That melancholy funk has returned and it's brought along an army of reinforcements and nothing, not even that hot sex dream I had last night about Tyler Florence and an inflatable mattress covered in sour cream and chive smashed potatoes, can lift this heavy gray veil of dread from my eyes.
I'm just kidding I didn't have a sex dream about Tyler Florence. It was about Neil Patrick Harris and a chocolate cream pie. Hey, don't knock it 'til you try it.
Even my Susie Sunshine posts of late (that are heavy on tangerine hued imagery and the liberal use of edible verse which are less food for thought and more half-done TV dinner) are helping. It has not escaped my attention that my recent writings have been, shall we say, sickeningly upbeat. But, dear reader, lest you think my life is all rainbows and puppies and apple cider donuts let me put your mind at ease.
(well, I did just eat about seven of those suckers in less than 24 hours - donuts not puppies - so I guess it is a little bit about donuts. Anyhow...)
I've needed to highlight the brighter parts of my life with a militant dictator in training in my blog because I need to have something to remind me of the good times. 'Cause living with a toddler with a 'tude and a slight Napoleon complex? It suuuuuuhhhhhh-cks.
I've decided that living with a toddler, especially a melodramatic girl who is gunning for Meryl Streep's job and the honor of being the first winner of an Academy Award to receive her Oscar in a Prada diaper, is exactly like living with an escaped schizophrenic, bi-polar patient from the local state hospital who has been off her meds for weeks. You never know who you're going to encounter at any given moment. Will it be Happy Chicky Baby? Cranky Chicky Baby? Mike Tyson-like Chicky Baby, complete with teeth to bite delicate ear tissue, a hair-trigger temper and fists-a-blazing? The Chicky Baby who acts exactly like your junior year drunken college roommate, kissing and hugging everyone in sight only to dissolve into a major crying jag when she finds out the cafeteria is no longer serving American chop suey?
Chances are I'll see all of those Chicky Babys and more today. Raise your hand if you're feeling my pain.
I need something to help me remember the highs. The wonderful, jubilant times when it feels like the warmth of her smile could keep me cozy all winter long, because the lows are so, so low around here. How low? This morning alone she had five tantrums before 11am. I could only identify the cause of about three of them. The other ones I'm chalking up to the fact that Elmo came on about five minutes earlier than usual (most days she only gets to watch the Elmo part of Sesame Street) so she had five minutes less of Elmo-rifficness to enjoy. Or barometric pressure. It could have been anything.
These days by 2:30 in the afternoon I'm starting the countdown to bedtime. Jesus H. Christ on a popsicle stick! What do you mean there's still four and a half more hours until bedtime?!
It's not just my dear, precocious daughter who's causing my mood to swing to the dark side, it's being a parent in general. The stress of being on duty 24/7 with no break in months, the monotony that is my "job" these days (really, what's the point in vacuuming up all that damn pet hair? It's just going to be there again in a few minutes.). Then there's the question: To go back to work or not? Part-time or full-time? Who the hell is going to hire me?
That is a post in itself. Later this week, perhaps.
It doesn't help that winter is fast approaching. I see long days stuck in the house stretched out before me. If I were in a better mood I would try to wax poetic about red noses, woolen hats, and pulling sleds down snowy streets but honestly the thought of all that is making me nauseous.
I wish I had something profound to say so I could wrap this post up in a pretty package complete with red velvet bow, but I don't. I've got nothing. N-O-T-H-I-N-G. I'm also a bit afraid that if I continued with the psychotic toddler train of thought I'd start getting into that whole rage/fury thing and I'm not ready to go there yet. There's enough guilt in my life without releasing the demon that is my temper these days.
And the beast is starting to stir from her nap. Damn. Nap is over already?
How many hours until bedtime?
____________________________
I'm not living with just two-legged dictators in this house, the four-legged ones exert their power too. Over at Dog Gone Blog - shwag for your canine intent on world domination. And, later today, pweshus puppy pictures.
Monday, October 16, 2006
Five more hours until bedtime
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35 comments:
The kid is still napping (over an hour which is unusual) and I got to get out of the house!
