Terrible mothering moments and grudges

TERRIBLE MOTHERING MOMENTS

Recently, we were sitting around the dinner table together – a rare event in our house with an 18-year-old and two school age boys with multiple sporting activities requiring me to drive white knuckles gripping the steering wheel for hours on end between the hours of 3 and 7.

When I say together I mean me and the three kids because whatever time current spouse (I'm going to call him The Lawyer from now on) tells me he will be home for dinner is always wrong.

One of the children, in a moment of sheer genius, decided to start a conversation about all the terrible things I had done to them as small children. Along the lines of 'remember when mum...' It's amazing they can recall these things in such remarkable detail when they can't remember to hang the bath mat up, but I digress.. This was intended to be funny and it was at first. Here are some of the things they remember me doing:

* Slamming Billy’s hand in the door of the car (fortunately, children’s bones bend).
* Driving over Harry's three year old foot, thinking he was already in the car, and then driving over it again in attempting to get off his foot.
* Slamming a sliding glass aluminum door onto Billy’s heel, almost severing his Achilles tendon, shortly after we moved into a brand new house. Unfortunately, he remembers me mentioning in the car as his sister held a towel tightly around his foot and gagging that I hoped the blood did not stain the grouting on the tiles.
*Leaving a new baby in his capsule behind a counter at a shop and wandering off for 10 minutes before realising (to be fair, I was in postnatal daze).
*Forgetting to pick various children up from various events at various times.
*Being the mother who clattered in in very high heels on a wooden floor to the end of the musical recital, just in time to see my daughter leave the stage (Elle is particularly good at jamming that guilt pin into me).
*Forcing each of them to take piano lessons with my old piano teacher, who was a dragon lady,and had an odd smell
*Not letting Elle continue with ballet lessons on the basis that it was too expensive.
*Resolving a dispute over who owned which balloons in the back of the car by taking a safety pin, popping all of them and gleefully announcing that no one owned them now
None of them remember this but it is family folklore that I lost or drove over five prams after placing baby or toddler in the car seat, getting into the car and driving off. Once, the pram was reported to have been last seen being used by a homeless person and I thought it had gone to a good home.

This was all quite amusing for some time, until it took a serious turn.

Elle turned to me and said 'I've never forgiven you, you know, for not taking me to school on my first day of high school'. I made the mistake of laughing thinking we were all still joking around at my expense. But she was deadly serious. 'I'm serious' she said, eyes brimming with tears. I looked at her and said, panic rising 'but you'd been at that school for 3 years in primary school'. She said it didn't matter, she was so hurt because 'every one else’s' mother had been there for the first day of high school. My mind started racing and I said that I recall that her first day of high school was also Harry’s first day of school EVER. Grade one. She looked at me and said 'yeah, you chose him over me that day'.

If only we mothers could live in Harry Potter world where we could be in two places at one time. Elle is 18, almost 19, and she has carried that grudge for more than 5 years. She can carry a grudge longer than Paul Keating or Mark Latham. By this stage, she had started crying because she perceived me to be not taking it seriously, and her brothers were laughing.

I tried to make light of it, but this just made it much, much worse. What started out as a fun conversation making fun of mum, turned into a disaster because of a grudge held for 5 years. I kept trying to placate her until she screamed at me to 'stop bringing it up all the time'. Which of course I never had, ever.

The boys fled (sensibly) leaving me alone with the grudge holding one in silence.


Motherhood ROCKS

AMFYOYO


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Death in the suburbs

I love animals. I can't abide cruelty to them. I can't even bring myself to kill a gecko even though they are annoying little pests.

I have two cats and one dog who are much adored and live a fairly stress free life:





Two days ago we had a visit from three chooks. Which were very cute. The romantic in me quite likes the idea of keeping chooks but with two cats thought perhaps in the chooks' best interests this was a bad idea.









As it turns put, the two cats were not remotely interested in the chooks and at first ran away (slightly pathetic) before keeping a respectful distance and letting them get on with their scratching.

The cute factor wore off quickly with the large amounts of chook poo on the paths around the house. But other than that they were harmless and happy to scratch around. I have no idea where they lived and was happy to have them visit from time to time The dog remained blissfully unaware of their presence, our yard being fully fenced, and the chooks remaining outside said fence, and the dog, not blessed with a lot of brains, inside.

Until today.

I went out the gate and the dumb dog ran out with me. He spotted the chooks and took off. Poor black henny penny made the mistake of trying to squeeze through the fence from the other side:





And got stuck half way through with the dog's jaws firmly clasped on its arse feathers. I managed to drag the dog off, the chook shrieking, me shrieking even louder. Then the excitement started. Poor black henny penny took off up the driveway; the dog leapt out of my arms in hot pursuit and managed to trap this poor hapless creature AGAIN. Again with the shrieking chook, the shrieking woman and the barking dog.

I might add that I had been cooking and was running around like a headless chook myself dressed in my exercise gear and stepford wife apron, and the Australia post delivery guy from next door thought he had come across a complete madwoman:





I got the dog and managed to carry him inside the gate AND THE STUPIDEST, INJURED CHOOK IN THE WORLD RAN UP THE STONE STEPS AND CAME INSIDE THE GATE.


Anyhow it did not end well. The two red chooks scarpered. Black henny penny is deceased - this is what is left after I disposed of the body:






So I'm guessing we won't be getting chooks any time in the future.

