This Is Me Maria

I drive a red Prius instead of a van now, but it looks and smells like a soccer mom in here. Practice Tuesdays, clinic on Thursdays, game on Saturday mornings, micro soccer also some how on Saturday mornings. Emails that all 20 people “Reply All” to - going back and forth just about every day.

When I’m not in the office I’m glued to my iphone trying to answer emails and cross things off of my ever growing to do list. Trying to find to time to do anything else but play catch up is just about impossible and school hasn’t even started due to the teacher strike. So of course PTA and Health Committee stuff are just waiting to pounce.

I’m taking the fall off from school so as not to overwhelm myself and so we can pay for a new bed again. (We are going to get a real king bed with no grand canyon in the middle and let the kids have these.)

Every Wednesday I rush off to the other side of downtown Bellevue to see my therapist after work. I always feel more distorted when I leave than when I got there. I feel like a crazy, spoiled person every time I go there. I feel like I’m going to get help for petty problems as I pull into the lovely office park. I’m not starving, dying, diseased, or ill! I think to myself as I sit down on her white couch to tell her about how busy and stressed out I am from being a working, sometimes in college, house is forever being remodeled, soccer mom.

Oddly though, I find myself more content rushing around like a some what crazy lady. It is kind of like a video game where you have to get all the points as you overcome various obstacles like shin guard chewing dogs, missing shoes, and those stupid weeds that keep coming back. I throw my head back and laugh as my husband says he’ll be working all weekend.

Saturday evening after returning from 8 hours in a software testing class (nearly 2 of which were spent w/o power) I took the kids to a local park. The parks in here are fantastic. Most are tucked away in a quiet neighborhood and surrounded by giant old trees.

My own yard is in complete disarray so I have a great appreciation for well cared for landscaping. We were getting some where but then we got Talia back who is a digger. Then the kids started digging as well. They have also taken to playing with our yard equipment to build forts.

When they are old they are going to say to their own kids, “When I was a kid I had to play with wheelbarrows and tarps.”

The parks here are well maintained and manicured. The grass here is so ridiculously and wonderfully green. There is always room for improvement in the restroom department though. 

We burned up the daylight avoiding the hot lava by climbing over the play structures, rolling down the grassy hills, laying under the giant trees, and the kids ran to and fro across the grassy ball fields.

The kids took off their shoes and danced around in the grass.  As usual I was busy snapping photographs and making sure  they didn’t get hurt or contract any germs.

At home I am pretty lax about most things but when we go out I am a germaphobe and a hawk. I don’t like public restrooms or anything that a lot of people touch. I also don’t like for them to be out of my sight for even a second when we are out. I feel a little crazy in the grocery store sounding like a parrot saying “don’t touch that” over and over again.

We made our way home as the sun ducked behind a hill. I had been arguing with Chris before we left for the park so I left my phone in the car. Later I realized that it was so blissful to spend time with them, with out any interruptions but that of curious dog being taken for an evening walk.

I recall these emotions from the days where I stayed at home with them and I miss those moments tremendously. I’m writing it down to remind me to take more uninterrupted time with them.

Our nanny IM’s me through out the day and tells me interesting things the kids have said or done. It is nice because I feel like I know more about what is going on in their day. I get to laugh a lot too.

Boobs

• “When I grow up I am going to feed my baby from my boob.”   -Madison (age 5)

The nanny has a wee little baby that nurses. The kids are very interested in this concept.

Poop

• They take bets on how much poop will be in a given a diaper. They are very interested in the baby poop and have to be around to witness the changing of the diapers. Whoever guesses the correct amount of poop (not sure how this is measured) gets bragging rights.

Shopping

• “I want to buy beautiful things. You know make up and stuff.”  -Madison

Dirt

• While packing up for a weekend at the cabin, she sent them outside to play for 15 minutes to run off some energy. In 15 minutes they dug a 2 foot hole in the backyard and rubbed dirt all over themselves.

Cody (age 7) is a good little worker and probably dug most of the hole himself. Madison probably stood close by singing and rubbing dirt into her skin.

My kids are funny, good spirited, little people. I’m so lucky.

