This is choppy. It’s apt; my memories seem choppy.  Certain things stand out – feelings, smells, sights, sounds – not always a whole memory, just a flash, just a part of the big picture. I have to think hard about the date, the year, the season.

My memories are like wisps of mist trailing away as a fog clears. They’re what gets left behind when the sun is shining brightly and it’s hard to imagine anything other than this moment, right now.

I am proud of myself.  I am proud of her.  I am proud of our family.  I think we’re doing OK.

But today I am feeling glum and dejected for no reason.  I am getting my period.  So I am reminding myself.  We are a pretty happy family.  We are a lucky family.  We love each other.  We are trying.

We are not perfect.

We don’t need to be.

We’re OK just as we are, and it doesn’t matter if others do not agree.  I am happy to listen to anyone’s criticism to see if there is a way that I may improve.  But that doesn’t mean I will change anything.

And that’s OK too.

Sometimes it’s hard to remember.

I had a very painful experience with my mother this week. Years of anger and resentment, hurt over slights real or perceived, built up into one angry crescendo of ultimatums, screaming, lecturing, swearing, and threatening. I reached my breaking point. On Tuesday, my husband and I realized that we could never meet her demands. She was being unreasonable, she wanted explanations, apologies, begging – she wanted a lot of things we couldn’t give her. The details don’t matter much – the bottom line for all of this was communication. We didn’t communicate with her. She didn’t communicate with us. When we did “communicate” we just talked at each other, no one really heard anyone else. We had misunderstandings. My husband and I failed to fulfill part of our bargain and it doesn’t matter that she made it impossible – I mean, it does matter, that’s the why of our failure, but to her it doesn’t matter because she didn’t see herself as being impossible, and the bottom line was that we didn’t manage to keep up our end of the childcare deal.

It’s funny how our emotions can cloud our perceptions of ourselves.

On Tuesday my husband and I decided we needed to take the kids out of her care during the day. Cupcake was picking up on the tension, the anger, the resentment. When my mother and I fight in the morning, she acts up the rest of the day, in the evening when I bring her home. She hits and yells and won’t listen. She says “Grandma doesn’t love you” and “Grandma doesn’t want you” to me.

I can’t quite explain how that statement broke my heart. Not because of what she said – I already knew these things. I’ve known them for a long time. It broke my heart that she recognized it in the hateful words, the angry tone, the shouting. I don’t want her to know that a mother could feel that way about a child. I don’t want her to believe that is what a healthy mother-daughter relationship looks like.  The worst part is that I can see myself in her. Not as she is with my kids; it’s amazing how much patience she has with them. No, I see a reflection, however faint, of our current relationship in th way that I sometimes handle my children.  I sometimes yell when I should whisper. I let my irritation at the world spill through into my interactions with them. Yes, some of this is human. I think some of it is influenced by daily reinforcement, in my life, of my own unique and unhealthy, daughter/mother relationship.

When my mother confronted me at the end of the day on Tuesday, demanding and threatening, I tried to let it wash over me. I tried to forget the last 8 hours I’d spend agonizing over our decision, alternately crying at my desk at work and going to the bathroom to see if I could throw up. I summoned my nerve and said it: We’re putting the kids in daycare.

It’s funny how just a few words can change everything.

Her entire expression changed. She went from yelling You cunt! to a stunned, shocked, hurt expression. Panic crossed her face, then came back to stay as she realized I was serious, so serious. Suddenly, she became reasonable. Suddenly, she was apologizing. Suddenly, she admitted that she was being impossible on purpose – in everything – because she felt slighted, used, hurt, taken advantage of.

Suddenly, we were communicating, calmly, like adults. Expressing our frustrations and fears.

We spent another hour or so talking that evening, after I discussed the turn of events with DaddyGeek. We talked Pros and Cons, we made lists. We knew that if we could eliminate the stress of our own personal interactions with my mother, and keep them from affecting the kids when they did arise, that in my mother’s care was the best place for Cupcake and Geeklet until school. They are learning so much, She loves them so much. With them, she is patient and kind and understanding, she is creative and she teaches them. She puts a smile on her face for them.

I think it’s safe to say that I am quite often jealous of my children and the relationship that they have with my mother. It used to be that I wanted to have the bond with my own children that she seemed to have. She helped me realize what I was doing wrong – I fixed it, and I don’t feel that’s lacking anymore. No, now I am jealous of their relationship with her because I want to be in their shoes. I want her unconditional patience and love again.

