Mommy Needs A Hug

A lot of mothers fear putting their kids into daycare. I am no exception to the rule and never was. I mean with all the horror stories you hear about at home and large facility daycares alike can you blame us? It is our job to have our children’s best interest and safety in mind, but also a lot of us have to, or want to, work. How are we as mothers supposed to place all our trust and our children’s care into someone else’s hands, typically a stranger?

I had a lot of really good childcare experiences with the kids, all stemming from Mark’s first caretaker I guess is the word. I’m not going to use any names out of respect for her privacy, but I can not thank her enough. Her and her family truly made us feel like family. Before we even started dropping him off she made sure we met with them and got to ask questions and talk before his first day. She was phenomenal with Mark and offered to help care for him when we had no other options. She was tender and caring and had such a lovely bond with Mark. I will forever be grateful for her kids and her relationship with Mark being my introduction to the world of childcare. If she is reading this, thank you so much from the bottom of my heart.

After several months of me being spoiled with this amazing family, I think Mark was 8 or 9 months old, we got into the CDC on base. It got off to a little bit of a rocky start. Within the first week Mark got Hand, Foot, and Mouth and had the worst diaper rash he had ever gotten. I had not anticipated him getting so sick so quickly and was frustrated, until I was reassured that this had happened to pretty much everyone’s kids upon starting daycare. After that it started to get better minus this one infant room teacher I didn’t like because she was awkward, but was harmless. Mark was thriving and moved up to pretoddlers where he had the MOST AMAZING teacher. Everything you could want for your kid. She is another person who really just made me feel at home and safe with my son in her care. She always made sure to ask me how I was, and even more so after I got pregnant with Rose. One day after Rose was born I got a cold and was looking forward to having a day without Mark to recover, when I got the call that he was sick. I broke down into tears and even with the kids rushing around she took a moment to make sure I was ok and called someone for me to talk to, which I needed.

At this point it was time for Rose to start daycare and the CDC was our obvious choice. As if I hadn’t been blessed enough, Rose got the best infant class teachers ever. Honestly, such wonderful women and I wish they got to see Rose grow up. Aside from a biting fiasco, Rose’s time at the CDC was great. There was however, one child that bit everyone in the class multiple times and I would have liked to punt him down a hallway because he repeatedly hurt my baby. It had to be like the 4th or 5th time she had gotten bit and I got a call at work, again. At that point I was on the verge of angry tears and going to lose it. I drove from Boston to Hanscom in record time just telling my boss I had to go. When I got there I stormed in trying my hardest not to lose it as I walked past the front desk. They asked me what I was doing and all I could say to keep from losing it was “picking up my kid”. I wasn’t going to let her get bit again, and when I got to the room and broke down her teachers consoled me and were also genuinely upset about the situation. As I walked out, Rose in arms, I heard the director on the phone with the kids parents. Thankfully shortly after that, the spawn of Satan was moved to a different class and things went back to normal. Don’t judge me for hating this small child, he truly sucked. He laughed when he bit people like a psycho, because he knew it was wrong. He was horrible.

while Rose was only in that one classroom, Mark moved up to toddlers, where he started teaching his classmates some colorful language. (Oops.) Now toddlers are on the other side of the building and for whatever reason, that terrified me. But again, Mark was blessed with amazing teachers who built such an incredible bond with him. Honestly, not a bad one in the entire bunch of toddler teachers. All the toddler teachers he was around really excelled at their job and it was great. And then we moved. First of all, those were some of the most difficult goodbyes for me, to have to say goodbye to all these wonderful women who had so easily eased my daycare fears. But then after we moved, it all went downhill, and fast.

I’m not holding back on this and I have a lot to say so buckle up.

We moved to Cape May, NJ and in what I thought was a no-brainer, chose the CDC there for the kids daycare. It immediately sucked. The director from the moment I met her had a nasty attitude and was, in general, a distasteful human. Then, they gave us a hard time about Mark being lactose intolerant and said we had to get him enrolled in the special needs program before he could start. This was ridiculous to me because, it’s lactose intolerance, definitely not a valid reason to be in the special needs program, especially when he hadn’t to be previously.

We were already off to a rough start and then they told us that we would be paying several hundred dollars more a month than we paid in Boston despite getting paid less than half what we were. Now I brought this up and was greeted with nothing but attitude and a “apply for subsidy then”. Honestly lady, fuck off. Somehow it just kept getting worse, but we didn’t have any other options as Cape May does not pay you enough and did not have any affordable options that we could find that worked with our ridiculous schedules. ( But that’s a whole other story.) So our kids started at the CDC and shortly after my worst nightmare came to life.

I partially blame myself for the events that followed because I still enrolled them despite the path lined with red flags and a flashing neon sign in my head reading “DON’T DO IT”. But like an idiot in a horror movie, I still enrolled them out of necessity. In August of 2019, I was in Virginia for a school when I got a call and photo from Joseph that turned my world upside down. He told me that Mark “tripped and hit” his head on a cinderblock wall at daycare. The photo absolutely terrified me. My sweet baby, hours after the incident, still had a giant bruised lump on his head. I immediately jumped into mama bear mode and called my command and contacted the daycare. My command was appalled and the daycare director told me she watched the tapes and he just tripped. Again, fuck off lady, there’s no way this child that’s been walking steadily for 2.5 years trips into a cinderblock wall, especially not that hard. Not to mention how sketchy his teachers and the assistant director started acting after the incident.

In the following week, the director continued telling my husband that he was a bad father because our children wore the same socks two days in a row. Now if you have kids you know that some days it’s just not worth the fight to try and get toddlers to take off their “favorite” socks, especially when the kids are clean. She also had the audacity to claim neglect saying that Rose’s hair was “matted to her head”. False. Literally anyone who spends any time with my kids can assure you that her hair has never been matted to her head. I don’t take too kindly to people accusing my husband and I of not taking care of our children. She wanted attitude and she sure got it.

