So, I had originally planned on writing about how I’m no longer the new momma on the block, and was going to include some of the knowledge I’ve managed to hold on to over the last 14 months. Even had notes and EVERYTHING (still organized!). But then today, I had kind of a shitty day. And it got me thinking about something else entirely, and whether or not other moms have felt the same way at some point. So I’m going to write about that instead. Because it’s my blog and I can do what I want.

Today was one of those days. You know the ones: where it starts off with a terrible nights sleep, and then just gets progressively worse for NO APPARENT REASON WHATSOEVER. Nothing bad happened. No one was sick (save for a sore throat that hasn’t decided if it’s staying or going). Had no plans, didn’t need to be anywhere, just a nice, lazy day at home, me and the kid. But she didn’t sleep well. Which means I didn’t sleep well. And then she refused to take a nap. RE-FUSED. All day. Now, if you have a baby or have ever had a baby, you’ll understand me when I say, that nap? Vital to my sanity. I need The Nap Not necessarily so I can nap too, but just that 2 hours of quiet, no baby, no toddler time. That’s mommy time. And I need mommy time sometimes.

But I especially need mommy time when mommy doesn’t feel good. And when mommy hasn’t slept so good. The Nap would have saved my life today. So she decided today, of all days, to say, “Meh. I’m going balls to the wall today, I don’t need no stinkin’ nap”. It was a long day. And in addition to this day testing my patience, and making me cry, and giving me a headache, this day made me feel something else: this day made me feel alone.

I’m a stay at home mom (by choice, 100%, I LOVE what I do). And I have no help. So from the moment Dylan stirs in the morning till the blessed moment she drifts off to sleep at night, it is her and I. Husband works all day, and the only family I have in the area are 2 sisters with kids and lives of their own. My friends are fucking amazing, but again, they have lives of their own, with work or school or babies or what have you. And we certainly did not make the decision for me to quit working to stay home so we could pay someone else to come around once in a while and watch the kid. And normally, this is awesome. 99.99999% of the time, smooth solo sailing. But occasionally, I’ll have a day like this. A day that makes me question what the fuck I’m doing, a day that does it’s damnedest to convince me that I’m no good, that I can’t even get my kid to take a nap, a day that just makes me want to sit in a dark, quiet room so I can just breathe. And when I have a day like this, man, the loneliness? It’s palpable. I can’t pick up the phone and ask my mom or mother-in-law or sister or whatever to come over because I need a MINUTE to unclench. There’s no one to call. At least, no one who would be able to help. And sometimes, that’s all I need. Someone to help. Not often, not a lot. Like I said, 99.99999% of the time, I captain the shit out of this ship, and enjoy every millisecond. But that 0.00001% can be brutal. And really lonely. Everyone should have a 0.00001% lifeline. Everyone needs a little help, even if it is only 0.00001% of the time.

Ok, I’m done now. I’ve vented, I’ve complained, and truth be told, I’ve kind of pissed myself off for feeling like this when I have so much to be thankful for. But I’m still going to publish this. Because I can’t be the only person out there who feels this way sometimes. And maybe someone who reads this can relate, and also needs a 0.00001% lifeline, and we can be that for each other.

I did a bad thing the other day. Something that I KNEW I shouldn’t have done, something that I could pretty much guarantee was going to give me angina and keep me up at night. Something that, if I was so stupidly insistent on doing it, should have been done before I had a kid.

I watched “Waiting for Superman”.

If you’ve never seen it, it’s a really eye opening documentary about the pretty pitiful state our pubic school system is in. No money, bad teachers, no accountability, corrupt and/or inept bureaucracy. Um, can we say holy clusterfuck, Batman? I had heard about it, had read some wonderful (and not so wonderful) reviews and recommendations and such when it came out last year. It has been on my list to watch since forever, so when I saw it at Blockbuster, I said yippee! and snatched it right off the shelf. NOT considering that while it is a subject that interests me greatly, until the birth of my child, it didn’t necessarily concern me. Turns out that’s a pretty important distinction. It’s the difference between “Oh, hey, those cute little kids are selling cookies to raise money to buy computers for their school, let’s buy one”, and “Holy Mother of God, we need to get 3 more jobs each to start saving to send the kid to private school because by the time she’s old enough to go to school, public schools will have become no more than crack dens with calculators”. And I don’t need that kind of anxiety right now people. Really.

