Category: Confessions

Confessions

If I don’t Write it Down, Could You Just Read it in my Head?

I realize at some point in every stay-at-home-parent’s existence, a list is made. A “What the hell do I do all day?” list. And thanks to the Internet, I also realize many of these lists have been published somewhere, and have circulated, mostly on Mommy websites, in Mom-to-Mom emails, and as “rants” on those ever growing cliches called Mommy Blogs.

Today I made a list.

I made a list and put it in an email and sent it to my husband. In hindsight, I maybe should have done this before I called him and went off about the garbage. We used to have an agreement that whatever I was mad about after he left for work, I had to type it as a Google Chat message and he’d read it when he arrived. I was allowed to use all-caps if necessary and he promised to hear the anger in my voice, as such.

Well, we had a rough morning. Somehow, all-caps cursing via G-chat just wasn’t going to do it for me today.

Mornings. Mornings are always difficult due to their unpredictability. If we have somewhere to be by a certain time, my children will inevitably sleep in. If we have no where to be and absolutely nothing to do (and especially if I’ve successfully extricated myself from the hypnosis of 3-6am coma-sleep) my children will be awake with the birds and already bored before breakfast. If we successfully get dressed before breakfast, Carter won’t be in the mood to eat anything. Even strawberry muffins with zero nutritional value whatsoever. Even if I tell her it is “cake.” If we successfully get dressed and eat breakfast in time to leave, Carter will poop the milisecond before I put her in the carseat. And if we are dressed, fed, changed, and out the door on time, likely I have mixed up Tuesday and Wednesday in my head and the empty parking lot which I am for the first time early to arrive to gives away the fact that I should have slept in that day. And, if everything is right in the world of Carter and my days are not mixed up, Eliott will be having what I like to call pre-school PMS.

I cannot win.

Eliott is enrolled in 9:15 am swim lessons at the YMCA. They are only a half an hour long for 2 weeks. We need to not be late. We need to not miss a day. And, we all really need to poop before we leave the house. Can I say, for the record, how debilitating it is to revolve a large majority of my schedule around my children’s digestive tracts? And this has nothing to do with potty training and accidents and diapers and all that. It simply has to do with the availability of a bathroom when it is time. There’s no such thing as telling a four-year-old to “hold it.” And because the diaper baby does not hold it, there is no such thing as, “Here, change your own diaper real quick while I parallel park.”

So my YMCA time today was spent on a couch in the lobby with my iced coffee and my iPhone (which I never got rid of by the way), emailing my husband in a rage after I spent the majority of the morning fighting with both children, ants in my kitchen, and the garbage (because it is Tuesday). It hit me at about 10:15 that all I ate for breakfast was half of Carter’s strawberry cake.

If personalities were measured like cup sizes in bras, then my husband would be an unpadded type-32-double-A. His sense of organization, adherence to rules, and inability to function without the use of or ability to deviate from a list goes so far beyond the confines of Type-A that it needs a category all to itself. I personally know many women who would murder me with a butter knife to know how often this personality actually frustrates me. With a man who will do anything, as long as it is written down, why am I complaining? Why aren’t I bottling him up and selling him as a remedy for their blobs of ESPN couch goo?

Maybe I’m a little spoiled.

But excerpts from my email went something like this:

…the thing is, if I have to come up with the list, organize it, and figure out by when it needs to get done, I’ve already tackled more than half the battle and I might as well just do the thing myself. Need I remind you that I get 90 whole minutes to myself every day?

…I’m sorry that the garbage set me off this morning. But really, it was the garbage, the blankets, the ants, Carter not eating (you know I’m still spoon feeding our 2 year old three meals a day), getting out the door on time, thinking about what kind of picnic dinner I can pack for your soccer game (which we will probably skip by the way), thinking about when Carter will poop and how many diapers I need to bring with us today… I didn’t even eat breakfast. So now I’m also trying to figure out what is easy to grab and eat on the road…and all because I forgot to write bananas on the grocery list for you…

…I know that you are stressed out by work. I know you have a lot to do and not enough hours in the day to do it all. I also know that I am selfishly holding you back from working until 9 every night, which, I KNOW, you could easily do. But I am tired. All the time. And the thought of sitting in an office on a computer for 8 hours a day, dealing with adults who all want to sue the police, defending child delinquents, looking up case law, writing angry demand letters, fighting with AT&T over yet another screwed up bill on the phone, setting up new office furniture, organizing paperwork, driving to and sitting through court in three counties, and creating a system for an intern to start doing half my work actually sounds like a relief to me right now. I know. The grass is always greener. No, I don’t want to go back to work. I just want someone to understand the difficulty of my existence despite what the numbers may say.