We are trying again with a clean(er) slate (No one ever gets a really clean slate again, no matter what they say). We are setting some ground rules for communication, and I am cautiously optimistic that this will solve our biggest problems. I am cautiously optimistic that once we solve those problems, my mother and I will have a chance at a relationship again. I am cautiously optimistic that if she is willing to admit her own part in the destruction of our relationship, which up until the other day she vehemently refused to admit (and she hasn’t admitted much, but it’s a start) that we can repair, renew, rejuvenate.

OH HAI, that was depressing. GRATUITOUS BABY PICTURES!

• doggie (“doggah”
• kitty (“kee’ee”)
• the dog’s name
• Nana
• Daddy (“dada”)
• Uh-Oh
• Thank You (“tankoooooo”)
• Bottle (“baba”)

And hundreds of gibberish words that clearly mean something to her. Still, none of them are Mama. I mean COME ON. Dada? Baba? Nana? I can’t get even ONE LITTLE “MAMA” out of the deal?!

She’ll pay for this when she’s 16.

A lot of women have trouble controlling their bowels on the delivery table. One of the biggest concerns when the kid pops out is for the first black, tarry poop. After that, it’s a well known fact that new parents do not talk about anything other than poop.

In fact, until all your kids are potty trained? It is the number two agenda item. *

On Saturday, as I worked to rectify the naptime issues we have been having, Cupcake wanted to go potty. “I need privacy, Mommy!” So I went to the kitchen to grab a cuppa. I was almost done when she called out, “Mommy, I did poopy on the potty!”

This statement didn’t mean much to me – she is learning to potty and sometimes thinks her farts are poop. She has only pooped two other times on the potty – once was horrible, she was constipated and I had to help it out. A lot. The other was pretty good, but other potty setbacks meant it was a one hit wonder.

So I walked to the bathroom without expecting much but lo and behold! She did poopy all by herself!

It is so silly and simple, but the look of pride on her cute little face matched the bursting swell of pride in my heart.

That is what parenting is about. Being proud of everything, celebrating life with these kids… even the shit.*

*those are my best attempts at poop puns. Please forgive me.

The kids played all morning, inside & outside. I got some critical project work done and then it was naptime. Naptime yesterday didn’t happen. Hubby tried, and it just didn’t work out.. his reaction wasn’t right, her reaction wasn’t right.. it just didn’t work. I knew today would be tough so I took it, I’ve had more success adapting to her mood & switching up my naptime style than DaddyGeek does.

Everything was all good until the second potty trip, and then she started up with bouncing on the bed, giggling, and generally doing whatever she could to stay awake. I opted to talk to her about it rather than play “stern mommy”, and it actually worked.  I told her that even if she didn’t want to nap, she needed one, she had to nap, and those were the rules. I can’t change the rules, babygirl. She finally settled down. She wasn’t happy about it. Then she conked, because DUH, she was tired even though she refused to admit it

So, for an hour while both kids slept, IT WAS BLISS. Got more critical project work done. Then we all packed up & headed to the park to enjoy the rest of the day. We played at the park, then got ice cream, then headed home and had movie night. Watched UP!, ate popcorn, ate pizza & mozarella sticks, and generally didn’t do *anything* until bedtime. That, also, was awesome.

These are the kinds of weekends I want to be having with my kids. Not a sequence of two stressed out, running around, errand-doing days. I want to make memories.

I was on the phone with my mother at the time. Have you ever tried to teach your child something or, worse, discipline your child while on the phone with your mother? Is it nervewracking and terrifying for you too?

I tried to explain to Cupcake (three and a half yrs old) that water and electricity can hurt her and she shouldn’t try to wash the table. I knew I wasn’t getting through to her and she ran away from me a few times too, which left me calling too sharply to get her back in the room.

I was actually glad when my mom talked to her and explained that if she wants to help clean she should use a dry cloth instead and that mommy will give her water when it is safe.

When I got back on the phone I started to thank her for her help but all she said was “I would have run away from you, too. That was horrible.”

Note to self: in 30yrs, when I disagree with my daughter’s parenting style, that sentence is the least likely way to get her in a mental state that will be appreciative and accepting of my wisdom.