Then the week after that, after already thinking I had lived out my worst fear, we got another call that Mark hit his head again, but he was “fine”. Now I don’t know where they learned to tell kids were fine because they were on crack on this one. Joseph and I left work and picked him up and it was horrifying. A bump, bruise, and cut, just as bad as the first, in the exact same spot. He was very disoriented and not acting himself at all so we rushed him to the emergency room where the doctor told us he had a concussion and likely had a concussion two weeks prior as well. Livid doesn’t even begin to explain how I was feeling. Luckily, my command let me take some time so I was at home with the kids for a few weeks instead of taking them into one of the deepest rings of Hell.

After the second incident Child Protective Services was contacted from our end to investigate the CDC. The daycare retaliated and told CPS we were neglecting our kids. The base also opened an investigation against us. They had a woman call us in to her office who proceeded to defend the CDC and accuse my husband of being unfit. CPS came to our house, investigated twice for the two separate cases, and told us we obviously take care of our kids and this call was ridiculous. In the meantime, CPS and TRACEN Cape May told us that the CDC had done nothing wrong despite our child having two concussions and various other wounds on both of our kids.

At this point, I obviously didn’t trust the CDC with my children’s well being and looked into several options in Cape May County. Finally, we landed on a daycare within a mile of our house that had just opened. We paid for two daycares for two weeks because we didn’t want them at the CDC for any longer than they had to be, but we had already paid for the month. We got our new daycare set up with childcare subsidy and we were ready to roll. And when the CDC told me that they had a check for us for money we were getting refunded because subsidy had just gone through, they mailed it because neither of us wanted to deal with the other and thank God because I don’t think I could have kept it together at that point.

Their new daycare was an absolute Godsend after the Hell we went through at the CDC. It took a few weeks to trust them a little bit, but they gave us peace of mind. Lil Prodigy 2 eased my worries and treated our kids wonderfully, despite Mark now being terrified of being at daycare. He screamed pretty much every morning before we left the house, and then again getting out of the car, and was always clinging to us so we wouldn’t leave. For the short time we had the pleasure of being there, it was almost a little like being back at the Hanscom CDC again. I thank them for helping me gain some trust back by not being disgusting human beings.

This is not meant to scare anyone, I just want to be blatantly honest about how these terrors you hear can quickly become reality. I saw all the horror stories but thought it wouldn’t happen to us because we had such good experiences. But no one can truly be 100% sure until it doesn’t ever happen to you. I would have never been able to forgive myself if I lost Mark due to their negligence. I will continue to fight this cause and encourage others not to use this daycare until my dying breath. For the other families I know of who had issues (quite a few) and those who I’m sure have had issues since, I hope your issues are resolved and you get/got closure, because we sure as Hell didn’t. They got away with these terrible events and it’s not right.

It only takes one bad egg for you to lose your child to someone’s negligence, and we know who the bad egg at that CDC is. We had a lot of wonderful experiences, but in the end, the one absolutely terrifying and heart-wrenching experience has ruined it for us, potentially for life. Heed your guts warning, and mine, and do your research. Follow your gut, read your reviews, and thoroughly research your daycares before enrolling your kids, because it can go bad quick, even if you think it will never be you. Keep those babies safe and I will keep fighting this fight for all of us.

• 

When I became a mother I developed this set of rules for people that wanted to deal with them. I’d like to believe all moms have a set of rules and I’m not just a psycho, but who knows. As I’ve grown and changed, and so have my kids and family dynamic, the list gets longer. The more we change as a family, as individuals, and as the world changes, the more rules I add to the list to accommodate. It’s ever changing but some things have always stayed the same.

Unfortunately, I’m extremely non-confrontational and I do notice that people take advantage of that. I don’t stick up for myself and unless it’s a safety issue, I’ll be honest, I usually don’t have the balls to enforce my list of rules. It gets really stressful for me because I’m a people pleaser, I’m not confrontational despite my temper, and even though most everyone knows the rules, they don’t listen to them because they know I won’t say anything to them. This makes for me feeling constantly undermined as a parent, which is frankly, really fucking disrespectful to me.

These rules I have aren’t anything crazy in my opinion, but still, no one cares. Mark is lactose intolerant so we greatly limit his dairy intake, which there are definitely people who are really respectful of that, others sometimes not so much. Mark also has acid reflux, since he was a baby, and projectile vomits when he drinks juices, so he isn’t allowed to have juice or lemonade (unless you’re cleaning up the puke and taking care of the ouchy stomach). Joseph and I don’t even drink soda except for a couple of times a year, and it’s usually ginger ale, so I don’t want my kids drinking soda either. It’s pretty strictly water and milk. They eat enough snacks and sugar with Joseph and I so I LOATHE when people give them sweets, unless they asked permission and I said yes. But again, I’m not confrontational so I usually will say yes because I don’t want to fight with anyone so just please try not to put me in that situation. And I don’t want people overfeeding my kids or giving them a different meal when they won’t eat what they’re given.

Then I have some rules that are just common decency that still, no one gives a shit about. You don’t kiss people’s babies or small children. You just don’t do it, especially now, I don’t what underlying conditions you have or where you’ve been. This applies to family and friends as well, if you didn’t make the baby and you don’t live with it, keep your lips to yourself. There are too many children that catch things and die because of the mindless act of kissing them (this includes kissing head, feet, and hands as well because you never know where there’s a cut and babies put their hands and feet in their mouth). JUST DON’T KISS PEOPLE’S KIDS!

Going along with that, my children don’t, and shouldn’t, have to hug anyone if they aren’t comfortable or don’t want to. This isn’t to say that they don’t like you, they may just not want to hug you and that’s fine. I don’t care if Christ himself wanted a hug. If my children don’t want to hug you, respect that and kick rocks. It’s about them having a say in their own bodies. Something not enough people understand or respect. If they want to give you a hug on Tuesday morning and by Tuesday afternoon they’re more comfortable with a high five, respect that. They are people too and get a say in their bodies.

If you are playing with my kids and they are crying or saying “No”, that means STOP! It doesn’t mean that they need to suck it up or get over it. It means that they are uncomfortable and don’t want to play so knock it off. Again, teaching my children they have control over their own bodies. If you continue even when they’re not comfortable you are telling them that their thoughts and feelings don’t matter. If it’s no longer fun for them, then stop.