Disclaimer: I went to public school, from preschool through high school. Everyone I know went to public school. I have very fond memories of my time in the public school system, and had the privilege of being taught by the most AMAZING teachers. I didn’t feel neglected or left behind or like I’d been dealt the short one. I should also mention that I grew up comfortably middle class. With parents who only had to work one job each to make ends meet. And there was always someone there to help with my homework or make me a costume for the school play, and my parents were pretty gung ho on us getting good grades, so I didn’t really have the option of slacking off or fading into the background in class. And all that matters, almost as much as WHERE your kids go to school. So the public school system didn’t fail me or my siblings or almost anyone else I know, because our parents didn’t let it.

How does a parent staring school age in the face (ok, not really in the face, but I can definitely see it on the horizon) deal with it? Well, if you’re me or anything like me (sorry), you immediately start researching the cost of private school, Google Map search the areas with the best public schools than do home price comp shopping on the computer, and bookmark every single article you can get your cursor on about home schooling. Have I mentioned that Dylan is ONE? Can someone please talk me down off this ledge? Don’t I have, like, 5,987 things to freak out about before school starts? I’m seriously thisclose to buying a desk and turning our back office into a school room. I need to stop. It’s going to be okay, right? RIGHT?

If you’ve got a kid in school (of any kind), how did you handle the situation? What decisions did you make in regards to your child’s education? A lot of us don’t have many options, so how did you make the most of what you did have? I’m genuinely curious, would love some feedback/guidance/commiseration. I’ve only got 3 or 4 years to decide. Time is of the essence people.

I’ve always considered myself a fairly organized, together person. I was never a planner/calendar/organizer type gal mind you, I just always managed to keep all my balls in the air using nothing but the magnificent power of my mind (heh). But, like almost EVERYTHING ELSE IN MY LIFE, having a baby threw a giant fucking monkey wrench at my mind power skills. And it’s been raining balls ever since (double heh).

I still (somehow) get stuff that needs to get done, done. I’m not entirely sure how, to be honest. Luck? Dumb luck? Some weird mathematical formula? Who knows. What I DO know, is that it has gotten much more difficult as of late to remember to do stuff. And by stuff, I mean any and all of the following: pay the bills, laundry, put the laundry away, shower (dirty side of being a mom), eat, feed the animals, take out the trash, brush my teeth, blog, return phone calls, and acknowledge my husband. If it’s not directly related to the kid in some way, chances are, it’s not too high on my brain list. What can I say? In the midst of the near constant chasing/changing/feeding/wiping/entertaining/consoling/locating/bathing/mothering that goes on around here, shit gets lost. At least it’s not the kid, right?

So, in an effort to begin the long, tedious untangling of what used to be my brain, I’ve started getting organized. Like, for reals. I got myself a fancy little gizmo that puts my calendar and notepad right at my grimy little fingertips, making the checking and updating and completing of my daily life much easier. I’ve started scheduling things, like writing and cleaning and showering (if you don’t have kids, please refrain from laughing at that until you do). I’ve taken to planning our meals a week in advance, so when it comes time to hit the grocery store, we’re not scrambling trying to come up with meals for the next 5 days. The meals thing alone has been life changing, no joke. I found myself always cooking the same stuff, week after week, which gets super boring, and led to a meal out more often than I’d like. It’s only been 2 weeks, but I can see a noticeable difference so far. I’ve managed to put the clean laundry away ON THE SAME DAY I WASH IT, 2 weeks in a row. Ask my husband how big a deal that is. I’ve made some super delicious meals, and for the first time in a long time, I’m excited about being back in the kitchen. I’ve been writing more, which is the most awesome change for me. I have scheduled time to blog 3 days a week, and last week I only did two, but in my defense, on Friday we rented Bridesmaids, and I was tired, so I crapped out on the smart stuff. But still, this is big stuff you guys! I no longer have that constant feeling of forgetting something, which, when you have a toddler, can lead to a bit of panic when for a split second you think that the something you forgot is your kid.

I’m pretty optimistic about my newly discovered organizational skills. I like having a schedule, and I like knowing that I accomplished all that I had set out to accomplish that day. I realize that if you don’t have children, or have a life, this all probably sounds pretty sad to you. And having just re-read what I wrote about being excited that I folded laundry, I am inclined to agree with you. But when your days consist of reading 4 page cardboard books 897 times a day and wiping someone else’s ass more than you wipe your own, you start to appreciate the little things. Clean clothes and no B.O., FOR THE WIN.

