His fatness enjoying a whirlpool spa.
A quiet moment, thanks to musical greeting cards.
An old mom with triplets plus one and an elderly mom to take care of. It's a party all the time.
Sunday, September 12, 2010
Friday, September 10, 2010
My daughter, hell cat
I have this fantastic daughter, you see, who is a hell cat. Or is that hellcat? Tonight, when she didn't want to get out of the bathtub I gave her a choice: get out yourself or I will get you out.
That seemed fair, no? At least I gave her a choice.
I counted down from 5, which is what I do, and she still refused to exit the tub, even though it was empty of all water and she must have been getting cold. So I reached in and grabbed her skinny, wet self.
Enter hellcat.
That child knows how to throw every limb in two directions at once while simultaneously becoming limp like some passive protester at a peace rally. Being covered in a slightly soapy water film did not help. I threw a towel on her to get some traction and held her around the waist while she flailed. I don't actually know what to do in this circumstance. Letting go seems like she wins. Holding her down seems wrong too though. And this girl was mad.
Everyone else exited the bathroom and I let her go. She retreated to the wall, her side to me, just like a feral cat. And I tried to control myself. I really did. But I had to laugh. With respect! This daughter of mine isn't going to take crap from anyone. She is stronger than I ever was already. She is also a little wild, and I love that.
Now I have dealt with insane cats at the vet where I used to work. It took at least two vet techs sometimes to hold a cat still for a simple physical exam. I have dealt with feral cats in my cat rescue. Catching them was a game of the mind. You had to use surprise and outwit them so you could grab the scruff before they had a chance to defend themselves. I was not scared of them, but I respected them. If you stopped respecting them you got hurt. I am scared of her though.
Not really scared of her, just scared of doing the wrong thing. I'm not some lay down parent who gets walked all over, but I do respect anger. Emotions of any sort. And my daughter's anger? I recognize it. It is me. If I could have fought like a hellcat when I was a kid I would have. But it would have done no good in a family with people who didn't even see me. I screamed and screamed and no one noticed. And for certain no one ever thought to ask me why I was so angry.
So I asked her why she was mad. Tell mommy what you are so mad about. And do you know what she did? She walked back over to me, laid down and submitted for the diaper and pjs.
Just because I respected her. And stopped to ask her why she was mad.
I think I guessed right. Today I am a good mom.
That seemed fair, no? At least I gave her a choice.
I counted down from 5, which is what I do, and she still refused to exit the tub, even though it was empty of all water and she must have been getting cold. So I reached in and grabbed her skinny, wet self.
Enter hellcat.
That child knows how to throw every limb in two directions at once while simultaneously becoming limp like some passive protester at a peace rally. Being covered in a slightly soapy water film did not help. I threw a towel on her to get some traction and held her around the waist while she flailed. I don't actually know what to do in this circumstance. Letting go seems like she wins. Holding her down seems wrong too though. And this girl was mad.
Everyone else exited the bathroom and I let her go. She retreated to the wall, her side to me, just like a feral cat. And I tried to control myself. I really did. But I had to laugh. With respect! This daughter of mine isn't going to take crap from anyone. She is stronger than I ever was already. She is also a little wild, and I love that.
Now I have dealt with insane cats at the vet where I used to work. It took at least two vet techs sometimes to hold a cat still for a simple physical exam. I have dealt with feral cats in my cat rescue. Catching them was a game of the mind. You had to use surprise and outwit them so you could grab the scruff before they had a chance to defend themselves. I was not scared of them, but I respected them. If you stopped respecting them you got hurt. I am scared of her though.
Not really scared of her, just scared of doing the wrong thing. I'm not some lay down parent who gets walked all over, but I do respect anger. Emotions of any sort. And my daughter's anger? I recognize it. It is me. If I could have fought like a hellcat when I was a kid I would have. But it would have done no good in a family with people who didn't even see me. I screamed and screamed and no one noticed. And for certain no one ever thought to ask me why I was so angry.
So I asked her why she was mad. Tell mommy what you are so mad about. And do you know what she did? She walked back over to me, laid down and submitted for the diaper and pjs.
Just because I respected her. And stopped to ask her why she was mad.
I think I guessed right. Today I am a good mom.
Things that suck
I've spent weeks now, even months, not posting because I don't want to bore you with my whining. I don't want what used to be and was supposed to be a funny blog to become my place to bitch and moan. Well screw that. Don't read it if I make you miserable. Because the truth is I'm never going to get past this miserable if I don't write about it and the other truth is that usually even my miserable blogs have some funny bits. I can't seem to find the funny if I don't write about it. So here's to trying again to blog regularly and hopefully you all can bear with me while I work through this particularly tough time I'm going through. Just to recap:
1. My cat is dying of a yet unknown form of cancer
2. My crazy mom is still my problem and seems to be hitting the crazy stride again. It is fall after all and all of her suicide attempts have been between September and January of any given year.