I’m not actually going to re-type my entire personal list of “What Do I Do All Day” (which was Part B of the above email). At least not today. And I admit, if I would just embrace John’s system, things would be more than fine on my end. But we don’t have any bananas because I forgot to write it down. So maybe in addition to everything else he does all day, I want want him to read my mind. Without a list. That I create. Read my mind IN my head. Read the mind that I am often unable to consciously express.

I really don’t think that I’m asking too much here.

Confessions

Sadistic Stress Relief

I think I have discovered, mostly by accident, a couple of incredibly satisfying stress relieving techniques.  The first, in college, came with turning in major term papers and projects a week early.  Of course there was the obvious relief that simply comes with being done.  And I want to note, for the record, that I never pulled an all-nighter in the name of “studying” in my life.  I was actually that dork who went to bed at 11:00 most nights and could sleep through anything in the dorms.  But none of this is to say I didn’t work just as furiously and just as long as my peers.  I just did it two weekends before the thing was due, instead of at the last minute (the penultimate completion, so to speak).  But double or even triple the satisfaction of completion with every complaint from the other students in my class the week before the due date.  As they furiously compared progress and soothed themselves and others with the common assumption that no one else had done anything either, I was that annoying bubble buster who got to feed off of their multiplied stress and fear that there just weren’t enough hours in a day (even when forgoing sleeping and eating and considering wearing a diaper) to get everything done.  Most of the time I didn’t even have to gloat about being finished.  I think they could smell it on me.  And I knew that when they said they “hated” me, it was that same kind of jealous hatred my mother taught me about in junior high.  Somehow by college, I had grown to thrive off it.  I just wish I had discovered this scheme my first semester.  My grades might have been better.

Last weekend, I was reminded of another stress reliever, as I drove more than an hour to a graduation back in Burlington.  When my GPS told me I was going to be at least 25 minutes early (rather than 10 minutes late, as I had really hoped), I found myself once again overcome by the zen that results from driving slower than the speed limit.  This started, admittedly, from my cheap nature and attempt to save money that first year that gas prices seemed to skyrocket by a dollar a gallon overnight.  At the time, I was living in Burlington but still working in Greensboro, and had exactly a 25 minute one way all highway commute.  My dad dropped me the tip that most cars gas mileage peaks at 55mph, so I thought, for 10 more minutes a day, what the heck.  The speed limit for half the trip was 65 and 70 for the other half.  I was in the habit of driving between 70 and 75 most of the way, which was generally the speed of traffic.  Slowing down to 55 was drastic, for everyone involved.

Within three days, I was sold.  I don’t even know if I actually raised my gas mileage, but I’m telling you, any sense of road rage I ever might have had, virtually gone.  In fact, I started noticing it in everyone else, and developed a superiority complex of a whole new nature.  I had this idea like, “I’m better than you because I’m not in a hurry today.”  And no, I didn’t drive in the left lane.  I didn’t drive in the far right lane either though, what with all the on and off ramps, it was really the safest to stay in the middle or second to right lane.  This created a very bizarre effect where, in my small car close to the road, I could put my head back and imagine all the cars flying around me were the bubbles created by hot tub jets on the back of my neck.  Getting honked at, someone handing me a martini.  Flipped off?  Extra olives.  No lie.

This brings me to Wal-mart, last Sunday.  For the record, Wal-mart was the closest, cleanest, cheap grocery store to campus when I was in college, so I endured it.  Now, I rarely go.  The fact is, I can, nearly always, beat Wal-mart’s prices.  I hate their parking lot.  I generally hate their customer service after 11am (when all the seniors’ shifts end) and I generally hate 75% of their patrons.  Generally.  But as a professional stay-at-home-mom who also uses coupons, I have come to a reconciliation of sorts, with long grocery lines, couponers, inept register clerks, and even ladies paying for a gallon of milk, a loaf of bread, and a pack of gum in dimes.  (That’s almost 70 dimes today people.)  My secret, of course, is timing.  Never go grocery shopping in a hurry.  Never.  In fact, my new tactic is to take the girls to the grocery store as a 90 minute time killer if they wake up early from naps or I need to push them through a snack until lunch.

