Tag Archives: motherhood

The Krewe of Survival

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My writing is, for the most part, unedited truth.

I take pride in putting myself out there so that other women will hopefully read my words and say, “ME, TOO!”

I’m here to remind you that you are never the only one.

There is always someone else experiencing the exact same frustration that you are experiencing as you snap on a pair of rubber gloves and extract yet another toy from the poop-filled toilet, wondering aloud how the hell you keep finding yourself in this situation.

I am here to assure you that your child is not the only child who screams “I WANT TO LET THE WATER OUT OF THE BATH TUB!” followed immediately by, “I DON’T WANT TO LET THE WATER OUT OF THE BATH TUB!” followed immediately by, “I WANT TO SLEEP WITH MY KITTIES!” followed immediately by, “I DON’T WANT TO SLEEP WITH MY KITTIES!”

You are not crazy. You are not alone.

There have been times when I felt so overwhelmed by the constant demands of motherhood that I just laid in the middle of the living room floor like a cartoon character and let my children stare at me until my lower lumbar started to ache.

I never had lumbar problems until I had children.

You are not the only mom who forgot to be at a thing or failed to send that paper or complete that form before the deadline. I’ve done it. ALL OF IT. I had high hopes for what kind of mother I would be and I’ve continually fallen short.

Today I yelled at my sons.

Yesterday I was struggling to put the third row back up in our van and the back hatch slammed down on me just before the third row somehow landed on my shin. I threw an epic, adult-sized tantrum in broad daylight, right there in my driveway. I threw things and said things and I’m pretty sure my neighbors either think I’m crazy or a terrible mom.

Maybe they think I’m home with my kids because I’m too much of a lunatic to hold down a regular job. That was certainly not the case when I started this stay-at-home-mom gig, but after yesterday … I’m beginning to wonder.

God, motherhood is hard.

And I feel sorry for myself.

But I do have good news, and that’s that children are resilient creatures and they seem to have the ability to see past the exterior and deep into the depths of our soul. Children know if you are good or bad and if you truly, deeply, love them.

I love my kids. I love them so much that I keep getting up, yes, every single day, to try to do better than I did yesterday. Except when it’s PMS week. During PMS week, I don’t give a damn about trying harder or doing better.

During PMS week, I just try not to kill people.

Yesterday, my middle child had a Mardi Gras parade and we (the parents) were supposed to decorate a float for them to ride in. Everyone else’s were totally tricked out, because of course they were, and my kid and my friend’s kid were literally thrown together into a white wagon with no decorations.

We drank our coffee and applauded ourselves for being there.

sURVIVAL

My oldest child came home from school upset because a kid in his class, a little girl, keeps making fun of him for being “too hairy.” I told him to tell her that little girls who make fun of other kids for being too hairy turn into gorillas when they hit puberty.

He just stared at me.

We’re surviving.

That’s allowed.

If I am a truth-teller, and I believe that I am, then this is my message: it’s hard to be a mom and no one gets it right.

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Taking Medication Does Not Make Me Weak

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I’ve been on anti-anxiety medication at three different points in my life. The first time was after the birth of our first child. The second was after the birth of our second child. And the third time, is now.

I’ve always been an anxious person. As a child, I remember feeling stressed by my parent’s spontaneity. I wanted to know where we were going every time we left the house — my mind raced ahead, planning and preparing. I didn’t like surprises, which was ironic considering I was the only child of two people who have always enjoyed “winging it.”

When I was 6, I began chewing my fingernails. At 9, I started pulling out my hair. I marveled at the strands, each one a different color. Blonde, brown, red—all of them glinted in the sun. One day, I stepped out of the shower and noticed the wide, bald strip running all the way down the middle of my head.

I remember my mom telling me it was okay, that she could cover it up with a side part. I was home-schooled that year, which fortunately spared me from whatever happens to kids who bald themselves in the 3rd grade. It took the remainder of the year for my hair to grow back.

I switched to chewing my cuticles.

At 12, I turned to food. During one particularly stressful Christmas break, I spent all day, every day, at my Grandma’s house eating cheese sandwiches and homemade fudge. I ate until I felt sick. I ate to feel better.

It didn’t work.

I have never been a medicine taker. My mom used to make poultices and tinctures out of tea bags to cure whatever ailed me; we avoided the doctor unless it was absolutely necessary. In fact, until I had my first child and experienced the kind of irrational desperation that made me want to drive my car into a building just to make the pain stop, I was judgmental of people who turned to medication to help them cope. I thought they were weak.

I was wrong.

