No more "please rescue me"

The reality of life with two kids has well and truly dawned on me. I am back at work two days a week and with a baby still waking and the other normal stuff like laundry, cooking, more laundry, keeping everyone happy and healthy etc. things are feeling pretty overwhelming. Today I remembered the overwhelming sense of responsibility for Ella that I felt when we first brought her home. And I realised that a lot of my depression at that time was due to feeling that I just couldn't do it. I couldn't be everything she needed and do everything that needed doing. And so I thought she would be better off without me.

And so now I find myself feeling the same at times. Not so much that they would be better off without me. but that there is only one Mum and its me and even when I would love someone to come and rescue me from the sense of responsibility and burden I feel at times, it ain't going to happen.

Now don't get me wrong. I love my kids. But being a Mum is tough. And I am not going to lie about that just because you somehow aren't supposed to say that it isn't much fun at times. But if I am honest, what makes it tough, apart from all the usual realities like lack of sleep, loss of time for me and hubby, kids being sick or issues with behaviour. Oh the list could go on and on...
is having unrealistic expectations of myself and my underlying fear that somehow I am going to hurt my kids  in some awful way.

And so I keep thinking I need rescuing because the pressure I put on myself is so huge. And when I am able to step back and get some perspective, I realise I am doing a pretty good job. But it is so easy when I wake up feeling bleary and tired from an interrupted night, to feel incapable of looking after my kids. And not just surviving through the day, but giving them childhoods which build them up and prepare them for life.

I hope that this is just a part of growing up. You know, putting your money where your mouth is, as it were. I chose to have kids, I love them. Now this is the time where the rubber meets the road. I have to get on and do it. Not worry about doing it "wrong" or over analyse it all. Just do it.

I keep repeating to myself "I am the Mummy and I decide how we are doing it" when I have those times of doubt and confusion and just don't know what to do or keep second guessing myself. Often I am having to filter what I have read, or heard, or the way people I know approach a parenting issue. We are all bombarded with so much advice and research and dire warnings about what we should and shouldn't do as parents, and I think especially as mothers.

I have always been so influenced by others and struggle to accept that there is not one right way to live and do things. Blame my perfectionist tendencies and Christian upbringing maybe. Ironically there is actually very little in the Bible about the details of raising kids. That explains why "Christian" parenting reflects exactly the same continuum as we see generally in Western society.

Having two kids to juggle and their needs as well as my hubby's and my own, has really solidified the fact that I need to stop considering anyone else except those who live under our roof, and that compromise is a given. Things can't stay the way they were with once child and I can't do things the same way. I thought I had made all my parenting decisions up to the age of three. Turns out I haven't. George is so different from Ella, our lives are different and we are different. So I have to choose again. And no one is turning up at the door to tell me what to do and give me a gold star for doing it "right". So that is up to me, both the decisions and the gold star.

I know deep down that this is something I have needed to truly learn for years and this may be the way I learn it. But it is hard and painful and quite scary. And at about 3pm when I am hanging on for hubby to walk in the door and rescue me, I am learning that it doesn't actually work that way. I am still Mum and I am still in charge and if I don't cook dinner, or do the dishes or whatever really needs doing, then it probably won't happen. Until tomorrow, when I still have to do it. And if hubby and I don't decide to deal with Ella taking over an hour to get to sleep each night, then no-one else is going to.

So I am hardening up I guess, in a growing up kind of way. Hopefully love and grace can be the path I follow as I build up my Mum muscles.

The grass is always greener. Always...

So we are at the end of "the weekend of tonsillitis". It was a weekend of paracetamol, throat lozenges, tissues and tag team parenting. George and Ella had a cold at the beginning of last week. Ella shook it but George's developed into tonsillitis with a dose of ear infection thrown in. Poor baby. Blocked and running nose, watering eyes, sore throat and fever. I succumbed on Friday and on Saturday I had a headache that threatened to push my brain out my cranial orifices ( hyperbole is totally allowed when ill). Hubby succumbed on Saturday and was in the thick of it by Sunday. Thankfully it was the weekend, and our suffering was staggered so that one of us could be horizontal while the other maintained feeding and watering children, laundry, dishes and comforting of very unhappy wee man.

It is at times like this weekend that I think "Why on earth did we have children?!"
I mean, when you feel sick it is not unreasonable to feel a little regret that the days of feeling sick and being able to stay in bed and get better are over, at least for the forseeable future. My perspective fails to acknowledge there is a horizon or that kids grow up when I am feeling this way. By Sunday I was feeling more chipper and while hanging out the 5th load of laundry for the day, I realised that wishing I was at another stage of my life really has nothing to do with the specific situation I faced this weekend, it is more of a habit and fact of how I think.

I always think the grass is greener in someone else's life. Our neighbours are an excellent example or this and a constant reminder of how it could be or will be. We love our neighbours on both sides. On one side we have a couple in their 40s with late teen kids. They are doing some home improvements at the moment. New kitchen and solar hot water heating. When I hear the Mum yelling at her kids it is usually about midday and she wants the lawns mowed. She has trouble waking her kids. I have trouble getting mine to sleep.