I don’t know when it happened, or how, or where the hell I was when it was happening, but sometime in the last, oh, 3 months or so, someone has come into my home and replaced my baby with one that walks and talks and sings and says “no” and screams and shrieks and laughs at farts and burps and dances at random songs and has opinions on everything from food to shoes to what is on TV. It seems to have changed overnight. One day I had a baby, the next, my very own little person.

I’ve got to say, this stage of the game is soooooooooooo much more entertaining. Not that caring for an inanimate lump of baby wasn’t rewarding in it’s own way. I mean, I enjoyed many a one-sided conversation with the little lovey, and there’s something almost Zen-like about how simple life can be when it’s all about an infant. But this new fangled kid I’m dealing with, she is a horse of different color. From the moment she gets up in the morning, it’s GO GO GO, DON’T STOP, MUST NOT STOP, CANNOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES STOP. Maybe she’s afraid that if she doesn’t use it, she’ll lose it? IT being the ability to walk really fast in circles around the dining room table for hours on end, stopping only to shovel food in her mouth or try to lick one of the animals.

And the talking. OH MY GOD the talking. She has full on conversations with me, the cats, the dog, her dad, her stuffed animals, the wall, her sippy cup, and her foot SIMULTANEOUSLY. Save for about 8 words that we’ve been able to decipher in the jumble of nonsense that pours from her mouth, I have absolutely no idea what the hell she’s saying. But she says it with such conviction, I can’t help but jump on board. I’ve probably agreed to buy her a car when she turns 13 and okayed her first tattoo. And with the talking comes listening. Meaning, she actually pays attention to me when I speak. Sometimes she acknowledges that she does indeed understand me, and sometimes she walks away and totally talks shit about me to the cat. But either way, I’ve gotten much more conscious of what I say, not just to her, but around her. “Don’t lick the wall” she ignores, but “shit” would totally be the one that stuck.

And now I’ve got to go, and sleep, and recharge for tomorrow. Because the thing about having this new version of the kid is, I never know what the day is going to bring. For all I know, she will wake up with the ability to do cartwheels and solve math problems. You’ve just gotta go with whatever shit comes up. Ahem, I mean “stuff”.

I am a terrible blogger. Really. Not in the writing sense (if I do say so mahself), but in the this-is-a-blog-that-needs-more-than-a-once-a-month-update-and-I-sometimes-don’t-do-that kind of way. And believe me, it’s not for lack of WANTING to post. I happen to find my daily life and all the going’s on quite fascinating, and I’m sure you guys would too. Plus, I find writing to be pretty therapeutic and cathartic, a way for me to purge. The writing and the wanting to write, not at all my problem.

My problem is, I just can’t seem to fit it into my life in a regular, continuous way. For some reason, I am flummoxed on a daily basis by the fact that there are only 24 hours in a day, and I seem to have a plate full of shit that requires a minimum of 27 hours a day. And I’m no Asian, but even I can see that math don’t add up. The crazy thing is, at the end of most days, I couldn’t tell you where the time went. Honestly. I’m a stay at home mom, so my job is the kid and my home. I guess I just didn’t realize how much of my time would be monopolized by those 2 things. Turns out, babies? A giant time suck. Who knew.

So anyway, I’ve been swirling around in a seemingly endless vortex of Disney Junior and pacifiers and toddler wrangling, and I’ve been missing something. THIS. I’ve been missing this. The conversation, however one-sided, with people other than my glorious little child who says the same 8 words over and over and over (albeit ridiculously adorably). So I’ve decided that this needs to happen, if only for the preservation of my already dwindling sanity. From now on, I WILL carve out time 3 days a week to sit down, at a table like an actual grown-up, and put my thoughts and words and ramblings and meanderings out into the internets, for someone or no one to read. I even have a little calendar app, and I’ve got it all penciled in and everything. I need this. So it’s important.

Ok, tis all for now. I’ll be back on Wednesday (yippee!), wherein I will quit with the boring me, me, me shit and regale you with tales from Toddlerdom, where Dylan is dictator and I am mere hired hand. If you’re reading, I thank you, sincerely. And ask that you maybe, idk, pass it along? Help me infect the internets. I need it.