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The funny thing about people with anxiety is that the mere idea of obtaining a prescription for medication is anxiety-inducing. What if the doctor thinks I’m lying? What if she thinks I’m one of those people who fill the prescription and then sell the meds on the black market? I better dress nicely for my appointment, so I don’t look like the kind of person who engages in criminal activity…but not too nice, because I don’t want to look like I run the crime ring.

Other worries included a paralyzing fear that the apocalypse would arrive and I would not only be unable to see (because I wouldn’t be able to obtain new contact lenses), but I would also lose my fucking mind because I wouldn’t be able to get the anti-anxiety medication that I WOULD CLEARLY NEED TO TAKE IF THE WORLD WAS COMING TO AN END.

I worried about one of my kids getting their hands on my pills and eating them. I worried about turning into a unemotional shell of a person. I worried about which was worse: slowly slipping into alcoholism, or taking medication for stress. Which one would I be judged more harshly for if people found out? Why did it matter?

For a long time, I fought it: I exercised and coped as best I could, but the day finally came when too many things were stacked too high, and they all came crashing down in one fell swoop.

It was time to get help.

My doctor didn’t treat me like a liar. She didn’t judge me. She affirmed, validated and assured me that my emotions were warranted. She patted my arm kindly, a gesture that I assume meant that she didn’t think I was there to con her.

She told me I wasn’t weak. To my surprise, I believed her.

I still read the entire warning label that accompanied the drug prescribed to me, and worried that I would be one of the 1% to experience numbness, tingling, pain, or weakness in the hands or feet. I was still concerned that I was losing my mind, but decided that I no longer cared because the tightness in my chest was finally gone.

Medication freed me. I can breathe again, big gulps of air.

People say that it takes courage to ask for help, but I believe that it takes courage to admit that you needed it in the first place.

© 2015 Harmony Hobbs, as first published on Scary Mommy.

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Epic Humiliation Post-Concussion

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I got a concussion last week, but this blog post is not about that. Don’t worry, I’ll tell the story eventually — but right now I want to talk about how I managed to epically humiliate myself as a result of said concussion.

Are you ready? Okay.

The guy who cuts our grass is Robbie’s childhood best friend’s brother. I would really prefer for Robbie to cut our grass himself, because nothing is more of a turn on for me than a man doing physical labor, but he works a lot now that he’s back in the car business. So we pay his friend’s brother to do it.

I can’t ever seem to recall the guy’s real name, because everyone calls him Wolfie, and I’m not sure if I am allowed to call him that or not, so I don’t call him anything. I just smile and wave.

Yesterday morning I took the little kids to preschool and I was quite proud of myself for doing so, because it was the first time I’ve been able to operate a motor vehicle since getting concussed without feeling like I was completely and utterly drunk. When I returned home, Wolfie was at our house. I was not thinking clearly begin with, and his presence caught me off guard.

Let me go ahead and explain that I normally think quite clearly. It’s not typical for me to be fuzzy-brained, even with three kids, but I was in the E.R. with a concussion 9 days prior to this occurrence and I am still not myself. So I rolled down my window and said good morning, the whole time thinking, “OH SHIT, WHAT IS THIS DUDE’S NAME AND WHY CAN’T I REMEMBER IT EVEN THOUGH I NEVER SAY IT ALOUD BECAUSE I’M NOT SURE IF I AM ALLOWED TO CALL HIM THAT NAME.”

A few minutes into our conversation, I realized he was looking at me funny. Maybe it was because I was acting funny. So I then felt compelled to explain to him that I got a concussion last Monday and his expression turned from slight confusion to mild horror, so I followed up with an explanation of how it happened and watched his horror turn to utter shock.

Then I told him I was going to go inside to write him a check and that I would be right back.

“You don’t have to worry about that,” he said. “I can just bill you.”

But no, I had to go on and on about how I hate letting bills pile up and I definitely wanted to pay him today, so he shrugged and said okay. He stood in my driveway with his weed eater turned off, waiting for me to return.

Except that when I got inside I couldn’t find the checkbook.

And then I couldn’t remember his real name — first OR last — and how much we pay him to cut our grass. So then I just sort of pretended that I forgot.

He eventually turned the weed eater back on and proceeded to spend the next hour mowing our grass. But then he was done, and he knocked on the back door, because I was supposed to have returned with a check over an hour ago.

I was too mortified about my lapse in memory and series of bad choices to do what I should have done, which was to hand him a blank check and ask him to fill it out for me.

cRINGE

Truth be told, I was afraid if he knew how bad my mental situation really was 9 days post-concussion, he would refuse to leave me alone, and after almost 2 weeks of having other adults up my ass telling me what NOT to do I just couldn’t handle it.