Well we finished our first week with the nanny. Just as with everything new, there is an adjustment period. The kids are not used to being in the house all day, but we are working on finding other things for them to do.

It is so nice to know the kids are well cared for in the safety of our home while we are away at work.

This once again traumatic summer childcare experience has caused me to seriously consider staying at home but I haven’t made a decision yet.

The other option I’ve considered is keeping our nanny on through the school year to clean and manage our household and be with the children after school, again I haven’t made a decision about that yet.

(Read: Don’t know if I can afford it.)

I am still eager for the school year to start, so that we can fall into our familiar routine once again.

I am still so upset I can barely type this. I should preface this post by stating that this is my fault, I should have checked out the childcare facility in advance and gotten more details. I should not assume that every childcare is as wonderful as our school year one.

As I mentioned before I don’t like summer too much. My children have to go to a different childcare during the summer. Last year we had an incident at the summer childcare through the school district - combined with other things that did and did not happen, we looked for a different solution for this summer. I was extremely unhappy with the things that occurred last summer.

This past Monday the kids attended their first day at the new childcare.

I was so upset at the situation that I cried when I left. They are in the basement of a facility that apparently does not have AC. They spend the majority of the day in this large room with few toys with kids that are much older than their age range. Today they didn’t even split up into the younger kid rooms and were just forced outside. The room doesn’t feel clean, the toys are clearly not sanitized. There are broken toys in broken unsanitized bins.

It is just kind of a place to stash the children when they aren’t taking their turn to go on a field trip to places like a dirty public beach to play in the freezing Puget Sound with a total of 60 kids in tow.

The first day that my husband picked them up, the door between the childcare and the pool was wide open as were every other door in the facility. The person inside didn’t know where our children were. My husband had to wander from room to room and then outside to locate them.

There are a few other “minor” things that all add up to one big failure. Tomorrow I am bringing them with me to the office for a little bit and then taking the rest of the day off to interview nannies. I pray that we find one right away. Please pray for us. I cannot and will not continue to send them to this childcare facility.

Tomorrow I have to call the grandparents and ask someone to watch them for Thursday and Friday. I can’t drop off my daughter there even one more morning. This morning when I dropped them off I was equally disgusted and upset with the facility, the staff, the situation, everything.

On Wednesday my husband’s mother picked up the littles and took them to her house. She’s been driving back and forth between Seattle and Bellevue to drop them off at school in the mornings and pick them up in the evenings.

Maddie hasn’t been away from us for this long before. She’d be content to be with me at home all day, every day. I feel guilty that I can’t give that to her. Not because I can’t afford it, but because I can’t stay at home anymore. As much as I can’t stand some parts of my work, the daily routine of having to be some where, helps me be sane. Mostly as a distraction from my self I’m sure.

When I was a SAHM, I was severely depressed and begged my husband to help me find work so I could get out. I know SAHMs are very busy with schedules and play dates and homework and keeping clean houses and a million other things but there is a certain amount of leisure that goes along with being a SAHM. I do miss that but I couldn’t go back. I don’t think I could even go back to working from home, which I also did for a few years.

Still, I think about doing it about a once a week just for her so that I don’t have to say goodbye to her in the morning when I drop her off at childcare.

On the other end of the spectrum, here I am letting my mother in law take my kids for 5 days and deal with the lunches and homework and what not. It was nice of her to offer because I never would have asked. The first night is always the hardest. There are no tiny teeth to brush or ducky books to read or stuffed animals to hunt for. The silence is permeable. This is where the dogs come in handy. They are just as rowdy and needy as the kids. When they go away, it is going to be rough.

This time, neither Chris or I are worried about being productive with our child free time. We are just stopping to breath. We’ve done weekends before but not a regular working week before. This is new. Friday I woke up, got dressed, tossed my hair up in a pony tail, walked out the door, got into my van, stopped at Starbucks and then went to work. That was it. I was walking out the door about 10 minutes after having woke up - the simplicity felt surreal.

I guess parenthood is filled with guilt because I’ve enjoyed just being me and not mom for a few days.