7pm is the bedtime then it's ME TIME!
I count down the hours till bedtime too. It's like my day doesn't begin until kids are asleep. Hang in there, we're all feeling your pain. :)
I feel you. I totally do. Leah is at "that age" and she is interesting to say the least. Elmo is my saviour. She will actually sit down and watch an ENTIRE Elmo's World DVD and it is a GODSEND. Now to deal with the slow loss of sanity due to our new addition...
I count the hours too. Do you have a Mother's Morning Out program nearby? Gives you some free time and it tires the little one out!
I have more days when I count down to bedtime then not.
Gosh it is just so hard sometimes!
BTW, I heard Neil Patrick Harris is gay, you may want to go back to Tyler.
Heh, I'm not even a stay-at-home mom and I count down some days when I'm just too tired or she's just too crazy or yesterday when her nap was one hour, not two so I didn't get enough rest to keep going and there was laundry piled up to my ears...
Brutal. It's hard to love something that much and still want so desperately for them to GO AWAY. Good luck...Meryl Streep has had a looooong career, so let's hope this isn't a complete repeat...
I hate those days when I'm looking at the clock by noon.
I'm dreading the winter too.
Hang in there! Feel free to vent to us.
Oh, yes, I'm there today too. And you're right that it helps to freeze-frame some of the good bits, the ones that you want to remember because maybe someday you'll be able to properly enjoy them (in retrospect, the best way to enjoy anything).
Ugh. I feel for you, lady. Why do those naps always seem so short? Why?
And if you're seriously thinking about heading back to work, don't ever let anything get in your way - especially fear that people wouldn't want to hire you. Cuz who WOULDN'T want to hire you?- you're MRS. CHICKY!
BTW, I loved how you wrote this post.
My guy isn't even two yet and I'm already seeing shades of split personalities/tantrumville on the horizon. My daughter didn't really hit that phase until she was three and I remember feeling like I'd been hit with a 2x4. What happened to my sweet little girl? Who is this demon child?? It was a little depressing and a lot exhausting. The good news is that is passes, but never soon enough, IMHO.
Have a {{hug}}
:)
I understand. All too well. Especially the pressures of the still relatively new gig of SAHM - and I don't dare complain since both girls still go to school part-time.
I raise my beer to you.
Was there a full moon this weekend or something? Perhaps our biorhythyms are in sync?
I basically flipped out on my husband yesterday at the sheer weight of always (1) having someone touching me and (2) the noise and unpredictable emotions I have to react maturely to and (3) always having my wants come after 3 other people's needs. Typical stuff, but nothing that a 6 hour trip up to IKEA and Jordan's by myself today couldn't fix. Also, wine. I highly recommend the wine. :)
Toddler Nazi's seem to being running amuck these days.
You have my sympathies. I expect to have yours in return in a few short months...
Shudder. The only part of adoption that I'm dreading. The terrible two's.
Yuck.
Neither of my boys went through the melodrama stage, so I'm bracing myself for Kaitlyn being a baby dictator.
I am powerless against apple cider donuts. And I don't care what Tuesday Girl says, Neil Patrick Harris is HOTT.
Yep.....try and toddler and a preschooler and the concept of relentless insanity moves to new highs!
I just moaned about it all on my corner of the blogosphere and what I HOPE to do about it...
I too dread the long dark days....
Mind you I see me out with the kids and dog, teeth gritted in determination to breath fresh air and have some goddam fun.
I FEEL ya pain, sista. My little 2 year old ball of sunshine daughter is driving me up a GD wall. In one day she went from my sweet, easy-going girl to a demon. And she sounds like one too.
I, too, am getting creeped out about the same routine. Every damn day. Just like the day before. And the day before that.
I wish I had some words of wisdom. But I keep telling myself it's normal to feel like 'I don't like my job anymore'. Because people who go to work feel that way. Why can't I?
Hang in there. It'll get better. Right?
Seth is four and I STILL look at the clock and count down his bedtime many days. It was harder when he was Chicky baby's age. That was a good time to reverse that whole, "No tv for the baby until he's 10" philosophy I had going...
