Parent to Parent By Jodie Lynn
Moments for Mom By Elisabeth Corcoran
Ask A Twin Mommy By Cheryl Lage
Mothering By Heart By Cheri Fuller
Jelly Mom By Lisa Barker
Family Check-up By Sheila Wray Gregoire
Simplifying Motherhood By Trish Berg
Making the Most of Marriage By Paula Friedrichsen
Bodily Fluids and Solids
By Lisa Barker
It's that kinda day. Must be National Bodily Functions Day in my house.
Between the cat wretching up two times her body weight all over the front window sill and curtain and the toddlers heaving and ho-ing enough to keep stock rising in Huggies, I'm ready to call it a day.
I've seen more butts in my lifetime than I care to count.
Is it any wonder that women live longer than men? We just need a few years to ourselves after everyone has grown up and moved away, or grown old and passed on. If I can remember, I'm going to spend a lot of time taking bubble baths, eating Chinese food in a nice restaurant and I'm going to just throw myself into my garden. Not literally. Not just yet.
Another cat of ours is buried out there. Right where I plan on growing a lush corner of flowers. I'm planning on putting a bench out there. It will be somewhere quiet and sane that I can escape to when the kids are all teens. Just me and my book and a glass of lemonade.
Don't get me wrong. I love my kids and my husband...VERY MUCH. But bodily fluids and solids must have been in the teeny-tiny print at the bottom of the contract I signed when I became a mom ten years ago.
Oh, you don't remember that contract? Sure you do!
It's the one that says from here on out you will never sleep a full night through. Oh, sure they tell you it will happen after a few months--HAHAHAHAHA! They're just trying to help you make it through the first year--so the warranty expires. You can't send your kids back after the first year. From there on out, you've got to charter a course (or mark time) until they turn you in and go on their own way. Which they will be trying to do from day one, but it will take at LEAST eighteen years (the average is twenty-five these days) before they can survive on their own.
Until that time, daily you will endure the constant criticism: Too hot, Too cold, Too tight, Too big, Too tired, Don't wanna sleep, Can I have....
Can I have is a big one. Can I have a cookie, Can I have a sleep-over, Can I have (insert any item here until they hit their teens and then it's can I have the car keys?).
 |
 |
"Can I have some money?" is constant.
"Suuuuuuure, YOU can have some money...whenever I can have some money."
"How come we can't go to the movies, Mom?"
"I thought you'd look better DRESSED when you went to school, rather than naked."
"How come we can't eat out?"
"I thought you'd want dinner the other six days of the week, INCLUDING tonight."
"Oh."
It's not that we're POOR. We have a decent middle-class life. My husband and I just thought it would be better to buy a house and skip a few trips to Disneyland.
But that pretty much nixes a lot of accessories.
My kids' friends are loaded with them. Gameboys, televisions, stereos. You name it, they have it.
In our family, those items are community property. It isn't one per member of the household.
So sometimes my kids wonder: "If we were a smaller family, would we have all those things?"
"Nope. You should know that by now. Accessories are fun, but they aren't the be-all and end-all in life. Brothers and sisters are something you can't put a price tag on."
They know that. They're very happy with what they DON'T have.
I've never seen such beautiful children love each other (when they aren't at war over who's first in line.)
Oh, wait--yes I have. My sister's children. She has three. And you know, today, any family with more than two children is considered a LARGE family.
And if you buy that...then you should meet my friend Sassy. She's got eleven kiddos.
© Lisa Barker, 2003-
Jelly Mom™ is written by Lisa Barker, author of "Just Because Your Kids Drive You Insane...Doesn't Mean You Are A Bad Parent!" and is syndicated through Martin-Ola Press/Parent To Parent. To publish Jelly Mom, buy the book or leave comments, please visit JellyMom.com. Sign up for the free Jelly Mom™ weekly newsletter and receive a BONUS GIFT.
Read Lisa's Jelly Mom column at C'Moms