So on Sunday, I was running several errands all on one side of town, and Wal-mart happened to be on my list.  I needed tomato stakes, for my garden.  I parked on the far left side of the building (knowing full well it would be easier to walk across the entire store in my heels from church than it would be to circle and navigate the front parking lot on a Sunday afternoon), picked up 6 stakes, a citronella candle, some plastic bowls and cups, and a pint of strawberries.

Certainly, all of these things could have been purchased elsewhere, but likely not in a one-stop shop.  And even more likely (and here’s my stress-reducing secret), not using gift-cards.  *So another confession: I am a secret shopper and a product tester, and many of the “companies” for which I test products pay in gift cards to get around the income tax issue.  This is why I happened to have eleven gift cards in $5 increments to Wal-mart bound by a rubber band in my center console.

Let me tell you what.  If you ever need a petty passive aggressive get-back at all the slow cart pushers, aisle blockers, crappy parkers, smelly shoppers, and bratty children, try this.  With every glare I only became more friendly to those behind me, “Uh, you might want to find another line, some of my cards aren’t scanning right.”  As they’d furiously begin slamming all their items back in the cart I’d top it off with a good-natured (and very innocent) laugh and say with a smile, “I know!  And I have about eleven of them!”  Then, rolling my eyes at myself I suddenly understood the meaning of “ignorance is bliss.”  It really is.  Even feigned ignorance feels pretty damn good.

Carter, Confessions

This is How I Know I’m a Good Mom Today

Two nights ago I went into Carter’s room to put away some laundry just after John had put her down for bed.

My almost-two-year-old-offspring was rocking and “Shushing” her doll babies to sleep.  As I opened the door, she looked up, smiled at me, showed me her babies, said, “Mommy.  Baby.”  She smiled again, kissed me goodnight on the lips, and snuggled in to her blanket closing her eyes.

So maybe every time I ask her, “Hey Carter, who’s your favorite, Mommy or Daddy?” she says anything but Mommy.  And maybe she whines with more regularity when I’m around and pretends she doesn’t like (or even need) me most of the time.

But suddenly I get it.

She WANTS TO BE ME.

When I was little and my two younger sisters used to follow me around and take everything I had and copy everything I did I was repeatedly told (mostly by my mother) to take all of it as a compliment.  All they wanted was to be just like me.  Such reminders, as a kid, mostly just gave me the urge to karate chop someone in the throat.

But I get it now.

And it does feel exactly as good as my mother told me it should.

Carter, Confessions

More Carter Stories

As per a recent request, today I have a Carter story.

Carter is 22 months old.  This means she will be 2 in July.  I’m fairly certain that in most things, she’s been right on target for developing at the same rate as the books say she should (or even that her big sister did).  Mind you, both of them have been, for the most part, the right size for their age all along, and seem to be basically average in all the developmental milestones (walking, talking, feeding themselves, etc).  I’m not big on the mom-style competitions of asking others how and when their children learned or started doing certain things.  My thought is, when we reach a milestone, I’ll figure it out.  Knowing how and when others tackled the basics (things like sleeping through the night and potty training) has no bearing on how I plan to tackle them.  On the other hand, if there is a mom or a child whom I particularly admire, I’m not above copying.

So.  Potty training.  Let me say for the record, no, Carter is not potty trained.  Nor am I actively potty training her.  However, she has a very regular poop schedule.  Therefore, when we have the time, it is not particularly difficult to put her on the potty when said “time” arrives.  This simply means one less dirty diaper for me to change.  And believe me, wiping a bottom off the potty is FAR easier, quicker, and more pleasant than changing a dirty diaper.  So last Thursday, Mommy and Carter synchronized schedules, and pooping on the potty happened.  Twice.