While Joseph and I believe that these are reasonable. Actually, let me not speak for Joseph on this one. While I believe that these are reasonable guidelines and rules, every single one of them has been ignored far more than once. I mean when you know you can get away with it and I won’t confront you why would you just follow them on your own? It’s not like it’s human decency.

Every time one of my rules is broken I feel less and less respect from the people that break them. I feel invalidated. If you don’t respect the rules I’ve set forth for my kids, you don’t respect me, and you certainly don’t respect my parental authority. I’ve flown off the handle at Joe and cried more times than I can count about being disrespected, because I don’t feel like I can actually speak up to the people that disrespected me about it.

And for anyone that feels targeted by this, who knows me or is just relating this to their own relationships, 1. It’s probably written because of you, or people like you and 2. Me writing this is not trying to take the easy way out, it’s the only way I know how to articulate this without having a panic attack about saying it to anyone in particular. Just because I will not say anything in the moment, or after, does not mean it is right or that it doesn’t bother me when you don’t follow my guidelines. It bothers me more than anyone will ever know and I am tired of not being respected as an adult and a parent. I appreciate everyone who has ever helped us out or continues to help us, but I’d also like you to not take advantage of me not being confrontational.

Moral of the story, follow a parents rules for dealing with their kids. It doesn’t matter if you think it’s stupid or unreasonable, they aren’t your kids and it’s common decency, even if they don’t enforce it with you.

Much love, your friendly motherhood introvert.

• 

I was convinced going in to get induced with Mark that I was NOT, under any circumstances, getting an epidural. They had talked to me prior about a shot in the butt and laughing gas as other, temporary, pain solutions. I was fully mentally committed before the Pitocin started that I was not getting the epidural. The reason was not because I was trying to be one of those birth warrior badass moms who does it unmedicated. Which, side note, unmedicated and natural are not the same thing. Unmedicated is self explanatory and “natural” is any birth that a baby comes out of your vagina, and I’m tired of people not knowing the difference. Hard concept to grasp apparently for some people who are those badass warrior moms that do it without medication.

Anyway, let me back off my tangent and get back on track.

I didn’t want to get an epidural with Mark because the thought of it terrified me. The mere thought of them putting anything anywhere near my spine made my skin crawl and my stomach churn something fierce. It also severely freaked out Joe. To this day he still gets that weird “can’t grip anything” feeling if I bring it up, and he wasn’t even in the room either time that I got it. Not that it matters what Joe thinks about epidurals because he’s not pushing out his children’s giant bodies, but I digress.

So I got induced with Mark and it was way more painful than Rose. Definitely was not the experience I was expecting and more than I bargained for. I was in so much pain and cussing up and down at Joe. (I was sweet as pie when the nurses came in though don’t you worry.) I was giving Joe the typical “you did this to me” monologue and all that. He likes to tell me that at one point he was terrified that I wasn’t making it out of that delivery room, so obviously I was not taking it well.

Well I decided to get the shot in the butt to help me out a little. It helped me for about all of 20 minutes before I could feel it wearing off again. Couldn’t even tell you what the name of this shot is called if you wanted to know, I think it started with an “N”. Anyway, so I got this shot and they told me some time frame that sounded reasonable before I could get another one. A few hours or something. I made it what felt like days with just this shot, despite it not doing anything for me. It was probably only realistically like an hour or two, but we’ll pretend it was longer so I feel less like a bitch.

After what felt like days, I nervously asked the nurse if I could please please please have the epidural. They brought in the anesthesiologist a few minutes later, kicked Joe out, and we got started. For the worry that I had, it wasn’t that bad at all. The worst part about getting the epidural is having contractions the entire time it’s getting put in. (And yes, I have back pain now, but I’m fairly sure it’s more from the weight of my boobs and carrying children than the epidural.) As soon as that epidural gets placed I got from Satan’s spawn screaming at Joe “you did this!” to “you’re so pretty, I love you”. Literally, that’s exactly what happens, my exact words.

Both times I can remember being curled up into this little ball contracting while they stabbed me in the spine to get this thing placed. With Mark I hadn’t been dilating for hours until I got the epidural. With Rose I labored at home so as soon as I got to the hospital at 4 centimeters and was confirmed I was staying, I was all “fuck yeah let’s get these meds broski”.

After I got the epidural with Mark, the whole mood of the room shifted. I couldn’t feel a damn thing for the rest of my labor and delivery, and boy was it great. I was completely numb for pushing too, but it still only took an hour. My nurse afterwards referred to me as “The Patron Saint of Pushing”, which made me feel really good despite not being able to feel anything during it.

With Rose I got to the hospital, got checked, got wheeled to my room, and immediately got my epidural placed. After laboring at home for hours, like several hours, it was such an amazing relief. Then, it started making me feel nauseous and dizzy so I had to get medication to help out with that. I went on painlessly through labor for hours. I got the meds around 5AM and right around 11:45/12 they started to wear off, right as I got to a ripe 9 centimeters. By pushing time (12:05PM), I had no more meds and was doing the last bit of labor and delivery getting to feel every single twinge and ache. How lovely to get to feel the “Ring of Fire”, which helped me understand why it’s called that.

I had obviously not felt any of my pushing with Mark, so being able to feel at that point came as a complete shock to me. Now, I looked at that bag of medication and there was nothing in there, not a drop, bone dry, completely empty, the whole life squeezed out of it. However, I’ve had people tell me that the nurses probably just stopped my meds so that I would be able to feel when pushing. At the time I wanted to choke someone, anyone, for not giving me more meds because I had exactly zero desire to feel that baby making its entrance. Looking back now though, it was really a great, and different, experience being able to feel pushing and is probably why I tear as bad the second time around.

My overall lesson learned about epidurals has been that there’s no shame or reason to be afraid to get one. The epidurals were so helpful and I honestly don’t know if I would have dilated any further with Mark without one. Props to moms who are warriors and have unmedicated births, and props to moms who do what they need to do to get a happy, healthy baby into their arms, natural or c-section. It is absolutely amazing that we as mothers have the option to have a damn near pain-free birth. I’m extremely grateful that I didn’t have to feel the full labor or pushing with Mark, and equally grateful that I didn’t feel the full labor but did feel pushing with Rose.

