Am I Parenting or in a Street Fight?

May 11, 2012 by Black Belt Mama · 5 Comments
Filed under: Mental Strain for Mama

I was talking to someone about my blog last weekend, about how I feel completely and totally stifled in what I’m able to write about. When I first started writing, I was completely anonymous. I didn’t even tell Mr. BBM I had a blog until I already had a couple posts up. I had my first comment before he even knew it existed.

Then all of that changed. First, people at my original karate school found out about it. I knew I hadn’t said anything unsavory about anyone, but I still went flying home after class, just to double-check and make sure. Then my family started finding out about it. Then my friends.

At some point, my neighbors found out about my blog. I worried that my crazy neighbor, the one who drank chardonnay at 10 a.m. in fuzzy slippers while stopping to peer in my kitchen window at me, would find out that the way I dealt with her weed garden and airing her litter box out on my sidewalk, was to vent about her erratic behavior on my blog. When she told me a squirrel had found its way into her house and she wasn’t sure where it was, I kind of stopped worrying. Hell, if a squirrel in her house didn’t bother her; nothing I could say was going to get to her.

Then I moved and within a few months, all my new friends and neighbors found out about my blog. Some of my best blog posts are my rants about the crazy people in my life; and when your family, friends, neighbors and everyone else is reading your blog, you’re sort of limited in what you can share without feeling like you’ll have a lynch mob after you.

But I miss writing, because it’s a release for me that I’m currently not getting by going to the gym or going to the dojo. I’m removing the gag and I’m just going to put it all out there and tell you about my week. . . because it was a good one (heavy on the sarcasm).

First, I’m now obsessed with making my own baby food. I started for two reasons: to give the little man healthy food and to save money. The amount of money that I’ve spent on little baby bullet storage containers, a crock pot, a steamer, a masher and a baby food cookbook (which basically says, “cook the crap out of everything and then blend it into nothing”), and a new peeler is definitely going to cancel out the money I thought I’d be saving. I also almost lost a finger this week.

I’ve been using a potato peeler (a super cheap one), since like college. I finally decided to be a big girl and buy a grown up one. I was amazed to find out that it actually peels stuff, well. Like really well. In fact, it peels things so well that while I was peeling an endless amount of apples to make applesauce for Baby Belated (that he still hasn’t eaten because I think he hates apples), I inadvertently peeled my middle finger. It was one of those moments where you’re like ohmygodthathurtouchholycrap, and then you think for just a second that you’re actually going to be ok, right before the gush of blood erupts.

At that point, Baby Belated had decided he was so completely done in his exersaucer. Sassy decided she forgot where all the band-aids were located (and when she finally remembered she brought me one that would cover a pimple, not a gushing near-amputating wound). Swim Girl was busy being an almost teen, locked in her room with her iPod. I wrapped my finger in a paper towel and tried to pretend I wasn’t getting light-headed. I handed a new toy to Baby Belated and ran upstairs to find a band-aid. Sassy beat me to it, because she finally remembered. The bathroom floor was covered with open band-aids, because you clearly can’t tell what size it is until you open it; and even if the paper looks the same size, what’s inside might be much bigger. You know, because that is ALWAYS the case.

I soaked through the paper towel and by the time I got two very tight band-aids on my finger, my bathroom counter looked like a murder scene. I needed chocolate; we had none. I also sort of needed a transfusion.

When dinner was finally ready and the homemade baby applesauce and sweet potatoes were ready too, we all sat down for dinner. Baby Belated decided he would have none of that. I was SOOOOOO happy I had slaved all afternoon and nearly amputated my finger (Hey Layton, you may be right. . . ).

Today, I took the girls for swimming lessons and was maneuvering the stroller into the pool through a double-set of doors when I slammed my left pinky toe into the wheel of the stroller. At this point, I’m fairly certain I have four broken toes, each in various stages of healing, with one still being firmly in the throbbing and hurting like a mother mode. I have broken all four of them on baby things, baby seats, baby strollers. Right now my toe is purple and my entire foot hurts. This is the curse of being born with finger toes when you love flip-flops. I think I need to start buying closed toe sandals like I used to make the girls wear to prevent tripping. It also didn’t help when Sassy asked if she could see my toe, and then proceeded to squeeze it. That’s what everyone with a broken toe needs, someone to squeeze it as hard as they can. (What was that kid thinking???)

Basically, this parenting business has been kicking my butt all week long. I won’t even go into details about how I threw my back out, all in the name of keeping little man asleep in his car seat for a little while, only to have him wake right up the minute I set him down in the house. Nope, not even going there.