A few things that have made this little accomplishment easier than it was with Eliott:

  1. Carter learning, understanding, and loving the action of and the word “toot.”  She announces it every time she does it, with a giggle.  She announces every time John does it, also with a giggle.  When she first did it, it was cute enough at the dinner table that we laughed.  She internalized this bit of attention and has continued it unceasingly (the old, if it is funny once, it is funny a million times tactic).  Though it is no longer funny at the dinner table (well, okay, it still is, but we have to pretend it isn’t), it has made for easy directions when pooping on the potty.  One thing many kids struggle with when potty training is the absence of the comfort of a diaper, and learning to simply let go.  All I have to say to Carter is, “Can you make a toot?” and potty success generally follows shortly thereafter.
  2. Knowing what M&M’s are, knowing she likes them, and her very keen albeit premature grasp of quid pro quo.  Eliott was fully 2-and-a-half before we even began potty training.  Though it only took exactly one weekend (and a very timely accident at Barnes and Noble one evening), Eliott was impervious to bribes.  I created and proceeded to eat directly in front of her a bowl of ice cream with chocolate sauce and M&Ms on top, declaring, “All you have to do is go poo-poo and this too, can be yours.”  It just made her confused and angry.  Carter not only seemed to understand, “Go poo-poo on the potty and you can have an M&M,” but she remembered it the next time, and still does.

As I’ve mentioned before, Carter doesn’t often speak about things she is not looking at, which, among other things, makes for very difficult phone calls with grandparents.  The idea that she can remember for later, ideas or moments which happened hours or even minutes before, is far too abstract for her concrete development to crack.  Or so I thought.  Because on Thursday after lunch (the 2nd potty accomplishment of the day), when she realized what she had done, her eyebrows and ears perked up (much like those of a cat when it senses dinner just before the can is opened), she smiled, and said, “Yaaaaaay…” sort of quietly.  Her hesitation was burst when I joined in with the verbal celebration.  At that, she announced, “I want.  M&M.”  We went downstairs to retrieve two M&Ms, and with her grimy little palm extended she then said, “Daddy.  Poo-poo.  Potty.  Goo-grrrl.”

“That’s right, Carter.  You tell Daddy you went poo-poo on the potty.  He’ll say, ‘Good girl,”  I said, pretending this is what she meant.

This is exactly what she meant.

Four hours later, when John came home from work, and she announced the same Carter-style sentence, his response was, “Yes Carter, poo-poo goes in the potty.”  Thank goodness for Eliott, our translator, who immediately cleared things up.

Let it not be mistaken.  My girls have a favorite.  They know who and what is most important to them.  Accomplishments, and M&Ms, are so much better when Daddy is included.

I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Confessions, Eliott

Those Were the Good Old Days

I think many of my childless friends would look back fondly on pre-school as one of those on-the-whole really good times in life. I also think that before I put my own children in pre-school, I too assumed everything about it was as innocent and gleeful as play-doh and rice tables. And mostly, it is. In the last five months, I’ve been invited to relive pre-school through Eliott (and soon Carter, when she can string more than 3-word sentences together and talk about anything besides what she’s currently looking at). Thankfully, our brains have this fabulous filter which, barring any major childhood trauma, causes us to remember mostly good things. But in these past five months, I’ve not only been reacquainted with carpet squares and the coveted Line Leader title, I’ve been newly introduced to a little something my adult self is going to call Pre-School Politics. Deep sigh. If you thought junior high was hard, and then were disappointed to find out that the “real world” and junior high are surprisingly similar, then let me burst yet one more of your idealistic ‘when-I-grow-up’ bubbles: junior high :: high-school :: the work place :: pre-school. All of them. Socially synonymous. Biggest difference? Relative height.

Some of you may remember my St. Patrick’s Day story in which a girl I called so-and-so punched (pinched, whatever) Eliott. Today, let’s give so-and-so an easier name to type. To make things personal yet keep them anonymous, we’ll call her Kelsey. (I never knew a Kelsey I actually liked.) I usually talk to Eliott about school on the drive home and continue at lunch. For about the first four or five weeks, it was all I could do to keep up with the other ten names of the kids in her class. One name, however, came up with such regularity, that I knew relatively quickly I didn’t like the kid. Kelsey.

Kelsey was naughty today, Mommy. Ms. Tiffany had to put her in time-out…

Kelsey is not my friend. I do not like her.
Well, you should be nice to her, Eliott. You should be nice to everyone.
Kelsey is not nice, Mommy. She told me, “No Eliott. You can’t sit here. You are not my friend.”

Kelsey took the purple scooter from me today in the Life Center.
Well, Eliott, you -always- get the purple scooter. Sometimes, it is nice if you let someone else have the purple scooter. Just because purple is your favorite color doesn’t mean you are the only one allowed to have the purple scooter. You need to share and let others have a turn.
No, Mommy, there are lots of purple scooters. She didn’t want a turn. She took it away and brought it to Ms. Tiffany and said, “Here Ms. Tiffany. Put this away so that Eliott can’t have it.”