A few months ago we finally got to a point where she was falling asleep within 15 minutes or so. We were still sitting in the room with her while she went to sleep, but we could see the light at the end of the tunnel. A time when we could read her a story, give her a kiss and be on our merry way while she put herself to sleep in her bed like a big girl.

Three weeks ago something changed. I don’t know what it was, but something triggered a bad reaction from her, a bad naptime, a bad experience… and now naptime at our house stresses her out to the point that (again) sometime she wakes up, panics, and vomits.

I feel like the worst mother in the world.

I didn’t recognize the signs quickly enough. For the first two weekends after the change, I reacted badly. I threw my own tantrums right alongside hers. I yelled and threatened, I revoked movie privileges and refused ice cream requests.  I cried and I told her I was disappointed in her. I reacted badly.

I should have realized that she was in fight or flight mode. I should have recognized the signs of stress. I should have nipped it in the bud.  Ultimately my reaction those two weeks just made it worse.

It took two and a half hours yesterday to get her to take her nap. She finally fell asleep after I changed my approach. I resolved to be calm – so calm, in fact, that she asked me why I was acting like a statue. I was determined to simply place her back in the bed when she sat up, stood up, rolled over, wiggled around. I resolved to calmly tell her over and over again that this was naptime, not playtime, and that we needed to sleep so our bodies could get a chance to grow and be strong. So we could have a good afternoon. So Mommy could get rid of her headache. So she could watch a movie/play outside/have ice cream after dinner.

It took about 40 more minutes for her to calm down, but she finally did.  I saw her relax, and I took my chance. I asked her if she wanted to try napping again. She agreed, and she was out cold in less than 10 minutes.

I’m trying to focus on the final success, the tactic that worked. I’m trying to focus on the fact that I managed to finally step outside her room, take one minute to sob and one minute to collect myself, and walk back in with a better attitude. It’s hard, but I need to stop getting stressed by her. I am the parent, I need to be in control.

I am trying not to remember that when Geeklet woke up from her nap two minutes after Cupcake fell asleep that I cried like a two year old. I am trying not to remember that half an hour later, when I realized DaddyGeek wasn’t coming back after work because he was starting his night class, that I felt like screaming and I stomped around the apartment for a few minutes, irrationally angry at him.

I’m trying to focus on the good and on improving, because nothing else is worthwhile.  At this point, my little girl needs me to help her stop being scared. And focusing on anything else is just a waste of time.

You will be four years old in June, and you say the funniest things. Your vocabulary is growing in leaps and bounds (hell, you know what leaps & bounds means!) and you surprise me, all the time. It’s little things. Today while we were going potty you put your hand on my knee while getting your Pull-Up on. You said to me, “I’m holding your knee to keep me steady!”

For some reason, that sentence crushed me. You’re not a baby anymore. You use words like steady in context, instead of just saying “so I don’t fall down.”

You are currently obsessed with dresses. Not all dresses. In fact, half the time the “dress”you want to wear is a tunic with leggings. Your favorite, though, is this shirt and pant combo that Nana gave you. It’s light purple with little white flowers all over it. The shirt has a ruffle on the bottom and it’s a little bit long. You call it your purple dress. You would wear this every day if you could. You completely freak out when we tell you it is dirty and needs to be washed.

Last night you were extra cranky. You missed your nap, and I didn’t catch your tired signals in time. Nothing made you happy! You wanted more tv, but I shut it off AND made you put on pajamas. OH THE INJUSTICE OF IT ALL. You pouted and balled up your little fists and said “Mommy, you made me mad because you turned the tv off. You made me mad because you put these ‘jamas on me. I’m grumpy.”

I told you that I was proud of you for using your words instead of having a temper tantrum, and then I played peekaboo and tickled you into a good mood again.

You are so independent, my beautiful girl. I long to hold you and cuddle you all the time but you just want to run and play. I cherish our moments. I love you.

Love,
Mommy (thank god you started calling me Mommy again! )

Maybe this shirt can help?

I was not a great mother today. I was lazy, and a little bit selfish, and too angry.

I was writing this post in my head earlier. I was going to write here that tomorrow is another day and a chance to b better. But it’s only 7:45pm. I’ve still got 45 minutes before the kids go to bed.

I’m going to go try to be better right now.