3. My stupid house won't sell so I'm stuck in a teensy tinsy apartment with too many children and neighbors who apparently don't know how to close a door without slamming it and any number of noisy delivery trucks right during nap time.
4. I have too many children. Or rather, when they're all sick and whiny or not getting the aforementioned naps, I have too many whiny, snotty, pushing, shoving, hitting, hair pulling, drooling, crying and generally crabby children under the age of 3.
5. I can't potty train said children because I am in someone else's house with someone else's furniture and rugs. I'm quite sure they don't want my children having accidents on their rugs. Therefore I (or someone helping me) change an average of 20+ diapers a day, a lot of them containing poop.
6. I am fat because when said children are misbehaving, not sleeping or disobeying me I choose to keep from slapping them by stuffing my face.
7. I can't cook nice meals for myself or my children because the kitchen is directly across the hall from their bedrooms and any noise, no matter how small, transmits immediately into their sleeping ears and awakens them. Even the rustling of a plastic bag. Over the sound of a white noise machine. Even in the dead of REM sleep. And if I cook when they're awake they will dismember the couch stick by stick, nail by nail, while I'm not watching. They are that good.
8. I can't get a nap because the timing of infant naps and toddler naps shall forever remain vastly different. And the infant will only sleep 35 minutes at a time so by the time I fall asleep it's time to put him back to sleep. And drugging him is only justifiable when he has a runny nose. And that only really extends the nap to 45 minutes.
9. I am in an un-airconditioned apartment in an area that apparently reaches the 90s regularly. And thanks to global warming, reached 105 last week. Ever tried to make a toddler go to sleep when they're sweating gallons per minute out of every pore of their body? Not successful.
10. All of my life's possessions are in storage. Because I was only staying here a couple of months. So I packed for a vacation. And I'm serving a life sentence apparently.
Ok, that's it for now folks! Updates to follow!
1. My cat is dying of a yet unknown form of cancer
2. My crazy mom is still my problem and seems to be hitting the crazy stride again. It is fall after all and all of her suicide attempts have been between September and January of any given year.
3. My stupid house won't sell so I'm stuck in a teensy tinsy apartment with too many children and neighbors who apparently don't know how to close a door without slamming it and any number of noisy delivery trucks right during nap time.
4. I have too many children. Or rather, when they're all sick and whiny or not getting the aforementioned naps, I have too many whiny, snotty, pushing, shoving, hitting, hair pulling, drooling, crying and generally crabby children under the age of 3.
5. I can't potty train said children because I am in someone else's house with someone else's furniture and rugs. I'm quite sure they don't want my children having accidents on their rugs. Therefore I (or someone helping me) change an average of 20+ diapers a day, a lot of them containing poop.
6. I am fat because when said children are misbehaving, not sleeping or disobeying me I choose to keep from slapping them by stuffing my face.
7. I can't cook nice meals for myself or my children because the kitchen is directly across the hall from their bedrooms and any noise, no matter how small, transmits immediately into their sleeping ears and awakens them. Even the rustling of a plastic bag. Over the sound of a white noise machine. Even in the dead of REM sleep. And if I cook when they're awake they will dismember the couch stick by stick, nail by nail, while I'm not watching. They are that good.
8. I can't get a nap because the timing of infant naps and toddler naps shall forever remain vastly different. And the infant will only sleep 35 minutes at a time so by the time I fall asleep it's time to put him back to sleep. And drugging him is only justifiable when he has a runny nose. And that only really extends the nap to 45 minutes.
9. I am in an un-airconditioned apartment in an area that apparently reaches the 90s regularly. And thanks to global warming, reached 105 last week. Ever tried to make a toddler go to sleep when they're sweating gallons per minute out of every pore of their body? Not successful.
10. All of my life's possessions are in storage. Because I was only staying here a couple of months. So I packed for a vacation. And I'm serving a life sentence apparently.
Ok, that's it for now folks! Updates to follow!
Wednesday, September 8, 2010
Sorry folks
Life is just hard on a funny girl sometimes. You get problem after problem piling on you until you just can't see the humor any more. Today, one more thing: one of my cats has cancer. The one who's been with me for 15 years and drives me crazy regularly with her neediness so much so that I spend most of the day saying 'no piglet' 'leave me alone piglet' 'get off of me piglet' and so on. So much so that now I feel like a terrible mother for a new and exciting reason. I'm now going to be nice to her only because she's dying. I have not had the time she desires for years. I have not petted her enough, snuggled with her enough nor played with her enough for years. And the triplet excuse just isn't good enough.