Oh no. Mommy does not like Kelsey. Imagine how difficult it is for me to filter my eyes of experience back down to a 4-year-old’s level. Of course I want to say, “Listen Eliott, bitches like Kelsey are going to pick on you for your entire life unless you do something about it. You have my permission to do and say whatever you want to make Kelsey leave you alone. And if you have to move your owl at the end of the day, keep this in mind: it was worth it.”

I actually don’t even know what I’m supposed to say. “All that matters is that Mommy and Daddy love you, and Jesus loves you.” (I was a kid once. I heard this. It didn’t make me feel any better, even when I knew it was true.) Or, “Kelsey is jealous of you and feels threatened by you. The best thing you can do is take her attitude and meanness as a compliment, and move on. Be nice to her. Even though you don’t know it, being nice to her is exactly what she needs.” (Right. I heard this one too. ALL THE TIME. Though I fully understand it now and believe it is also the root of Eliott’s problem, I also know that she doesn’t know the word “jealous” yet, and even when she knows what it means one day, she’ll still never fully understand this phenomenon of women.)

Fast forward to just after Spring Break. (Don’t even get me started on why pre-school needs Spring Break…) Eliott comes home that first Monday and says, “Hey Mommy, Kelsey’s coming over to my house next week.” This is news to me.

“Really?” I say, “Because you didn’t ask me if that was okay.”

“No. Her mommy says it’s okay. She’s coming over to my house.”

Initially, I just ignored this. First of all, “next week,” for Eliott’s grasp of time, currently translates to “anytime in the future.” Second, I was pretty sure Kelsey was just employing some sort of manipulation tactic that would die out as soon as her 4-year-old memory kicked in.

I was wrong.

I have to go inside to drop-off and pick the girls up every day, because Carter is too young for the car-line. Kelsey, on the other hand, is a car-line kid. And though I’ve -seen- I’ve never actually -met- her mother. For the next several days in a row, when I came in to pick up the girls, Kelsey also got off the bench and announced she was “coming over to Eliott’s house.” The first time I just kept walking down the hall and let the teachers chase Kelsey and get her back on the bench. But when this tactic ceased to work, I had to have a heart-to-heart with Eliott and an eye-to-eye with Kelsey. In the car I instructed Eliott as follows:

Listen to me Eliott. Are you listening? Kelsey is not coming over to our house to play. Not today. Not next week. Okay? Do you want to know why? It is because I do not know Kelsey’s mommy. You can play with Kelsey at school. But she can’t come to our house. So when she tells you she’s coming over, you need to say, “No, Kelsey, my mommy says you can’t come over.” Okay? Let’s practice. Pretend like I’m Kelsey. “Hey Eliott, I’m coming over to your house today.” What do you say, Eliott?

No, you can’t come over to my house.

Why?

Because your mommy is not friends with my mommy.

Perfect. As for the eye-to-eye, I squatted down one day (to a full head shorter than Eliott’s height, go figure) and looked Kelsey directly in the eyes. I put on a serious face, but added that nice mom-ish smile and said sweetly, “Kelsey. You are not coming over to Eliott’s house today. I’m sorry. If you want to come over, you tell your mommy to come ask ME if it is okay. Alright?”

So I thought the Kelsey thing was over. Little did I know just exactly how correct I was with my original assessment of jealousy and manipulation. It is very obvious that Eliott does not have to work very hard for kids to like her. In fact, it isn’t just the kids in her class. It is kids all over the tiny school. We walk into the building every morning and kids I do not recognize are beating on their windows and waving. We leave at noon and kids from other classes are waving and yelling, “Bye Eliott!” Once I even heard a little boy turn to his teacher as we passed and whisper excitedly, “Eliott waved at me!” I thought, WHAT? Who is this child, and where did she come from?

I asked her at lunch one day, “Hey Eliott, how do all the kids in other classes know you?”

“I don’t know, Mommy. Everybody likes me.” (No chance of teenage suicidal thoughts in our future.)

“Yes, but how do they know you? Do they say hi to all the kids in your class?”

“I don’t know.”

“How do they know your name?”