Sending hugs. Because, gah. That IS a tough age.
Doogie Houser!! OMG
Winter approacheth...I will hold your hand as you hold mine.
I've always said that they should hire more moms of toddlers in the CIA. If they ever got caught by the enemy, they are the only people I know who could go through ten hours of waterboarding and consider it a spa treatment.
My baby still sits on one place, but the days of mobility and tantrums are in my future. Stay with me and I'll stay with you.
Okay, raising my hand in agreement over here too - and unfortunately, having 2 older kids, I know that this could be a very long haul. Turning 3 does not magically erase the little dictator living within. I am more convinced that it is a "girl" thing, as my boys weren't like this, busy - absolutely, dramatic to the extremes I've witnessed in the last 2 years - no way!
Cheers! And remember, you are not alone.
Carrie
ps. Watch Harlod and Kumar go to Whitecastle and you will be cured of the Neil Patrick Harris thoughts! :)
Hand up in the air and waving frantically.
The bi-polar off her meds for a week psych patient lives at my house, too, and I'd like her to return to her asylum and bring back the happy, kissy, funny child I used to have.
I'm dreading winter as well. I hate the cold, hate going out in the cold, hate driving in the snow and just generally would rather be in the house with a hot cup of tea and a book. But with a two-year old, that just spells boredom and boredom spells uber-tantrums. Guess I'll be buying boots and mittens soon. *sigh*
Maybe there's a full moon or something.
I find myself doing the same thing....counting the hours til bedtime. naps are gone now...*sniff* I miss them so.
Hang in there, Mrs. Chicky...it will pass!
Oh girl, I've had those days. I think it's easier as they get older...they're much more self reliant. But, seeing how you're really having it rough, I'm going to pull out the big guns. There is a word, one word, that is guaranteed to put a smile on anyone's face. I only use it in desperate times. Ready?
DOOKIE.
My work is done here. I'm outtie.
I hear ya... I don't have the exact same problem, but every evening since the birth, I get a little anxious and melancholy. I'm telling myself it's the shorter days/less sunlight. Hope you can get a break soon.
Forgive them mother.. for they know not what they do. Okay now I am off to HBM to leave the same message
We have the same child, apparently. Or they were both left with us by the same race of tyrannical aliens as some sort of cosmic lab experiment.
Feel yah, sister.
At dinnertime, I actually sing "THE FINAL COUNTDOWN" out loud. Because then bedtime - and the couch with just ME on it - is in sight.
Totally feel you. Totally.
I totally, totally hear you. How old is Chicky? Sam is 17 months. Tantrums, screaming, crying. I never know why. I count the hours every single day. And I appreciate/can empathize with the happy blogging in an attempt to mask it all. I often do the same.
I'd like to say hang in there it gets better but I'm not sure it does, so instead I'll say YEAH look at you and give you a virtual pat on the back because it does su-uck living with these insane demands and mood swings every single minute. phew.
Grr...Blogger ate my first attempt at a comment.
Basically, yeah, I understand exactly how you're feeling. Cordy goes through those same multiple personalities several times before naptime.
And working doesn't necessarily help with the monotony and dullness. I work part-time, but now I have monotony from two places - home and work.
You've read how Emmie can run me when she feels like it. Toddlerhood is tough. And I understand what you mean about the whole monotony thing. Honestly, that's why I started freelancing again. I needed that feeling of accomplishment, the different feeling that comes from work.
It does pass. Then they are teenagers. Oy.
I'm trying just to get to bedtime tonight too. Already threatened my oldest AND sent him to his room for complaining about dinner AGAIN (fifth night in a row).
I'm not the best cook in the world but I'm not THAT bad.
We don't make him eat anything. I'm just tired of hearing him complain.
Fortunately for us all, bedtime is almost here and we will all live to fight another day.
Heh-heh...Neil Patrick Harris....
(I'm still laughing, ya'know?!)
I'm raising my hand over here! I've often wondered if Lithium would do the trick with my 2 year old.
Neil Patrick Harris will always be Doogie Howser to me!
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