I have never understood people who treat their pets as second class citizens. My cats are as important as my kids to me. However, when push comes to shove, the humans do win every time don't they? Obviously I adopted her long before I ever thought about having kids but doesn't that mean she should come first? She was here first. I committed to her first. She's just as helpless as my kids and just as dependent upon me.
I can't personally justify treating my cats differently. In a way I'm more responsible for them because I, alone, adopted them. They have no grandparents who could care for them and they can never speak for themselves no matter how old they get. They can't even throw tantrums (although they can do a hell of a job keeping you from holding on to them.) I am responsible for them in a way that is pretty much the same as to my kids. But when I neglect her emotionally, no one comes to take her away from me. She just suffers through it.
So I guess I get a chance now to spend some time with her, I don't know how long yet as they have not diagnosed the type of cancer she has, but some time. Only here I sit with 4 kids, a crazy mom, in a terribly small apartment with a house that wont sell with barely time to shop for groceries much less find a new house to live in, pay bills, take my 4 sick kids to the doctor and wipe my own butt after pooping, should I be lucky to have 5 minutes on the toilet to even accomplish that.
I guess I will just keep on putting one foot in front of the other.
I have never understood people who treat their pets as second class citizens. My cats are as important as my kids to me. However, when push comes to shove, the humans do win every time don't they? Obviously I adopted her long before I ever thought about having kids but doesn't that mean she should come first? She was here first. I committed to her first. She's just as helpless as my kids and just as dependent upon me.
I can't personally justify treating my cats differently. In a way I'm more responsible for them because I, alone, adopted them. They have no grandparents who could care for them and they can never speak for themselves no matter how old they get. They can't even throw tantrums (although they can do a hell of a job keeping you from holding on to them.) I am responsible for them in a way that is pretty much the same as to my kids. But when I neglect her emotionally, no one comes to take her away from me. She just suffers through it.
So I guess I get a chance now to spend some time with her, I don't know how long yet as they have not diagnosed the type of cancer she has, but some time. Only here I sit with 4 kids, a crazy mom, in a terribly small apartment with a house that wont sell with barely time to shop for groceries much less find a new house to live in, pay bills, take my 4 sick kids to the doctor and wipe my own butt after pooping, should I be lucky to have 5 minutes on the toilet to even accomplish that.
I guess I will just keep on putting one foot in front of the other.
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
Murphy's laws of too many children
1. Just when you get the baby to sleep a triplet will wake up. Especially if it's 3 am.
2. Once you get the triplet back to sleep the baby will reawaken or you just won't be able to sleep.
3. If one triplet awakens and screams for 10 minutes, no one will awaken......until you have gone back to bed and are juuuuuust falling asleep. Then triplet #2 will awaken.
4. When an illness descends upon the family each kid will get it 2-3 days apart so that you have a minimum of 6 days of high level whininess. Meanwhile you will also get the stupid cold but no one wants to hear you whine.
5. At least one child out of 4 is having a bad day EVERY DAY.
6. What one kid has, every kid must have. RIGHT NOW.
7. Even though everyone has one it's still not the one they want.
8. There's never enough.
9. If mommy's doing it, I want grandma to do it. If grandma's doing it, I want mommy to do it.
10. I don't care if I liked it yesterday, I don't like it today.
11. There are always more problems than you have hands to handle them.
12. At least one kid probably hates you every minute of the day.
13. Everyone on the outside thinks you're mother of the year.
2. Once you get the triplet back to sleep the baby will reawaken or you just won't be able to sleep.
3. If one triplet awakens and screams for 10 minutes, no one will awaken......until you have gone back to bed and are juuuuuust falling asleep. Then triplet #2 will awaken.
4. When an illness descends upon the family each kid will get it 2-3 days apart so that you have a minimum of 6 days of high level whininess. Meanwhile you will also get the stupid cold but no one wants to hear you whine.
5. At least one child out of 4 is having a bad day EVERY DAY.
6. What one kid has, every kid must have. RIGHT NOW.
7. Even though everyone has one it's still not the one they want.
8. There's never enough.
9. If mommy's doing it, I want grandma to do it. If grandma's doing it, I want mommy to do it.
10. I don't care if I liked it yesterday, I don't like it today.
11. There are always more problems than you have hands to handle them.
12. At least one kid probably hates you every minute of the day.
13. Everyone on the outside thinks you're mother of the year.
Sunday, August 8, 2010
Tuesday, August 3, 2010
This is not a pity party
When you're raised in a family where the parents are a narcissistic alcoholic and bipolar who never had a childhood, you learn to take care of yourself.
Scratch that. You learn to take care of everyone else BUT yourself.