“Because, when I see other kids I just yell (demonstration with her hands cupped around her mouth), ‘Hey kids! Hey kids who are not in my class! My name is Eliott!’ And so they just know me.”

It (unfortunately) came as absolutely no surprise then, when Eliott crawled into my bed one morning and started crying. “Mommy. Kelsey doesn’t like me anymore. She said, ‘You are not my friend anymore, Eliott.'”

I hugged her to my chest and said, “It’s okay, Sweetie. The most important thing is that Mommy loves you, and Daddy loves you, and Jesus loves you. And don’t worry. You will always be taller than Kelsey.”

Confessions, Eliott

Eliott’s First Lesson In Irony (to be reviewed in 10 years)

Eliott, why did you get a spanking?

Because I wasn’t listening.

No. (But apparently also yes.)

Because I wasn’t following directions?

No.

Because I was being rough in the bathtub.

No. Eliott. It has to do with the gum.

Because I ate four pieces of gum.

No. Because you LIED TO ME about the gum. When I asked how much you ate, you didn’t tell the truth. Do you know what happens when you don’t tell the truth?

I get a spanking.

Well, yes, that, but do you know what else happens?

No.

Santa doesn’t come. He knows every time you lie. And then he doesn’t come.

(And, just in case you actually stop lying and he was thinking about coming, he’s now going to change his mind because Mommy used him in this very lesson. About lying.)

Confessions, Eliott

What Women Want

I have some free advice.  I’m sure this advice has been said and probably written before but I never claimed to be the greatest teacher in the Western World based on originality.  (I claim to be a great teacher because I speak the language of the people, can create a metaphor, an analogy, or a real life example for just about any lesson on the spot, and I’m funny.)  So listen up, because if you don’t get this after I’m through with you, your wife, mother, sister, daughter, girlfriend, or that girl who never returns your calls has every reason to believe you are exactly as idiotic as you probably are.

LESSON:

Women + Want = VALIDATION

(Now, let’s define our terms and review things we already know.)

A.  Women = One of two kinds of humans.  The kind who…

1.  do not problem solve alone.
2.  do not need help (in the form of advice) when problem solving, except the maintaining of eye contact and, “That sounds like it might work,” muttered at appropriate times.
3.  tend to be lead by emotion which appears to cancel out rationality:

MYTH: emotional women are incapable of rational thinking.
FACT: Estrogen, like Satan, resides within us as an ever present stronghold over most verbal and many physical behaviors.  For our purposes, consider estrogen and emotion to be Siamese twins sharing one heart.

B.  Want = not merely a petty desire or even a need;  better stated as…

1.  crave, require, cannot survive without.
2.  THIS IS IMPORTANT
3.  must have in order for everyone to dwell in peace.

C.  Validation = Confirmation of existence, importance, and correctness by another living, breathing, and thinking human, preferably within 3 years of woman’s age or older, preferably over the height of 3.5 feet (extenuating circumstances here may apply).  Validation…

1.  has to do with feelings not circumstances which actually exist.
2.  has nothing to do with anyone except the woman.
3.  can be accomplished with a very simple approach to all future conversations.  (Examples below.)

EXAMPLE 1 (woman to man):

What is said: We never talk anymore. -OR- You’re not listening to me.
What is meant: I have been talking to children, idiots, and/or myself all day.  Will someone please (pretend to) be interested in me for ____ minutes/hours and remind me that I’m an adult with a college education who has something to offer the world beyond the confines of goldfish crackers and/or 3 word sentences?  (This is even applicable for women who are not stay-at-home moms.)
Things not to say: What do you mean we never talk anymore?  We talk every night when I get home from work.  |  I heard everything you said tonight.  If you gave me a quiz on tonight’s conversation, I promise you I’d make an A.  |  Honey, just because you think I’m not listening doesn’t mean I’m not listening.  (All of these messages say the same thing: You. Are. Wrong.)
Things to say (when all else fails, simply repeat her words back to her with emphasis on different words): You’re right honey, I feel like we never talk anymore.  |  I know.  I spend the entire day at work talking to idiots who might as well be children and I’ve probably been bringing that home.  Can we start over?  (This actually appeals directly to how she feels and might illicit a response of agreement and relief knowing someone understands her.)
Pre-emptive Strike Strategy: regularly mention how much you miss “talking to” her when you are apart. | Do not ask, “How was your day?”  Instead try (with raised eyebrows and as much interest as you can muster), “So, any good mom gossip/drama today?  Anybody cheating on anyone?  Who’s mad at whom?  Who’s kids were the most annoying today?  Did you find any good deals today?

