Monday, January 03, 2005

Constant servitude


brrr! Posted by Hello

It's -16F right now. Look, even the dog is cold! He loves his blankie. This is Kernel, by the way, our 1 1/2 year old Rottweiler. I wanted to name him Colonel, but my husband is a computer nerd, so he wanted to spell it Kernel.

One thing about parenthood: constant servitude. It wasn't so much with one, and maybe a little more with two. But three? One being 10 weeks old? Between the three of them and the aforementioned dog, I feel like all I do all day is serve others. Mornings are the most stressful for me. First thing I do when I wake up, nurse the baby. If the baby woke at 6 or 6:30, I can put him back down and shower, but if not, I usually don't get one. By 7 or 7:30, the older boys are up, demanding breakfast. I pop a load of laundry in while they eat. Then I get them dressed. Then I change the baby, and feed & let out the dog. It's cold lately, so he has to be let back in shortly thereafter. Nurse the baby again, put him down for a nap. And now it is 9:30 and I'm just sitting down to my breakfast and first cup of coffee. My coffee pot is set to make coffee at 7:30 and stay on two hours; some mornings, I actually don't get my first cup before the pot shuts off.

Some people think stay-home moms have it easy, but really, we don't. A working-mom friend of mine says her mornings are hectic (and I believe her - can't imagine getting myself and a kid ready and out the door by 7!), but she loves getting to work after stopping off to grab a latte, she goes in her office, shuts the door, and spends time dealing with emails and sipping her coffee in a quiet office, phone turned off, for the first hour. I would love to have an uninterrupted hour!

I'm not complaining though, really - I'm not! Because I have all my family members alive and with me. That is more than I could ever ask for, given the situation in Southeast Asia. I pray for the victims and their families every day.

3 comments:

Sherocious said...

well as a mommy on both sides of the fence as of tomorrow (return to work day - boo!!!) I second that being a SAHM is exhausting and really really hard work. In fact, my holi, it was you that said to me YEARS ago, after Darien was wee, that being a mom was the hardest thing you'd ever done. I didn't believe you (well, sorta like when a parent says to a pregnant person "having a child will change your life!" and the pregnant person thinks - oh, sure. Not me. I mean, it will be different, but not life changing. Its life changing. Its hard. The hardest. No one understands unless they've done it. And its just a reminder I have to listen to you more :)

*snog* love you.

Jen said...

Aww, she! It is really hard, and it is life-changing, but there's just no way to explain it to a person. Like that email thing that gets passed around where the older mother takes her younger, pregnant daughter out for lunch and says "It will change your life" and the daughter laughs and says, "Oh I know, mom - no more spontaneous nights out, no more frivolously spending money", etc. Well yes, that, but there's so much more. You go from being Number One in your life to putting someone else first, just like that. You would lay down your life for a person that you have just barely met. And you do things like I did last night.. holding the barf bucket for hours on end and getting no sleep at all. It sounds so cliche, LOL.

Monica said...

I stumbled upon this blog and after reading just this blurb I like it already. I'll bookmark it to return to again. Whether we're SAHM or working moms, we want the same thing--to just raise our children to be the best they can, find and follow their dreams and stay safe.

Great blog!