On the other side are a younger married couple who bought the house soon after we bought ours. They both have good jobs and have a couple of flat mates to help pay the mortgage. They all are a busy, going to the beach, going camping, going mountain biking, to music festivals and having parties. They leave the house when they want, sleep in at the weekends and generally burn the candle at both ends. We often share meals with them and I don't think we give the best impression of life with preschoolers. One commented on the amount of laundry on our line, another on the fact she got home late from a party and heard hubby asking Ella rather the forcefully to please "Do a wee, just do a wee" at about two in the morning. They told a story about going to a one year old's party for a friend's child who has had the first baby in their social circle. "There were babies every where! They were all over the place!" Oh the shock, oh the horror. But as I heard them heading off to Laneway the other weekend, I admit, I was jealous.

But my lovely neighbours haven't caused these moments (or days) of wistfulness about the past or the future. I have become a professional admirer of other people's life stages and situations. Before we had kids I was just desperate to become a Mum and have our own. It got to the stage where I was certifiably obsessed. I mean, it was understandable. We had talked about kids and having a family for years before we got married and then finances dictated waiting a while longer so that my biological clock had moved from clanging to some kind of earthquake. That kind of wanting and waiting is really not healthy. And for those people who have to continue to wait and want, I have absolute admiration that they can keep on or the ability to have some balance and joy in life. I definitely was quite unbalanced. The lost and grief of losing our baby was piled on top of that.

Now I find myself with everything I ever hoped and dreamed of. A genuinely fantastic hubby who I joke about cloning and selling online because he is such a great model. I could make a fortune. A lovely home which we hope will be our forever home and a wonderful suburb which gives us a quality of life we can't really believe. And to complete the perfect picture, two beautiful kids who are a delight to watch grow and get to know.

But despite this it is still possible to look at the people around me and wish my life were different. While Ella and I were shopping yesterday I saw a dreadlocked guy sitting in STA travel. I imagined he was booking some exciting trip to an exotic destination and continuing his journey to see more amazing places and to discover more about himself. I started quickly calculating the cost of four round the world tickets and talking to Ella about visiting her godfather Paul, in Spain. But of course we couldn't do that. Young kids, mortgage, no money yada yada yada. Later on we saw the same guy. Except this time he was accompanied by his wife and toddler. Mmmmm maybe if you want to do something you should just do it Marion instead of assuming your life is so different from the guy with dreadlocks.

And I think that is what it comes down to. Whether by choice or chance, I am where I am. And I do love my life. There are always tough things about life. Some times are tougher than others. But at the moment anything I have to complain about is small and fleeting and kind of symptomatic of my age and stage. Nothing is massive or disastrous. Admittedly, some things are painful, especially the growing up and facing facts kinds of things. But I think most of us have those experiences.

Before I go and knock on every wooden surface in my home (paranoia anyone?), I am trying to focus being content and to appreciate my life as it is right now. It is hard when I am tired and sick and George is waking hourly at night cause he is still sick. But wishing I were 24 again or wanting to fast-forward to world trip in our twilight years has some pretty obvious draw backs. So focusing on my own green grass and being grateful. Cause I love my life and if I keep looking over the fence I might miss it.

Loving laundry

I have always been the laundry go to person between hubby and me. He has put washing on a few times in the last 8 years, and has hung out plenty of loads. But I am the one with the strategic planning in my mind of how many loads on which days and whether they will be delicate, regular, sheets and towels, etc. I am also the folder. There are three loads waiting to be folded in the lounge while I write this.

And I actually love laundry. I used to love the folding and putting it away. Creating order, a fresh start, a job done. Now I like putting the loads on. Watching the huge piles diminish and the machine humming away. While I was pregnant I had to buy Persil again cause I couldn't cope with the "natural" smells of eco friendly laundry liquid. So I love walking past the cupboard the machine lives in and smelling the smell of "clean". But recently my absolute favourite bit is hanging the washing out.

Hanging it out takes a long time. And it involves lots of bending up and down. But I am alone - at least with a bit of personal space. I get to move and stretch. I can smell the air and the day. I have to squint into the sun and get up on my tippy toes to reach the line. It is a rotary clothesline which is stuck a bit too high for me. There is still the satisfaction of organisation (I am definitely not a fan of the random washing arrangements hubby seems to go for). I have rules I follow to try to fit as much on the line as possible and for it to dry as fast as possible. I get to look around the garden and see the bees flying in and out of the hives, the chickens scratching around and the veges growing. At the moment the "cherry on top" is looking to see if there are any ripe raspberries or strawberries. It sounds blissful, and it really is. I look around and see how over the last few years our dreams have unfolded from our minds and into our reality.

Ella loves to play in her ride on car and make up all sorts of games while I am pegging busily away. At the moment there is lots of talking to herself and her imaginary friends. I hear her talking like she is the mummy. Sometimes what she says is a little too close for comfort "Stop that Mafi!" (her imaginary friend). "You are not using your listening ears and I am getting cross". Mmm wonder who says that?

If George is awake, he doesn't quite have the stamina for a whole load of laundry. He sits in his bouncinet squinting a little at the outside, outside world. Funny how babies are born from inside tummies, to inside rooms, and then finally out into the outside world, especially July babies in New Zealand.

Hanging out the laundry reminds me of me. That I love being outside and being at home and growing things and all this life that is around me and that I am living is what I have wanted. And sometimes I forget that. Sometimes it all gets really overwhelming and I think "Is this really me? Am I in someone else's life? Has there been some terrible mistake and I am supposed to be somewhere else?"
But with pegs in hand, creating a little order in the chaos, I remember that I love it all - the everydayness and the ordinary of it. And that we are really living it. Living our dream. I might have a lot more scars - real and invisible - than I expected, but I am still essentially me. I can trust that, even when it feels like the ground is in constant motion and I am lost.

Laundry as meditation.