Mother's Day

The initiation into this club called motherhood isn't easy. I mean you grow a whole person inside of your body for a lifetime 40 weeks. You parade around, huge and swollen, in the body that used to be yours, on display for the world (most of whom think you're a "hands on" exhibit) until one day (if you're luck and that's all it takes) you get to give birth to a screaming baby who continues to do just that for at least two months. Then, if you're like me, you some how forget about all of these things and are crazy enough to start the whole process over again.

Once the initial initiation is over is an endless cycle of tests to see if you stack up. Test one: Go two days with four hours of sleep and then get you, the baby, and the house clean. Test two: Change a diaper that has exploded, one handed as you hold the bathroom stall closed with the other,  holding the clean diaper in your mouth trying so hard not to touch anything! Test 43: Baby proof your house as your child has magically become mobile and is pulling on the tv cord when you get out of the shower. (Then do some more baby proofing when you realize that they can reach way more than you thought.) Test 205: Toddler melt down in the grocery store and debit/credit card system down. Test: 318: Your toddler climbs into bed with you in the middle of the night and you discover she's naked and freezing because at some point in the night she removed all her clothes and peed the bed. Test 402: You walk into a room just in time to see your toddler pulling the baby out of the swing. Test 653: Your toddler unlocks the door and runs outside while you're drying off after your shower.

As each of these tests come you just keep wondering, "Did I pass? Or at least not fail miserably?" The only reassurance you have is that your kid is still alive and relatively unscathed the next day. (I don't think it will be until they're grown that we'll truly know what effects these things have on them. Or maybe when they're teenagers. They'll blame us for everything then.) The only assurance I have that I'm not royally messing up my children is hearing stories and getting encouragement from other members of this elite club.

I write this mostly sarcastically. Most of my days/weeks are filled with laugh or cry moments and I'd rather laugh. (Which usually weirds my husband out. I guess I get it, you come home to two sobbing babies and a messy house and when you ask your wife how the day went and she starts laughing rather hysterically...) I'm sure I'm not alone in this feeling, parenting can be challenging.

Of course there are a lot of good moments too. From the first moment you hold your child in your arms there is a connection that is so strong that words cannot express. In those tired moments of late night feedings there is something fulfilling in the quite time spent skin to skin with them. As you watch them grow and change they look to you for reassurance and there is a quite confidence building in them only from the look you exchange. I have so much pride as I watch them grow and change and I'm amazed by them daily.

I am so proud to be a mother and I have a great respect for everyone else with that title. It's one that comes with many responsibilities and even more rewards. Happy Mother's Day to all the moms in my life!





And now I'll leave you with some of the cards I found at Target. I'm pretty convinced their sole purpose was to entertain me.