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Location: Northern California

Tuesday, October 11, 2005

 

I dream of grumpy

I have been a very grumpy mom lately. Everything pisses me off and I'm rarely happy. Is it because I feel so overwhelmed yet at the same time so underwhelmed by my life as a mother? I don't know, but I have dreams of going away, of signing up for a two-week writing retreat and hiding out in a cabin in a small town filled with redwoods.

I dream of being alone.

The tricky part of feeling this way is not letting your feelings turn into resentment. Of course I love my kids. Of course I love my husband. It's not my kids' fault that I feel this way. It's not my husband's fault that I feel this way. I have a great life. I know.

But sometimes I want to shed my responsibilities. I want the nanny to come every day, instead of just Tuesdays and Thursdays. I want the nanny to move in and the kids start calling her mom. The nanny can be the mom and I can be the daughter, the daughter who is old and who stays in her room a lot, the crazy daughter.

If I can't be the nanny's crazy daughter, then I want to be a person who wakes up late, pads into the kitchen, yawns, turns on the coffee maker and the computer, and spends a leisurely morning checking email and reading blogs while sipping strong coffee and eating a sweet roll by tearing off small pieces with her fingers.

I do not want to be the person woken up by crying of any kind. I do not want to have to change two soggy diapers and one poopy diaper, scramble two eggs, fill one cup of milk and another cup of juice, put him in his chair, find the most recently TIVO'd episode of Sesame Street, ask her to get in her chair, ask her again to get in her chair, get the eggs onto plates, get her a fork, and put two breakfasts down in front of two people, one of whom thanks me by throwing half of it on the floor and the other of whom thanks me after I tell her to say, "Thank you, mommy."

I know feeling grumpy is temporary and is probably related to hormones, but it still sucks.