Unattractive

Parenthood is hard.

I know a collective "Duh!" just went up from people who have been parents for decades (KUDOS to you, by the way), but bear with me.

When I was pregnant, I read all the books, watched all the shows/movies, took all the classes, asked all the questions, and harangued my mother and mother-in-law for their opinions on everything from napping and showering with an infant to "to use a soother, or not to use a soother?". And do you know how much help it was??

A big fat NO HELP.

Oh wait, it did one thing - it let me think, for 9 blissful months, that I was prepared, that I was ready, that I could handle it.

Which is funny, because literally 1 second after the first contraction, I realized I was none of those things, and that I would probably never be any of those things ever again. Period. (Contractions lend a sort of intensity to thinking - never question a woman who is contracting...it would not bode well for your intent to remain living).

Parenthood is so hard, that I have become one of the most unattractive people on the face of the earth.

And no, I'm not talking about the obvious unattractiveness - the unwashed-hair-no-make-up-bags-under-the-eyes-lumpy-bits-galore-messed-up-fashion-sense unattractiveness.

I'm talking about the personality unattractiveness (the other kind is SO much easier to clean up!).

I have become a martyr. Plain and simple.

I work myself to the bone, trying to be superwomanhousewife...and in the end, I become a snivelling, crying, upset, over-worked, disgustingly self-righteous, nagging martyr.

This morning my husband and I had a pretty bad fight about pretty much nothing at all, and the reason for it? The martyrdom shooting out of every one of my orphices.

I don't know how to stop being a martyr (for example, my retaliation so far today for the fight is to clean up our bedroom, and wash, fold, and put away every stitch of laundry in our house...that will SHOW HIM).

I hate martyrs. I hate them with a passion. And I desperately hate myself right now.

I wish that I could stop for sixteen seconds and actually enjoy the fact that today is finally, FINALLY Friday...that my husband loves me enough not to bite my head off when it's all I seem to do to him...and that for 3 days we get to blissfully hang out together as a little family with few if any interruptions (everyone is busy this weekend, so little to no drop-ins from random people trying to see the baby).

That will be my goal for the rest of the day - focusing on the good that is coming my way...

...while washing, folding, and putting away every stitch of laundry.

Understanding

As all new parents, I've had multiple "I get it" revelations about my parents on some things that previously puzzled me (other things, I'm still confused). One such revelation happened this morning...

The kid decided to sleep in this morning and by sleep in I mean she stayed in bed until 7 instead of waking for a feeding at 3:30 and getting up for the day at 6 a.m. (HUGE victory)

I, of course, woke up for both the 3:30 feeding and the 6 a.m. wake-up. Now a normal human being would simply go back to sleep and enjoy the sleep until 7 a.m., but I am no longer a normal human being - I'm a mother to a very young child...which means that I am all things to a very young child - food, sleep, comfort, etc...

And this means that I got out of bed, pumped some bottles of milk, enjoyed the quiet of the morning, watched the news which I feel guilty doing around the husband (he needs captions to watch t.v., so I try not to watch live shows around him as the captions lag and he doesn't get the same enjoyable experience that I do), and generally enjoyed being just me for a few minutes.

As a kid, I used to wonder why on earth my mom relished the thought of waking up early and having the house to herself. Now I know that that was her only moment in a long day of moments that weren't hers.

I think that this blog is going to become one of those moments for me...although I hate saying what this blog is - it puts pressure on me and inevitably makes me run away. So for now we'll say this space is an oasis...this spot is mine...and no young child or even husband can encroach on it.

For now. ;)

Losing myself

There are days when I don't even recognize myself anymore. Instead of a cool, level-headed 20-something, I'm an old nagging wife and mother who can't muster even an ounce of patience and compassion for my husband.

That's right - since I've last written, I've become a mother. The mere thought of this is insane - aren't mothers older than me? More put together than me? Better at this than me?

All evidence points to no, simply because no one is the "right" age to be a mother (there is no right age), there is no perfectly put together mother (it does not exist), and no one is better than anyone else (we are all our best at every moment by using what we've got and trying our damnedest to not fail entirely).

That last paragraph is the hardest thing in the world to embrace - that no one is perfect and I will never be.

But there are days when I feel like if I get angry one more time at my husband...if I am frustrated with my 3-month old one more time...if I breakdown and complain about motherhood to women who want children but aren't able to have them one more time...that someone is going to punish me by taking it all away - my beautiful baby, my patient husband, my good life.

I keep waiting, but no one comes...no one takes anything away....

But maybe it will happen one day. This is my greatest fear. EVER.