would run in front of a speeding car for them and wrestle an alligator for them. I love them to the moon and back a million times. But arguing about what I've made for dinner for the three-hundredth night in a row kind of makes me feel all crazy.

I am not Suzy Homemaker. I do not find it rewarding scrubbing soap scum out of the bathtub. I do not find it comforting to spend time cooking a meal from scratch. I do not find satisfaction in getting stains out of the laundry.

But I love to be home full-time with my kids.

I just suck at all things house related. Of course, I don't mean "suck" as in I can't do it. Unfortunately I am very capable of swiffering the floors, not burning down the house while cooking dinner, and keeping clothes in decent shape going through the washer and dryer. I just stink at keeping up with any of it. Because it's never done. NEVER.

And some days, it feels like too much.

Am I alone here? Please reassure I'm not alone here. Because it feels like, in today's world, it's not okay to admit that sometimes parenting is not fun. It feels like if there is even a whisper of frustration or unhappiness or doneness, that this somehow means we don't love our children, or we don't deserve them, or we aren't appreciating them enough.

Trust me. I'm perfectly capable of piling on guilt over how I should have unlimited patience and appreciation for all moments and times with my children (especially after losing Calvin -- oh how the guilt when I'm frustrated can pull me under like the ocean's waves).

But having to be a grown-up? It's hard. And sometimes, it's not fun. And sometimes, as rewarding as parenting can be? Sometimes it's just not rewarding.

I don't want to give off the impression that I don't like motherhood, or that I can't handle it. I just... I'm just not an everything-is-sunshine-and-rainbows-and-happy-happy-all-the-time kind of person. Believe me, I wish I was. I feel like life would be so much easier if I could always see it through some rose-colored glasses. (Someone tell me where I can get a pair of those!)

It's not all hard, no it most definitely is not. But sometimes it is hard. And I guess I wanted to get this out of me, and share it, and hope that maybe I'm not alone? It would be nice to know that when I'm having one of those days, nights, moments where I just want to throw my hands up and shout, "I QUIT!" that I'm not the only one, that instead of feeling like an isolated leper, there is a larger community of moms out there who (at least occasionally) feel the same way.

Perhaps then instead of dying to crawl upstairs into bed, I can imagine the solidarity with other moms. I can pour myself a cup of tea, clink with an imaginary glass or two, and know that no matter how many more hours there are until I really can be done for the day, there's another mom out there who's clinking an imaginary glass with me.

xoxo, christine