If medicated is what you want, but epidurals freak you out, I’m here to tell you, just do it. Do whatever you want or need to do to get through your labor, because it’s your labor/birth and no one else’s. No one else knows what you need or want except you. Don’t let your partner, friends, family, nurses, or anyone else (yourself), force you into a direction you don’t want to take for fear of the decision or the guilt anyone might instill in you (unless it’s a safety issue). Happy birthing mama’s and may you all have happy, healthy babies no matter what way they come.

• 

I have absolutely terrible separation anxiety when it comes to my kids. Quite frankly, it sucks. I don’t want to feel guilty leaving them for me time, or have panic attacks in the supermarket worrying about if they’re ok. Everyone needs a break occasionally to collect themselves, practice self-care, and just generally do something for themselves. I know that I also need to do that, but I struggle with it so much. The second I step out of the house for anything other than work, I have a panic attack. Particularly if Joseph and I are going somewhere together without the kids.

I’m not even exaggerating, it’s literally the second I step out of the house. My mom can attest to that. A few weeks ago she was visiting and Joseph and I went to Rita’s while she watched the kids and before we even got out of the driveway I asked her to send me pictures of the kids. And it’s not that I don’t trust my mom to watch the kids, which I’m sure occasionally is how she feels. I just start playing out every possible worst case scenario in my head when I leave.

I walk out of the house and start thinking about what if someone breaks in while we’re gone, or the kids fall and hit their head. What happens if I’m in the middle of grocery shopping and my kid breaks their leg? I run through all the scenarios every single time. And I try not to. Obviously nothing has happened to them while I’ve been gone yet, but I can’t help but panic.

I haven’t spent more than an hour without my kids, aside from work, more than one time. Joseph and I went on a cruise in February 2019, and that was the only time I’ve been away from them for something even resembling self-care. I’ve gone to a school for work which was two weeks, but even then they drove all the way down to see me because I couldn’t take it anymore. I just can’t bring myself to take time away from them for myself, and it’s exhausting sometimes.

I really can’t pinpoint the exact reason I feel this way. I feel like maybe there’s just a combination of a lot of things that have put me into this spot. Between the experience Mark had at the daycare when we first moved here, the state of the world, mom guilt, or just the way I’m built, I think I have a reasonable explanation for feeling this way, but sometimes I feel bad like I’m being excessive. It’s really hard for me to justify taking time for myself the longer that I push it off also. The longer it’s on the back burner the more I think “well I’ve done it without a break this long I can just keep going”.

Joseph gets some breaks though. And I know that it’s by my own fault that I don’t get breaks, but it still really frustrates me that he gets to take a break. Honestly, it’s not fair of me to get irritated with it though because he’s a stay at home parent and he deserves a break too. I’m glad that he gets those occasional moments away for himself whether it be golfing, grocery shopping, going to get coffee, or just other little things to do. He needs it. It just gets to me that I need it too, but I can’t just go out and relax. I can’t just sneak away and worry about myself, by fault of my own.

Not getting a break makes me very on edge sometimes. And that makes me feel even worse, because then I lose my patience with the kids, and with Joe. No matter what I do I feel guilty, and like a bad mom. No matter what time I try to take for myself, I feel wrong, I go through the worst case scenario of me not being there for them. I honestly even do it for the very few solitary moments that I take to do things around the house, or write this blog. I worry about them getting hurt or something happening to them while I’m distracted, even though I know Joseph is with them.

One day I hope that I can get myself into a spot where I don’t constantly worry about everything. A spot where I can go to the grocery store without worrying about how they’re doing or if they’re ok. I’d love to go on an actual date with my husband instead of only being able to bear the 30-45 minutes it takes us to drive and get ice cream and come home. I hope one day, and one day soon, I can learn to let go a little and give myself the break I need, for my mental health and for my family. They deserve a refreshed, fully focused mama/wife, instead of a ball of stress, guilt, and panic. It’s an everyday struggle and I hope soon I can get there.

• 

Time to talk potty training. I started potty training Mark when he was just a little over a year old. I didn’t know that there were cues you were supposed to look for to see if they’re ready so I just thought it was time. I knew very little about it at all actually. I didn’t even do very much research on it. I just decided to wing it and give it a shot in an effort to have him potty trained before Rose made her appearance. I was starting the process completely alone though, no research, no Joe, no help at all just going for it.

Joe was gone the majority of the time I was potty training Mark. The time that he was home it was hard for him to keep up with the program. It’s hard to come into the middle of a routine when you have your own and just catch on to what’s happening. Potty training was stressful for all of us and it got overwhelming for him to try and potty train when he wasn’t home when it started. I had to explain to him what we were doing or trying and it just didn’t really help him understand at all.

From what I hear, it took Joseph a long time to get potty trained, and boys tend to be more difficult anyway. I did not know this going into it, so I had unreasonably high expectations for a one year old to master the potty in a few months time. I thought it would be a year tops and he would be fully potty trained by two. I was very, very wrong. Mark actually only recently got potty trained shortly before his fourth birthday. He was fully potty trained with no accidents right around 3.5, give or take a few months. So that puts us at a grand total of about 2.5 years of potty training, again, give or take a few months.

Up until the last few months, it was a trial and error of me trying to figure it out by myself. Learning new things. Trying new ways to encourage him, and losing my patience a lot. By the end we were taking him to the bathroom every 5-10 minutes. We would have timers set and no matter what we were doing, Mark was going to the bathroom when that 5 minutes was up. I mean this was our last resort. We had tried just letting him not wear a pull up, which just led us to messes constantly on the floor. The same goes for just trying to cut ties with the pull ups and put him straight into big boy underwear. I’d try giving stickers for him to put on his potty, stickers for him, and other small rewards to no avail, so the timer was our last chance. At this point it was getting increasingly stressful for all three of us, but we were so close to the end and this wasn’t something we could just give up on at 3 years old. Finally, there was a light at the end of the tunnel and Mark had finally started to get the hang of going on his own.