EXAMPLE 2 (woman to woman, possibly):

What is said: Does your child ever do this? -OR- What do you do when…
What is meant: I’m not actually looking for advice nor a solution.  I just need someone to confirm that my child/situation is normal and hear from someone who has experienced it and survived.  By the way, don’t want to hear HOW you survived, just that you did.  I will then make appropriate comparisons, tell myself that if YOU can do it, then I definitely can, and sleep more soundly tonight as a result.
Things not to say: No, that has never happened to me.  |  You and your life are completely abnormal and this just might in fact kill you.  |  Have you tried A, B, or C?  (Even if she hasn’t, she’s beyond “trying” anything at the point where she comes to you pretending to ask for advice.)  | You need to do this, this, and this.  (No.  What she needs is a stiff drink.  The hero is the person who shuts up and hands it to her.)
Things to say: Yes.  It is completely normal, mine did it too and then one day, just stopped.  Like that.  Guess it was a phase.  (More than likely, this is a lie.  Don’t worry about it.  Just give her hope.)  |  Ugh.  Yes!  I hate that!  I know exactly how you feel.  You are a good mommy and an even better wife.  Those kids (that husband) are lucky to have you!  They don’t even know how good they’ve got it.  You are [insert short list of positive qualities here].  (Even though you are convinced she probably could do something to better her situation, it will only be regarded at this point as criticism.  All she wants is for someone to throw her a freaking bone.  Validate her effort, because right now she feels like it is futile and therefore, she is useless and a failure.  At life.)
Pre-emptive Strike: paying regular verbal compliments for unusual things to the women in your life will generally improve her overall mood and life-outlook and ultimately will get you everywhere.

A while back it seemed like Eliott had reverted from semi-well adjusted and pretty much happy 4 year old back to the terrible two’s.  After what seemed like weeks of fighting whining and crying over every little thing, I decided to treat her how I always want to be treated when I’m being that whiny.  I just started agreeing with her.  Genuinely.  “You’re right,” I said to the shoe-trauma, “You do not like putting on your shoes.  It is hard to put them on every day.  It is so hard.  And you do not like it.”  And like magic, the girl stopped whining, looked at me and said, very matter of factly, “Yeah.  I do not like it.”  She put the shoes on and was done.


VALIDATE US.  That’s it.

Confessions

Dear iPhone, Before I Say Goodbye

As my iPhone anxiety slowly weans, I’m finding my hormonal re-balance manifesting itself in the form of “nesting.”  When a woman is pregnant, nesting is the technical term for “Dear-God-somebody-make-my-wife-stop-cleaning-and-organizing-things!”  No, I’m not pregnant.  I’m just saying that my hormones often seem to treat me like I am.  (This is what it means to be a woman.)  Right now, it is all I can do to stop adding more things to my things to do list.

When we moved into this “gigantic” house 6 months ago, we had enough furniture and belongings to fill not even half of it.  It is amazing to me how quickly the little things start to add up and how furniture and clothes manage to multiply like rabbits.  We’ve only lived here for 6 months and I’m sort of wishing we’d taken about half of the stuff in the moving truck and just kept driving it to nowhere.

So in a last-ditch effort to give myself more guilt after I give up the idea of an iPhone later today, I thought I’d use it for one final purposeful project.  I’m about to invite you into a very personal part of my life.  This actually makes me a little bit nervous because I like to pretend that I’m just as Type-A as John.  I like to pretend that I’m skilled at organization even if I don’t pretend to like it.  (As a teacher, my classroom was really neat and organized, and my system was so simple I could put actual students to work at my Type-A tasks, and found success in the form of dictatorship and delegation.)  But the current truth is that John is directly responsible for most of the tidiness of my house.  Once my home became my office, all things Type-A went the way of my high school novel collection.  That is to say, they remain in a classroom somewhere, either ignored or abused by strangers.

Everyone knows that when it comes to productivity, Step 1 is to make a plan.  Thank you iPhone, for Step 1 completion.  Step 2, in my mind, is to get others involved.  Perhaps more for the purpose of indirect accountability, I’m involving others by revealing my To-Do list.  Much of the following should be pretty self-explanatory, at least for John, who is really the only person other than me who needs to understand the madness.