You tiptoe around the house trying not to set off the alarms. You roll along under the radar behaving yourself but for your back talk, which, for some reason, is mostly tolerated in this family. You may even scream and scream, literally, to be heard, but you wont be. But you don't learn that taking care of yourself is of prime importance. Because the whole family is about taking care of your sick mom.
And when your brother dies, and your mom falls apart - more - you grow up fast and take on more responsibility. And more. You collect friends around you who are dependent upon you. You attract needy people like flies and wonder why you're so tired all the time. And why you're depressed too.
And then you have a family of your own. You frantically run around (figuratively more than literally) trying to be everything to everyone. Sure, you get a massage now and then. And you do sit on your butt after everyone's asleep instead of doing laundry or cleaning the house. And you make your children crap for dinner instead of real meals, but in your mind you are constantly on guard. You don't know how to let them take care of themselves. Not even your grown husband. You are afraid to sleep train the baby, even though you did ok with the triplets. You are concerned you're messing them up for not having dinner with them at a table every night instead of eating later when it's quiet. There's always something you could be doing.
In theory, you have to run out of energy at some point. But in 38 years I haven't. I do take care of myself in certain ways. I am pretty good at fighting for a few minutes to myself even if it's at the expense of couple time. But I am afraid. Am I going to go so far in the other direction from my parents that I actually create narcissists in my own children? Will they learn that they have to take care of each other, me, their dad or grandparents and themselves in fair amounts? Will they turn into the opposite of me like I did my parents? Is it possible, in the first generation, to create a different story?
And when things come out of my mouth that sound just like my mom and dad like "what is wrong with you?" can they forgive me? Because nothing is wrong with them. They're just being 2. My mom watches them and shakes her head with the honest belief that something is wrong with them. I merely have a momentary thought of 'what has gotten into you' and I can see the difference, but can they? Will they think I think poorly of them because I do too much for them? Will they think I think they're stupid because I help them do things?
How do you parent well when you have not been parented well? How do you not go so far off the other end and create a whole different set of traps? Therapy is helpful, but when those kids have driven you to the edge of your sanity and you haven't slept in weeks and you just want to sit down and eat some damned lunch if they would just nap like they're supposed to......how do you not yell the things you grew up hearing at them? "Why are you doing this to me?" "I'll give you something to cry about" "Don't talk back to me missy!"
I know no one is the perfect parent but I'd like to be middle of the road. Is it possible?
Scratch that. You learn to take care of everyone else BUT yourself.
You tiptoe around the house trying not to set off the alarms. You roll along under the radar behaving yourself but for your back talk, which, for some reason, is mostly tolerated in this family. You may even scream and scream, literally, to be heard, but you wont be. But you don't learn that taking care of yourself is of prime importance. Because the whole family is about taking care of your sick mom.
And when your brother dies, and your mom falls apart - more - you grow up fast and take on more responsibility. And more. You collect friends around you who are dependent upon you. You attract needy people like flies and wonder why you're so tired all the time. And why you're depressed too.
And then you have a family of your own. You frantically run around (figuratively more than literally) trying to be everything to everyone. Sure, you get a massage now and then. And you do sit on your butt after everyone's asleep instead of doing laundry or cleaning the house. And you make your children crap for dinner instead of real meals, but in your mind you are constantly on guard. You don't know how to let them take care of themselves. Not even your grown husband. You are afraid to sleep train the baby, even though you did ok with the triplets. You are concerned you're messing them up for not having dinner with them at a table every night instead of eating later when it's quiet. There's always something you could be doing.
In theory, you have to run out of energy at some point. But in 38 years I haven't. I do take care of myself in certain ways. I am pretty good at fighting for a few minutes to myself even if it's at the expense of couple time. But I am afraid. Am I going to go so far in the other direction from my parents that I actually create narcissists in my own children? Will they learn that they have to take care of each other, me, their dad or grandparents and themselves in fair amounts? Will they turn into the opposite of me like I did my parents? Is it possible, in the first generation, to create a different story?
And when things come out of my mouth that sound just like my mom and dad like "what is wrong with you?" can they forgive me? Because nothing is wrong with them. They're just being 2. My mom watches them and shakes her head with the honest belief that something is wrong with them. I merely have a momentary thought of 'what has gotten into you' and I can see the difference, but can they? Will they think I think poorly of them because I do too much for them? Will they think I think they're stupid because I help them do things?
How do you parent well when you have not been parented well? How do you not go so far off the other end and create a whole different set of traps? Therapy is helpful, but when those kids have driven you to the edge of your sanity and you haven't slept in weeks and you just want to sit down and eat some damned lunch if they would just nap like they're supposed to......how do you not yell the things you grew up hearing at them? "Why are you doing this to me?" "I'll give you something to cry about" "Don't talk back to me missy!"
I know no one is the perfect parent but I'd like to be middle of the road. Is it possible?
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