We let him pick out his own underwear, because we were super proud. But, again, being naive I had thought “that’s it! We did it! It’s done!”, and tried to get back into a more normal routine. Silly mommy. We had many accidents following. Honestly, not all were accidents though. If Mark got sent to time out, or sent to nap time, pretty much anything he didn’t want to do, he went in his pants. It didn’t matter if he had literally just gone to the bathroom before he went to his room. This kid was really pooping his pants out of spite. I know you’re all probably thinking I’m crazy, but it wasn’t hard to tell when he genuinely had an accident and when he was just doing it out of retaliation. I refused to wash poopy underwear when he did it on purpose. Why? Because I’m petty. I can not even tell you how many pairs of his “cool” underwear went in the trash or how many sheets, blankets, and toys I washed because of his “accidents”.

Don’t get me wrong he did have a lot of actual, genuine accidents. We always sat him down and talked with him when he had an accident. We reestablished the proper place to go potty, cleaned him up, and got him all set to go again. Like I said though, it was really easy to tell when it was truly accidental and when he was doing it on purpose though. We had so many talks I tell you. So many talks where I came down to his level, sat on his bedroom floor and talked about not peeing his pants on purpose. At one point he had to clean it up himself and you could see he understood how frustrating it was. So much laundry. So many paper towels.

He also went through a phase where if he did have an accident he would hide it at all costs. We kept trying to encourage him to tell us if he had an accident because we would rather him tell us the truth and let us help clean him up than for him to hide it and lie about it. He would come out of his room after a nap in a completely different outfit than he went in with. He would just creep around his room going through his drawers and hiding his dirty clothes. This made for a really fun game for me of playing hide and seek with piss soaked pants. He also would poop in his pants and then use the bathroom towels and his hands to clean himself up. He mastered quietly washing his hands in his bathroom. Much to my surprise, I’d find shitty towels, walls, and pants around the house in hiding spots. It was great.

Lately (knock on wood) he’s been doing really well though. I don’t find poop anymore and there’s no more hiding pee pants. He very rarely even has an accident anymore. Also, he stopped using an excessive amount of toilet paper (the whole roll), and is wiping himself now. We are FINALLY completely wrapped up on potty training Mark, just in time for Rose to really get started.

Learning from my mistakes, I got Rose a potty when she turned one but was waiting on the cues. We have never tried to push her into potty training before she was ready. We would just leave the little potty out if she decided to get acquainted with the idea. When we first got it she was sitting on it a lot getting associated with it, but we didn’t push it at all. As a matter of fact, Rose has taken it into her own hands.

We got a special toilet seat for the bathroom toilet, along with the plastic potty, and a step stool. Overnight Rose became obsessed with the potty. She wants to spend all her time on the toilet or eating, there’s no in between. I’m not exaggerating, she is like the living example of “shit or get off the pot”. I mean, I guess it’s a good thing she’s taken it into her own hands because 1. we know she’s ready and 2. it’s less stressful for her. We have a long way to go still with her though.

So far what I’ve learned from Rose is to always check her pull up for poop before she decides to take it off and sit on the toilet. She likes to poop and then immediately decide she needs to be on the potty. Not the greatest cleaning smeared poop off the toilet seat and her. Also, I’m learning that she needs instruction on how much toilet paper to use. She uses an excessive amount and also thinks you just go into the potty and wipe even if you aren’t using the bathroom. Thankfully we aren’t going the toilet paper shortage of 2020 anymore.

Hopefully in the time it takes for Rose to get potty trained I get more patient and learn even more. Also, I hope Mark starts getting more pee in the toilet than on the seat or the floor, because it’s getting old cleaning the bathroom two or more times a day.

I continue to learn every day and now have potty training both genders under my belt. I look forward to the light at the end of the tunnel, and continuing to improve my teaching methods to tailor to the kids more specifically. It’s a long road ahead of us still and I’m sure I’ll have a lot of stories and updates on the serial pottier. And to any one out there potty training, patience is key, all kids are different, you will get there eventually. And you will get used to the word “potty” and use it around adults too. Most importantly, GOOD LUCK!

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As we know, toddlers gradually get more independent. They start wanting less help and want to do more things for themselves. Which as a mother, the thought of that has always been very bittersweet for me. I simultaneously love catering to my little gremlins and them needing me for every little thing, and also thinking “man could you just do this yourself please I need a break”. When it actually starts happening its a very nerve-wracking experience. Obviously our kids have to start doing things themselves at some point, and we all want our kids to grow into capable adults so we let them do things alone, but it gave me this haunting sense of replacement.

With Mark his independence came very slowly, A little at a time he would want to try and do something for himself. It would be something new that he would try and master every month or two. It was nice getting to ease into that change. It would just be like one day he would want to pick his own shirt, then weeks later he would work on getting himself dressed, and so on and so forth. It was never learning to do two things at once. He always wanted to master the one thing he was learning to do along before he tried something else. By the time he was 2 and Rose was born he was doing a whole lot by himself and insisting on helping me with the baby. It obviously takes longer to get places, and do things once they start doing them without help, but the goal is to teach your children to be pretty self reliant. Teach them that as a parent, I’m always standing right here to help you, but you know you can do it on your own.

Rose’s independence didn’t come gradually. We are in the midst of dealing with that right now. Instead of the nice steady easing into it, her sense of independence came in like a tidal wave crashing right on our heads. This week to be exact. It was just like an overnight thing that she suddenly just wanted to do everything on her own. At the beginning of this week she just decided she wanted not a crumb of help from Joseph or I, and she was going to master it all on her own. I’m going to attribute her new found sense of independence to always seeing Mark get to do so many things on his own. I don’t know if that’s actually what happened, but that’s what I’m going with.

In the blink of an eye we went from ushering her around and holding her hand to do everything to watching her conquer the world. This week alone she doesn’t want help getting in or out of the car, she HAS to turn the lights on herself, she picks her own clothes, tries to wash her own hair, tried to teach herself to swim (obviously we intervened on this one), helped me cook once, wants to help with dishes, unloads the groceries with me (and puts them away), and so much more. If we try and help her she yells at us and will do whatever it is, again. For example, if we walk in the house and turn the lights on she will yell and then get up on the couch, turn the lights off (or demand we do), and then turn them back on. And she is very feisty about it.