AMFYOYO

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Just one shade of grey

By this time next week I will be 50. 50!!!! Hard to believe but there you have it. I have not been feeling the slightest bit concerned about this fact. No mid life crisis, no desire to run off with a much younger lover (well, no more than usual).

But then this morning I saw it. A grey eyebrow hair. No one told me this might happen. WTF? Eyebrows go grey. Who would have thought it.

AMFYOYO


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I love my dog, but...

I have a really cute dog. Dumb, but incredibly cute. And loyal. And cute. Not a mean bone in his body. I also have two cats but that is for another day. This dog ADORES me. I can pop out to get milk and he greets me as if I have been away for a week. He follows me around the house, not wanting to be alone. Sometimes I turn around quickly and fall over him.

He has one fault. Actually he has two - he snores really loudly but he can't help that and I do too. He will eat anything and is a food thief. His latest trick is to get into the rubbish bin if I have left the house without him. So I often come home to this:




Dumb, but cunning. To do this, he has to open the bin drawer (I think with the towel), get into the bin drawer in order to knock the bin out and spread the contents all over the house.

He always looks guilty and sad but he must be punished. The worst punishment for him is to be locked outside with me inside:






He runs from door to door hoping I will let him in but I am unmoved. For a while. Then I forget to be cross with him because he is so cute.

Because who could hold a grudge against this:







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Anxiety - Learning to recognise the bleeding obvious

I suffer from anxiety. Sometimes it is a mild ever present feeling - dread, fear, panic and at other times it turns into a monster that turns me into a great big mess. Most of the time, I need to have a melt down to recognise, with hindsight, that I have taken on too much, done too much, not had enough sleep. It is all so bleeding obvious In Hindsight

I gave up my highly paid job for 12 months a while ago because it was making me sick. Constant migraine headaches. And as a consequence too many painkillers and way too much wine, for medicinal purposes - it is a muscle relaxant after all. My doctor warned me that given my personality I should be prepared for the fact that I would find other things to get anxious about. And how right he was. Washing, school pick ups, sport drop offs and pick ups, (i didn't pay my nanny nearly enough money), cooking new and interesting things, losing weight, and generally being Sargent major at home. And I seemed to always be in the damn car.

After i gave up work, I became my mother in law's speed dial technology help desk. And banking consultant. And peters of kensington purchaser. My mother died very suddenly and unexpectedly and I became my Dear Old Dad's ( DOD) cook and carer. I went back to work very part time and in some odd way I manage to mostly switch off from all of the home stuff while at work, but can't imagine how I managed it all before.

But today I had an epiphany. I had that familiar feeling of dread and panic set in thinking about my day tomorrow. I had agreed to host my son's futsal break up at 4.30pm on a day I had agreed to work a few hours on a day I don't normally work. Two meetings at 11-12 and 12.30-2.30. I was trying to work out when was the best time to squeeze in shopping, tidying, setting up etc as well as collect the boys from school, and get DOD's dinner done.

The Epiphany came. I didn't actually need to go into work at all - I CANCELLED MY WORK COMMITMENTS. No one thought I was terrible. No one died. Nothing bad happened. The only thing that happened was that the relief for me was palpable. I relaxed. The feeling of dread and panic left and my teeth unclenched. I suddenly had the whole day back.

I'm a smart person but it has taken me nearly 50 years to get to this point. I hope I can do it again. I hope I don't start worrying about whether or not I can do it again!

AMFYOYO


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I hate you, damn three kilos

About two years ago I lost 21 kilos. Actually 'lost' implies something that has gone and you might be yearning for and for which you might still be looking. Not so. Not even close. I recently purged the 4 boxes of clothes I no longer fitted into and almost two of me could have squeezed into one of my skirts.

Before anyone gets excited and congratulatory, to be fair I had put ON 12 kilos over the previous three years so in net terms I really only dropped nine extra kilos. I am one of those sad pathetic people who now weigh themselves every day. Naked. In the morning. After a visit to the toilet.

At my best, about 18 months ago I bought this Alex Perry dress:





Since then I have gained three kilos. Enough for Alex to be just a little tight on me and make me self conscious about my thighs and arse in it. And fearful that if I move too quickly I will split it. Quel horreur.

So I go to the gym, I limit my intake of food and wine (wine not as limited as it should be of course) and get on the scales every day AND NEVER HAVE I LOST THAT DAMN THREE KILOS. In fact every weekend I seem to put on 1 kilo then spend the rest of the week losing that sole kilo and start the cycle again.

Should I go on the biggest loser? Should I worry about something more important? Should I give Alex away?





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Boys and their aim

When my current spouse and I built our home over a decade ago, I cleverly designed the childrens' bathroom as a three way (the only three way I am likely to have). This means that the toilet is separate from the basins which are also separate from the bath and shower. With three kids this meant that someone could be in the shower, another in or on the toilet and someone doing whatever they needed to do in from of the mirrors. Washing hands is not a big priority as one can tell for the level of soap in the dispenser.

I thought I was so clever.

However I have two sons. Their aim is not good at the best of times; nor lifting the seat a priority, as evidenced by the shrieks from their sister at regular intervals. Here is the toilet room:





And here is the view from the toilet room if the door is not shut:





This means that if the television or x-box is on, whichever boy is going to the toilet veers to the left to view what is happening on the television screen. This then means there is a constant puddle of urine in the left corner of the toilet and the faint odour of public toilet.

AMFYOYO





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