So I laid on the floor.

He continued to knock.

I called Robbie.

“I’m in a weird situation and I need your help.”

“What KIND of weird situation?”

“Ummm … what the guy’s name who mows our grass?”

“Wolfie.”

“He’s here, and I’m pretty sure he thinks I died.”

“WHAT?!”

Basically, Wolfie is the nicest guy ever and when I did not come to the door, he called his brother, who called my husband and asked if he needed to KICK THE DOOR IN TO CHECK ON ME.

Robbie thankfully explained that I was fine. A tad off, obviously, but fine.

I cannot put into words how mortified I would have been if he had kicked in the door. But also? I totally deserved it.

So the next time I see Wolfie, I’m going to hug him and apologize.

Or I might lie on the floor and play dead.

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A Mother’s Denial.

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I have spent so much of my life wanting time to move faster.

I’m a doer. A planner. I get the metaphorical ball rolling. I mobilize.

And yes, it’s exhausting. But that is who I am and who I always have been. I lie awake in bed at night planning the next day. I spend almost my entire day on my feet, doing things. I can’t help it. It’s in my DNA.

But now my last child has outgrown her crib, and I CANNOT MOVE PAST IT. I have planned for this moment at length, watching three teething babies gnaw on the wooden rails, telling myself that one day it will be time to convert it into a full-size bed and close the Crib Chapter of our lives. And now that time has come … and I just can’t move forward.

I’m stuck.

I’m sad.

I cry a lot.

It’s weird.

I’ve been dragging my feet for weeks, saying things like “I still need to find bedding,” or, “We’ll do it this weekend.”

Excuses.

The fact of the matter is, I don’t want my last baby to sleep in a big girl bed. I stare at her very-long-for-her-age body folded inside of her crib and I tell myself that she likes it, because it’s a lot like sleeping in a womb. I tell myself that she’s only 2 1/2 and children that small are too little to be in full-sized sleigh beds, even though both of her brothers were sleeping in big beds by the time they were her age.

But she’s different. Because she’s my last.

When she crawls into her brother’s bed, snuggles under the covers, and announces “I WANT A BIG GIRL BED!” I pretend not to hear it. I don’t want to face it. And that’s a weird feeling for someone who hurtles through her life like a neurotic wildebeest.

No matter how much I try to treat all of my children the same, I’m always going to be a little slower to accept the newest stage of my youngest.

Fortunately for us all, she is not the type to be slowed by anyone.

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An Open Letter To My Children

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Dear Children,

I hope that by the time you read this letter you know how much your father and I love you and how we want nothing more than to give you the world. But one day you will come to understand that if we gave you the world, you wouldn’t appreciate it. You wouldn’t live in it with the same pizzazz and gusto as you will if you have to work for it.

We want you to work hard to earn what you have.

It is hard to watch you struggle to learn things on your own, and sometimes I have to fight the urge to swoop in and do things for you, but I try really hard to stand back. I watch and I wait. Usually you can figure it out on your own.

That’s what life is like as a grown up.

Don’t rush to adulthood. It’s hard here. But also, we don’t want you dragging your feet when you’re old enough to be responsible for your own laundry and bills. My job is to put myself out of a job. Don’t expect me to treat you like you’re 7 when you’re 17.

We want you to follow your dreams, live your life to the fullest, and become who you are meant to be, but following your dreams is really hard. No one talks about that part. There will be times when you have no money. Your pride will take a beating. You’ll wonder why you’re putting yourself through this torture. You will feel like you have nothing new to offer. You’ll want to give up, because everything is terrible.

You might come back home and sit on the couch and stay there for several days. It’s okay. We’re here.

But one day out of nowhere, doors will start opening and they will keep opening if you keep working hard and treating other people with respect, and all of the sudden you’ll realize that you are LIVING the dream you once had.

To push through the hard stuff, you have to be persistent. You have to be fueled by something.

What fuels me is the fear of being forced back into a mauve cubicle. I also fear failure. I’m not sure what will fuel you, but it’s usually a terrible experience. That’s why when bad things happen to you, I’ll encourage you to press on. Better things are coming.

They really are.

Halloween

“If you are lucky enough to find a weirdo, never let them go.” — Unknown

I hope that you fall in love with a person who makes you feel like the best version of yourself. I hope you find someone who makes you laugh and who inspires you. If you can’t find someone like that, get a dog.

I insisted on having the three of you because I know what it feels like to be the only child. You are each other’s people, and I hope that you all stick together when weird family stuff happens. If you start acting crazy when I am on my deathbed, I will come back and haunt you.