When they start doing things slowly, it’s easy to handle. Mentally, physically, and emotionally, it’s easier to grasp that you’re coming into the “not needed” territory. But the way Rose decided to take it on all at once, whew, we are exhausted. She has us running all over the house constantly trying to make sure she’s learning correctly and being safe with what she’s teaching herself. It’s just a constant blur of movement, and let me tell you I’m not usually home, but when I am it’s absolutely exhausting. Joseph and I are beat with chasing her around. Mark gave us this false sense of security that she too would gradually progress, and boy she is the polar opposite.

We decided to start potty training with Rose because she seemed ready. Apparently that little bit of teaching, coupled with Mark’s independence, opened up Pandora’s box. But there will be more on that another time.

These days I’m just trying to figure out where my two little babies went. I’ve been looking at throwback pictures of them and wondering how they got to this point so quickly. Seeing pictures of them when they were so tiny and helpless. They depended on us for everything and we just thought “man I wish they could do this on their own”. Now I see those pictures and think about how I wish I had a little bit more of that time back. Now we have two very independent mini teenagers and it’s so incredibly bittersweet. I’m glad that they are doing well learning to do things on their own, and that they’re self-reliant, but I wish time would just slow down a little so they could need me more again. I miss my little babies needing me for everything. But I’ll continue to teach them how to depend on themselves, believe in themselves, and be here to kiss away the tears and embrace the snuggles that they still give me. And today I’ll glow in the fact that I taught my babies that they can do anything they set their mind too.

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Let me tell you, payback is a bitch. When I was a kid I was an extremely picky eater. Still am, honestly. I don’t eat a lot of meat, mushrooms make me gag unless they’re on something, and I’m more than content with just chicken (not reheated) and rice. I love cooking, I’m pretty good at it and can’t wait to share it with the kids and teach them, but I’m picky. I like to cook more for other people than myself because of my limited palette. I can vividly remember sitting at various people’s kitchen tables for hours until everyone just got annoyed and let me go. Apparently my eating habits were sweet revenge for my mom’s picky eating as a kid, and my children weren’t going to miss the chance to do the same to me.

Now, Mark has always had issues with eating, starting with his reflux. Despite throwing up his bottles, he still ate pretty well so I couldn’t have predicted what was coming down the road. I started trying solids with him at 6 months old, with baby food. He would only eat the mango baby food (and blueberry, but it gave him a weird rash so I didn’t let him eat that anymore). Then, when he moved out of the baby food phase I made him try a lot of things so it seemed like he was eating pretty well. But his regular meals weren’t a very diverse selection. He stuck to cereal bars, chicken tenders, and potato products (unfortunately for us, because he had issues with choking on mashed potatoes). I can’t remember the moment it clicked, but (at home at least) he ate barely any fruits or vegetables. Once Rose was born, it only got worse.

After Rose was born I noticed that he wouldn’t even try anything new anymore. I chocked it up to a little toddler rebellion against having a new sister, but he loved her and it didn’t change at all as he got older. There were days where I would break down in tears because he wasn’t eating. He was already a very slim child, probably due to his height, so I started to worry that he wouldn’t meet his weight milestones, but he somehow always did.

Fast forward to now and he is so extremely picky. He rarely eats more than half a meal, including the things that we KNOW he really likes. He will skip entire meals and then just snack all day. It’s so frustrating to put a bowl of spaghetti in front of this kid and watch him make a disgusted face like I gave him a bowl of dirt. It breaks my heart making meals centered around what Mark likes to eat and watch him not take a single bite. I thought for a while it was just because I cooked it, which obviously really hurt my feelings, but he does the same with takeout or food that Joseph makes as well.

I’ve been trying to come up with ways to get him to eat with a few small successes. One day I turned small pieces of spinach and egg into a makeshift “egg sandwich bite” and that worked. My methods don’t usually work more than twice though, frequently not even working a second time. I’ve tried bribing him to eat vegetables with occasional success, but that doesn’t last either. We’ve tried the age old “sit here until it’s gone”, but I’m living proof that for a stubborn kid that never works. Finally, most days we just give up and come to terms he’ll eat when he’s hungry. He doesn’t have to eat it, but if he doesn’t he doesn’t get any other snacks anymore. We leave out his meal for a while after meals and if he gets hungry he eats it. If not, then he doesn’t have to, because no amount of coercing is going to make him eat it. That works better than anything else, for all of us. It helps us stress less about it and Mark stresses less at meals thinking he’ll be forced to eat what’s on his plate. He’s still growing just fine, he still eats, and he’s just as active as ever. It’s still so irritating, but if he’s healthy and happy that’s all I can ask for. Maybe one day he’ll grow out of it, but until then, at least he occasionally tries new foods and he eats.

Now the other one, Rose. This little girl has always had the best appetite. The girl can eat something fierce. She tries everything. Joe gave her seafood, steak, pork, anything he has and she’s always tried it. She is the complete opposite side of the spectrum to Mark. She loves fruits and vegetables, thrives on salad, and doesn’t really like bread at all. Well, she did.

As of late, Rose has been getting slightly pickier and I’m just hoping it never reaches the level that Mark is at. She still eats all her veggies and she loves tomatoes and cheese more than anyone I’ve ever met. She eats an entire container of grapes before they even make it into the fridge after shopping. Recently Rose picked up eating bread and pasta, and kind of fixates on it. She says “I’m hungry” more than she says anything else she knows how to say. However, she doesn’t eat turkey, ham, or steak (probably my fault), and she has days where she’ll sit at the table through a whole meal and not eat a single crumb. She does snack a lot so I’m not worried about her eating, but it’s definitely not great watching her eat, and then immediately get up and ask for a snack with an “I’M HUNGRY”. (Yes she yells it, she’s very passionate about her food.)

Kids will eat when they’re hungry and there’s nothing anyone can do to change that. I’d rather my kids have a healthy relationship with food because I didn’t constantly force them to eat things they didn’t want. The sooner we can all come to terms with a picky eater being a picky eater and just let them be, the easier and less stressful life will be. When it comes to your own picky eaters, may the odds be in your favor, your hopes be high, and your patience be steel.