Things To Do List (honey), in Pictures taken with my iPhone:

Happy Weekend!

Confessions

iPhone Anxiety

Typically, I am not a fickle decision maker.

This is especially true when someone else is paying for the thing on which I’m deciding.

When it comes to spending my own money, however, I tend to be a bit obsessive about making changes to my routine, adding a new expense to the budget, or deciding on a major purchase.  It kills me, because, the longer I spend thinking about a decision, the less I trust myself.

But I think I may have discovered a solution to this problem:  Make the decision.  React.  Undo decision if reaction is more negative than positive.

Thank God we live in a 30-day money-back-guarantee world.

On Tuesday, John and I mutually ended a 6 year relationship with Verizon and committed to AT&T.  The decision was not made instantly, and most of it was out of my control.  John’s been flirting with AT&T for several months now as he’s building a business with nothing but Apple technology.  This is one expensive relationship which I fully support and plan to join at home as soon as possible.  The cell phone break up, however, has not been so stress free.

On principle, I hate AT&T.  I hate their customer service.  I hate their coverage.  I hate their website and its inability to be forthcoming about what is the best plan to fit my family’s needs.  I hate that their customer service representatives range from Johnny-On-The-Money-Saving-Spot to High School Dropout and that inevitably, whatever Johnny told you yesterday, is no longer available today and suddenly neither is Johnny.

However.

It turns out, for what we need right now, AT&T is cheaper than Verizon.  And, in all fairness, I hate Verizon, as a company, for all of the same above reasons.  The only difference is that I haven’t made any changes to my cheapest cell phone plan on Earth in 6 years, so I never have to deal with them.  And, because of the iPhone 4, the previous generation iPhone is currently $50 with an AT&T contract.  To John (and his business mind), this is a steal that he snatched up immediately.  My first (and entirely wrong) reaction was: “Why do you get all the fun toys?  That is not fair.”

What a stupid thought.  What a stupid thing to say.

Unfortunately, my husband agreed with me.

So I bought an iPhone and we signed a 2 year contract that will cost us $140 a month.  *GULP*

I called it a “business expense” and blinked exactly twice before signing the paper.

Then I went home.

I have been having mild to moderate to severe anxiety ever since.

My brain:

Can you really justify an extra $15 a month right now for a data-plan you may or may not need?  (Yes, probably.  That’s only $0.50 a day.  I’ll potty train Carter this summer and it will come out of our diaper budget.)  You have an iPod Touch that you rarely use.  What makes you think you’ll use the iPhone features if you don’t even use them on your iPod Touch?  (Good point.)  How often are you in an area that does not have Wi-Fi access where you could not live without the Internet?  (The park?)  Wait a minute.  What do you do all day?  Do you really need Internet access all the time no matter where you go?  What are you going to do, check your email?  How many emails did you receive in total last week?  (Not counting Groupon nor grocery store deals?  Four.)  Do you really want to be that available?  Do you really want to be that woman, checking her phone every 5 minutes like she’s so important?  (Oh God.  I hate that woman.  Is that what I would be?  Yes.  Yes it is.  And I hate her.  I’m not that important.  I don’t even have a desk job.  When I did have a desk job, my favorite thing about it was leaving everything on my desk when I left for the day and boasting of my ability not to do any work at home.  The most important things in my day haven’t even fully grasped fine motor skills, let alone the use of their fingers for things like typing.  In fact, any and all emergency situations would likely result from my lack of attention to them, the chances of which rise with the idea of portable Facebook.  Do I really want my children to associate me with a hand-held idiot box?  What kind of message am I sending?!)

And with that, my decision has been made.

I’ll be returning to AT&T tomorrow.

Confessions

AND To My Mother-In-Law…

Though I won’t be telling any embarrassing childhood stories for John or Daniel (of which I’m sure they have many, including the time you left the choir risers in the middle of church and bit one of the boys in the name of a lesson), I will say this: whatever you did, you did it right.  John is as close to perfect (for me) as any man in the universe could ever hope to be.  Though I’ve often complained of his ignorance in the female department (especially where sharing a bathroom is concerned), I actually believe this is purely due to the fact that he grew up without any sisters.  His natural parental instincts have already given me all the confidence in the world that my daughters will one day marry extraordinary men.  They don’t have a choice.  They will compare everyone to their father.  So thank you, for John.