Motherhood is my greatest joy. It is my greatest achievement, producing the three of you. But I am many other things in addition to being your mother. I have to be, to hold onto who I am. Never allow yourself to be absorbed into anyone else, even your own children.

Whatever you are, be that.

And whatever that is, I will always love you.

Love,

Your Mother

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She Tried.

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Of all the questions I ask myself daily, and there are many — “Where is my coffee? What day is it? WHERE IS MY CHILD?!” — the one that weighs most heavily is “Have I done enough?”

A mother’s work is never done, so it is senseless to assume that I, a mere mortal, could do more … but there always is more. Even after all of the socks are neatly paired and the kitchen is swept clean, meals eaten and leftovers put away, there are still three little hearts and minds in my house. The list of things that could, and probably should, be done is endless and exhausting.

I have limits.

My husband is working a lot again. And at the end of the day, after retrieving the last cup of water and tiptoeing down the hall for what I hope is the last time, I look at myself in the mirror and wonder if I’ve really, truly done enough.

Have I loved them enough? Did I silence their fears with my presence? Did I answer their questions appropriately, feed them adequately, give them enough of my time?

Did I look each one of them in the eye? Did I let her know she was valued and important? Does he know that even though I’m busy, I am still listening to what he says?

Did I balance their needs with my own? Did I neglect too much of myself? Have I still managed to be a good wife and friend?

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If my children ever have a question in their minds about my priorities, I want to lay it to rest right now. The answer is that I gave being a mother all I had, every damn day. Even when I’m multi-tasking badly and yelling and everything is a complete and utter shit show, my kids are my priority.

Even when I’m cutting corners, running through a drive-thru, pulling up to the school last-minute with baked goods that were bought in a panic, taking 10 minutes to lock myself in my bedroom so I don’t come unhinged … I give it my all. Every single day.

I have no idea if I’m doing it right, if I’m placing emphasis on the right things, picking the correct battles, or exhibiting proper behavior.

I just try until the day is over. I tell myself it was enough.

So at the end of this long road, if what I have managed to do is a complete and utter failure, it won’t be for lack of trying. My headstone shall read:

SHE TRIED.

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Teaching My Children That Race Doesn’t Matter

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The boys found my favorite Christmas ornament in the kitchen today and asked, “Who is the little boy in this picture?” I told them the picture came with the ornament, so I didn’t know, but he sure was cute.

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After a few minutes, Maverick asked me, “Why is this Santa brown?”

“What color do you think Santa is?” I asked. Both boys decided that Santa must be white, because most of the Santas they see are white.

“No one knows what color Santa is,” I told them. “Kind of like how no one knows what color God is, either.”

“Why are all of the Santas we see white, then? And why are the pictures of God white, if no one knows what He looks like?” They stared at me.

“Because sometimes white people think everyone should be white.”

Maverick said, “That’s dumb.”

I agreed.

Asher (who had been quietly listening this whole time) said he thinks God is purple. Or yellow. He can’t decide, but definitely an LSU color. I didn’t correct him, because who am I to say? AND WHY DOES IT MATTER?

It doesn’t.

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My Son Thinks He Is A Cat.

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Asher is 4.

Four is a magical age, full of excitement, wonder, and pretending to be a kitty cat for 3 weeks straight.

We are in week three — yes, THREE — of Asher impersonating a cat. His favorite past time is watching cat videos and then putting his observations into practice. He uses his paws to bat things around the house. He walks on all fours and perches on top of furniture.

He pretends to be afraid of cucumbers.

He scratches.

Asher

We have long conversations about what activities cats do and do not enjoy. “Cats don’t like to take baths,” Asher insists every night at bath time. “Cats can’t swim.”

“WANNA BET? I had a cat named Wonder who used to swim across our lake,” I tell him. Which is yet another strange-but-true fact from my childhood that seems to grow weirder and weirder the older I get.

One morning I overheard Robbie say “Now, stand up on your hind legs so I can get you dressed,” when he was helping him get ready for school. Hissing followed.

Last week, he rolled around on the grocery store floor while I was paying for our food. I pretended nothing was out of the ordinary, because that’s what mothers who are trying to foster independent, free-thinking, feline wannabes do, right? They just play along. Kind of like I’m doing right meow.

The pooping in the yard thing makes so much more sense now.

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Focusing On What Is Good.

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I haven’t written much lately because the things I have to say aren’t fun or happy and that’s a real drag.

I don’t like to be a downer. I like to be an upper. I said this recently to a very wise woman who replied, “Well, sometimes you can’t choose.”