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I hate birth control. There I said it. People always say how great it is and it regulated their periods or they don’t get periods at all. I hate it. It is literally my worst enemy. I started birth control at 19 years old after Joseph and I started dating and every day following I was a raging bitch. Granted, I’m a bitch to start with, but it definitely doesn’t help.

I’ve had the girl talk with probably dozens of females in my life about birth control. I had never heard any bad stories about it. I had always heard these great stories about how it helped people so much. It made their periods lighter, non existent, or at the least helped with cramps. So when I pulled the trigger and decided to start birth control I was stoked. Who doesn’t want to stop having cramps every month? And I had terrible cramps.

I went to the clinic is Portsmouth, Virginia absolutely terrified because I’d never had any kind of reproductive care before aside from one Pap smear at boot camp. I sat down with one of the doctors and after what seemed like an eternity of discussing options I decided on starting with a low dose pill because it was the least invasive option. And so the adventure began. For the first several weeks everything was fine. I didn’t even really notice any difference for a while. Then, it kicked in and my hormones were on a rollercoaster similar to that of Kingda Ka at Six Flags. I had extreme mood swings, with smaller, less drastic mood changes in between.

Once I started having these hormonal changes I started thinking about maybe trying a different option. But of course, now I started hearing all these scary stories. Seeing articles about women who had the arm implant and having it put in the wrong place, or getting rejected. Stories of people with an IUD whose period has been happening for months straight. Or it getting lodged in their uterine wall. Suddenly the mood swings didn’t seem so bad, so I stuck with it.

Then I became the tiny percentage of people that take their birth control correctly and still conceive and I didn’t have to worry about it for a while. What a glorious time to have not so crazy mood swings. You’d think being pregnant my hormones would be worse, but the break was amazing. I felt more leveled out for the first time in a long time, and it was great.

After Mark was born and I had to talk to my doctor again about my birth control options I chose the same low dose pill, because it was the lesser of the evils in my eyes. Once again, it sucked. At least it’s consistent. So for another year I dealt with my continued cramps, horrible periods, and raging hormones until the sweet relief of pregnancy came around to help me level out again. It was magical, like walking in your first snow storm as a child. Through out all of this Joseph had never even thought about how it was the birth control that was making me crazy, but I had.

A few months after my postpartum appointment with Rose I brought it up to Joseph. It finally clicked with him like flipping on a light switch. We had a long conversation about it. (Yes, he talks to me about “girl issues”, because he cares.) I continued taking my birth control because there isn’t really very much of an option as a woman. You either take the birth control or you get told that you aren’t being responsible with your reproductive health. So I continued to take the pills day after day.

I still don’t know where to go from here, but I know why my attitude gets so bad, and that’s a start. I hope that I can figure out a solution that works for me, but I don’t know what that is. I’m finding a lot more options and have talked with my doctors to help find the right method for more, but there’s a lot more out there than I naively thought all these years. I recently learned about natural family planning and maybe that’s where I go. Who knows? Until I figure it out I’ll continue discussing the options with Joseph, the doctors, and researching for myself. I hope I can figure this out and I wish all the women who have issues with birth control can also figure it out. It’s 2020 and birth control being mostly on women’s shoulders still with very few options for men is dumb. I’ll continue to hope that also changes. Because it sucks. Birth control sucks.

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Being a working mom is hard. Before anyone gets defensive, being a stay at home parent is just as, if not more, difficult. I couldn’t do it and people that do are stronger willed than I am. Stay at home parents do so much for so little recognition most of the time. Being a mom is hard. Being a parent is hard. But the point is, I have learned how difficult being a working mom is. It presents a unique set of struggles. Those challenges starting and ending with other moms feeling the need to make comments about how you work outside of the home and how awful that is for you kids. I will never forget the first time someone made a comment about me “letting someone else raise my child”, because he was going to daycare. What a horrible feeling when you already feel terrible about having to leave your kids.

Anyway, being a working mom is challenging. Somedays the kids just don’t want me to go. Sometimes they scream and yell and beg me to stay home. Sometimes it’s near impossible to walk out that door because my kids are so upset that I’m leaving. It was so incredibly difficult on those days when they were in daycare and they would cling to my leg (Mark mostly) and just keep asking for hugs, and then hearing them scream down the hallway for me. On those days I cry the entire drive into work. I show up to work with a puffy face and red eyes and have to visit the bathroom to try and pull it together and seem tough.

Even more often than those days they don’t want me to leave, are days when they just couldn’t give a crap if I was there or not. On those days I walk past those little faces and I say “goodbye, I love you” desperately hoping that they’ll say it back. Those days I feel like I’m not needed and it crushes me, but on those days I manage to hold it together because at least my babies are happy. I hate thinking about the time I’ve spent away from them, and the time that I still have to face away from them that hasn’t come yet. Every once in a while, on a bad day, I start contemplating about staying home with them. When we were both employed maybe, but that’s no longer realistic because bills don’t pay themselves so I have to keep my job. Also, I immediately follow the thoughts of staying home about how I would possibly maintain my sanity and completely dismiss it. Staying home, as much as I would love to spend more time with the kids, is definitely not for me.

I felt better about working when Joseph was working too. It felt a little less like I was abandoning them. I had my best friend who could relate to the pain and doubt of leaving our kids in someone else’s hands. Now that he’s a stay at home parent, it’s progressively harder to come to terms with working and leaving them. Joe does a great job with them and I appreciate him giving up his career so I could keep mine, but it’s troublesome not having a partner who can relate anymore. Since Joe’s been home I’ve found that my days are consumed more than not, with thoughts of my kids and if they’re mad at me for still working when they get to spend all this time with daddy.

It’s especially arduous looking back on when I was raising them alone and seeing how much they needed me then. They depended on me for everything at one point and it, quite frankly, sucks to see that role being taken on by Joe. Now they depend on him for everything. They depend on him for snacks, drinks, diaper changes, someone to play with them. It’s not me that fixes their boo-boos and their big emotional days and it really hurts. It hurts when Mark calls Joe his best friend, or when they walk right past me to ask for something, because that used to be all on me. I complained about it then, not realizing how much I would miss being depended on for everything. Today we went to get in the car and a sweatshirt I’ve been wearing on and off for 2 days, that Joe has a matching one, Joe decided to wear today. While Mark didn’t bat an eye when I was wearing it, he complimented Joe on it this morning. I know I shouldn’t be so selfish, but those moments really break my heart. I feel like they have a better bond now than I could ever hope to have and it’s crushing. Also this morning getting in the car I said to Joe “I feel like they don’t like me”, because that’s truly how it feels some days. Joe says his usual “that’s not true”, directly followed by Rose screaming “NO MOMMY, DADDY” from the backseat, and cue the waterworks.

Then there’s days when I get home from work and my kids run to the garage door jumping up and down, screaming “MOMMY’S HOME”, and what a spectacular feeling that is, especially in comparison. All those days that they just let me leave with no fuss, because they had daddy, and it broke my heart, doesn’t even matter anymore. In those days when they jump for joy to see me I have to remind myself that they do need me, not just today, but all the time. I’m still the one who gives them baths, brushes their hair, makes sure they brush their teeth, and gives them hugs when they’re feeling down and just need a mommy hug. They still depend on me to kiss their boo-boos and break up their fights. I’m still the one that cooks meals for them and makes sure they have clothes on their back, food in the fridge, and everything they need (and most of what they want). And when the sun sets, I’m still there to put them to bed and tell them I love them, way more night now than not.

Being a mom is hard. We judge ourselves just as much as other moms judge us. We tear ourselves down for all of our choices because it’s what we see all too frequently. Working or staying home, it’s difficult. It’s never going to be easy to be a parent. It’s never going to be easy to be a mom. The reality is it’s always going to be a grueling decision for every single decision we have to make. You can’t always be the superhero, number 1, everything to everyone. You have to do what you have to do to get the bills paid, keep the kids happy, and keep yourself sane. I’m so tired of judging myself for being a working mom because I’m way harder on myself now than anyone else could ever be. I judge myself harsher than any other mom, parent, or coworker could ever judge me. But I’m tired of making myself feel guilty for all my decisions, and like my kids don’t need me. Every time I look back and reflect on these decisions and experiences I’ve had as a mom, I think about how dumb it is that I make myself feel guilty. It’s a work in progress though and I’m probably going to keep doing it to myself even though I’m self-aware that it’s stupid. My kids do need me. They will always need me. I will always be their mommy. And for today, at this moment, I will not make myself feel bad for doing my best. I will not feel guilty for loving them with everything I am, giving them everything they need, and trying to give them a life they’ll look back on fondly. Today I will go for a walk with them, I will give them a bath, I will do silly activities with them, and I will not feel bad for being a working mom.

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Let me just warn you right now, this might trigger some people but I want to touch on this topic because the longer I am a mother and the more often I talk to other mothers, the more common I realize this is.

Joseph never wanted kids. He never even thought he would get married until he met me. He was just going to live out his days as a bachelor hermit venturing out to Coldstone by himself. When we first started dating, and then again when we got married, I made it abundantly clear that I wanted kids. However, when we found out I was pregnant the look on his face was as if someone had keyed his car while kicking him in the nuts. It was a shock to me as well when the test was positive being as I was still on birth control, but when I saw those two lines I was still really excited. After all, I had dreamed of being a mommy my whole life.

My excitement quickly changed when I called out to Joseph from the bathroom and told him, what I thought, was the good news. Seeing his absolutely devastated look took the wind right out of me and truly felt like somebody had stolen my soul. I was crushed at the thought that he did not want to have this child with me. That one look sent me into an emotional and mental downward spiral.

Within 30 minutes I went from two pink lines and being ecstatic, to on the phone with my mom crying about how I felt Joseph didn’t love me and wouldn’t love this baby. I hung up the phone and starting weighing any and all of my options, something that I definitely didn’t want to be doing. I didn’t want Joseph to be upset with me and I certainly didn’t want to feel so alone as I did in that moment.

For about a week I looked into every possible outcome and option while I starting getting set up for my first doctor’s appointment. This entire time I had been avoiding telling my dad for fear of his reaction. Then like a quickly passing rain storm, everything became so clear after I told him. His only words were “we like babies” and that was that. I no longer had a single doubt in my mind that this little miracle was coming home with us in 9 short months. And he did.

9 months passed by and our beautiful little Marky was on his way home with us. From the moment he first entered Joe’s arms, all those hesitant feelings and that devastating look didn’t mean a thing. He loved that little boy and immediately melted into fatherhood. It was such an amazing moment to know that all my fears, as far as Joseph loving our son, were just ridiculous thoughts in the end.

Then here we were again just over a year later. We had planned this out so he had to be excited right? Well we all know that “Scream” painting. Just imagine me saying “honey look it’s positive, we did it” and Joe turning into the living embodiment of that painting. It was like the first time all over again and it honestly made me incredibly mad. We had planned this out! We made the schedule, we talked this over, he was onboard and more excited than me even, and now that it happened it was like the slate had wiped clean.

All over again I was crushed. Obviously I had already come to terms that this little baby was ours and I loved it, now I just had to wait for Joe to come around. This man drives me nuts to this day thinking about how long it took. I guess it just is harder for him to grasp because he doesn’t get to feel the baby, he isn’t the one with the two pink lines. I’ve noticed this as a pretty common theme for fathers in general though the more people’s stories I hear.

Looking back it’s irritating and I wish his reactions would’ve been different, I really do. I wish I could’ve had those over the moon reactions that you see on social media videos all the time. But also looking back, having grown a little, I get it. A new baby is always kind of a shocking thing to take in, whether you plan it or not, because you never know how soon it will happen. I also understand now that it has to be a lot harder, as a father, to grasp the concept of a child that early when you can’t physically see or feel what’s happening. A baby is always a big change, no matter what number you’re adding to the mix. At the end of the day, he is still here, still loving me and our kids, and a totally kick ass father.

It’s still hard to think of those faces and still frustrating, but I’m glad I have him and our kids. I love you Googly Bear. Thank you for helping me understand a little bit of the male thought process because everyone thinks women are confusing but yeesh.

And I know it’s not always easy to come to terms with your partner not being as excited as you, or taking a while, but from my experience and what I hear from others, they do come around the majority of the time.

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