That’s true. Sometimes, you can’t.

If I’m being honest — and I am, because my writing is based on honesty — this has been a tough year for my family. My mother was diagnosed with cancer and then my uncle was murdered in my childhood home. If that sounds crazy, it’s because IT IS. Every dysfunctional facet of my extended family that I was dimly aware of, but mostly shielded from, rained down on me in the span of about three days. If there was ever a time that I COULD NOT EVEN, IT’S NOW.

I keep waiting for things to get less difficult, but they don’t — in fact, they continue to get harder. That doesn’t seem right. Life shouldn’t get harder the older you get, but it does.

However, as our difficulties increase we get better at navigating the bullshit. We put up boundaries and become more comfortable saying “I’m not okay with that,” or “You are not allowed to do that to me,” or “You are not welcome in my home.” As life gets harder, WE GET BETTER.

We get better.

It’s like parenting. We don’t give birth to a child in the throes of the terrible two’s — we start out with a mewling newborn and it feels like the hardest thing we have ever done. But then they start crawling and running and fighting back when you’re desperately trying to cram them into car seats and grocery carts, and again you think to yourself: this is the hardest thing I have ever done.

You find yourself thinking that every time you face down a new problem or situation that taxes your spirit. But remembering all of the other hard things you have surmounted — the colic, the endless nights, the tantrums, the failures made right — gets you through it.

That is how I am looking at my life right now. I will get through it, because I have made it through a lot of other hard things.

But it’s still really hard.

When life outside of these four walls becomes overwhelming, I turn inward and focus my attention on my people. They make me forget the bad and focus on the good.

There’s a lot of both, but I’d rather focus on the good. And there is so, so much of it.

my people

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It’s Always Something.

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“It’s always something.”

I remember my parents saying that a lot when I was younger. I nodded like I understood what that meant, because in my life, there was always something. I was wrapped up in getting through college. I spent hours e-mailing my friends who were scattered all over the country in faraway places like medical school. I was too busy to notice my parents, who were saddled with a failing business and struggling to care for my grandparents.

“It’s always something.“

I looked up from my laptop to see my mother, standing in the doorway of my bedroom. She was in her early forties. She looked tired as she leaned against the entry, telling me that my grandmother was in the hospital. My parents were supposed to take a business trip, but they were postponing it to care for my grandmother.

I blithely responded because saying nothing would be impolite. I may have even believed that I understood what she meant when she said, “It’s always something.” Life is a constant barrage of somethings. For me, it was term papers and finding a parking space at the university. A trail of failed relationships dragged behind me from one college to the next, and finally to my parents’ Louisiana home where I stayed for good, writing and mulling in my bedroom as my friends got engaged and planned their weddings.

I stood in six different weddings in 2002. I was convinced I would never meet the right man and would die alone, surrounded by cats. That would be my final something in a string of always somethings. These are the things that kept me up at night, while my mother was choking under the pressure of running a business and lining up in-home caregivers for her parents.

It’s not that I was any more self-involved than the next 22-year-old; it was that no matter what was going on, she was still my mom, available when I needed her. I went on to marry and have children, and she didn’t miss a thing.

I remember her hurrying into the delivery room with my father following behind hesitantly, likely out of fear that he would see something he could never un-see, and relief crossed her face when she saw they had made it in time. The check engine light was on in their truck, and they were worried they might break down on the highway as they raced to meet their first grandchild.

“It’s always something,” I heard her say.

But my mother was always my mother despite the somethings.

Years later, the dynamic has shifted, and I find myself asking out loud to no one in particular, because there is no one around to answer: How does one person care for three children under the age of 6 while her mother’s health slips away?

I am unprepared, gasping for air. I have no headlamp, no footing, no guidance. Nothing.

My mom called one afternoon to tell me what the cardiologist said, right as my oldest got home from school. I strained to hear her through the phone as children swarmed around me. “Hold on just a minute,” I said, covering the phone with my hand. I yelled at my kids to get out of the kitchen, and cradled the phone on my shoulder as I scooped up the TV remote and turned on something—anything—that would keep them quiet for a few minutes.

I choked back the tears as I listened. She sounded tired. The kids were digging in the pantry. I pulled down a bag of Goldfish crackers, and the two older ones dove into it as the baby snacked on the pieces that fell to the floor.

I had more to say, more questions to ask, but my 3-year-old was crying.

“It’s always something,” I heard myself say. “I’ll call you tomorrow.”

Now I understand.

Making the best of it.

Making the best of it.

© 2015 Harmony Hobbs, as first published on Scary Mommy.

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