Vomit? No, no, that's not a good blog title

What does one write about when they've had a pretty boring week?  Vomit.

It's gross, it smells, it comes out of children at warp speed.

I know I mentioned last week that Claire was sick.  That doesn't really come close to describing what went on in this house for 24 hours.  There was puke, there was crying, there was dry-heaving. 

I must say that this is the first round of pukes we have had.  Claire has been pretty healthy for her first 2 years and aside from a few runny noses and a total of 3 fevers, this kid is the picture of health.  So you can imagine how blindsided I was by the remake of the Exorcist that was going on in my living room, bedroom, and bathroom. 

After six baths to wash bodies and hair, I was ready to throw in the towel.  Thank goodness she was feeling well enough to not heave all over the house on her birthday.  Although the illness wasn't done with her yet.  She spent most of her first full day as a 2 year old filling her diaper.  She was a Bear Care that day, though, so darn...I missed it.

Yeah, it's gross.  I'm grossed out just writing this.  Thankfully, last week I got to spend a much-needed evening out with some fellow mommies swilling wine and complaining about husbands, etc. 

What I discovered over the course of 4 hours and a shocking 2 glasses of wine (I usually only have 1) was that I am not the only crazy person.  In fact, other mothers are presently being driven crazy by their children.  I was surprised.  Why, you ask?  Because I always feel like I'm the only person who is learning this stuff as I go.  Other moms seem to be so put together.  I mean some of them even wear make-up and real pants out of the house (as opposed to yoga pants or pajama pants...don't worry, I'm not leaving the house pantsless).

Whilst swilling aforementioned wine, one mom made a great point that had never really occurred to me in all of my infinite 2 years of child-rearing wisdom.  She said that as adults, sometimes we have a bad day at work, etc, and we come home and complain to our spouse, friend, family member, whomever.  Our kids have bad days, too.  They have days when they're tired, feeling icky, feeling sad, or just feeling frustrated.  Our kids, unlike us, cannot vent to their chosen soundboard.  I don't know about you, but my toddler has never said, "Hey Mom, can you draw me a bubble bath and get me a nice ice-cold chocolate milk?  I had a rough day at school." 

If she did say that, I'd surely accommodate her because I would know what she was feeling.  Instead, I get ear-piercing screams, body-flinging fits, and big, real tears.  What do I do?  I get upset with her for having a meltdown and sometimes she even gets time out. 

Since we started using time out I have tried to not punish emotions because I want her to feel free to express any and all emotions so that we might work through them when she gets older.  Right now we're still working on things like keeping her fingers out of her nose.  Despite my best efforts, I know I have punished for emotions.

So, I have decided to institute a practice that my sister and her husband use.  They have a "crying chair."  Whenever their daughter is having a meltdown, she goes and sits in the crying chair until she is done crying and ready to talk about whatever made her melt.  She's 5, so self-reflection, while still a new concept, is not impossible.  It seems to work and at least they feel like they are doing something for her.

For the past week when Claire starts to do that scream/yodel/whale call thing that she does I ask her if she needs a minute to herself.  A few times she proceeded to melt in spite of my question.  But, a few times she went in her room and sat in the time out spot.  I didn't tell her to go, I didn't even mention time out.  A few minutes later, she emerged with a handful of books and a smile.

All of that being said, this isn't news to a lot of parents and I certainly don't think I've figured out some magic formula, or that my child is the picture of behavioral perfection.  I just wanted to share yet another week of my daily life.

Claire is now a famous Sprout TV Sproutlet...okay, maybe not...but her birthday card was shown on-air on her birthday and Kelly and Chica wished her a happy birthday.  She was thrilled.  There'll be no dealing with her now.  Oh well, I have to say that more exciting things happen everyday on Fireman Sam than have happened all season on The Walking Dead.  Sprout - 1, AMC - 0.

Horrible Bosses

I'd like to say that we didn't watch television this past week, but that would be a blatant lie and not nearly as interesting.  We'll get back to that.

One of  my friends from high school posed an interesting question to me last week on the book of face.  She said that at a recent social gathering a few people had asked her what she did.  She responded that she stays home with her daughter and apparently received a few eye rolls.  Now, this particular high school friend(who played a mean saxophone if I recall) is an attorney as well as a mom.  Her husband suggested that she lead with attorney and then say that she's staying home with her daughter right now.

Okay, really people?  Does staying at home with your child really necessitate an eye roll?  Uh-oh, here comes my rant...

I realized when she posed this that I often lead with the fact that I am an attorney but that I'm currently staying home with my children.  For whose benefit am I providing this information?   Is it me?  Am I ashamed of my status of homemaker (and I make a mean home)?  Do I lead with my credentials because I think raising children isn't a legitimate job?  I'm not sure what I think, but this is definitely a subconscious/self-conscious thing that I do. 

The bottom line is that staying home with your children is a job.  It's a big, tiring, smelly, sticky(at times), thankless, wage-less job.  Think about it this way:  when your boss yells at you, does he ever get mad enough to vomit?  Do you have to change your co-workers' diapers?  Do all of your colleagues speak a foreign language for which there is no translation?  Do they demand things of you all day in said foreign language?  Do you spend literally all day every day with them?     

Sidebar:  I am not discounting or dismissing the real stress that any job can cause.  Whatever you do, I'm sure you get stressed.  This is merely my comparison of my current job to my previous employment experiences.

Back to my rant.  If you answered "no" to any of the above, then let me tell you, I'd trade jobs with you for at least an hour every day.  Unless you work for my former boss.  I'm pretty sure at least one of the above applies to him. 

So if motherhood and raising children is this difficult then why do I feel the need to qualify my responses to "what do you do?" with an addendum that lists my work experience and how many letters follow my name?  The only possible answer can be, "it's not you, it's me."  It's me that while I stand with diaper bag on shoulder and sippy cup in hand at story time, feels the need to say:  "I'm actually an attorney and an adjunct professor.  I choose to stay home with my children."  It's not like anyone has ever responded with: "Oh, well since you said that I won't decide immediately that you are _____."  (Insert anything here, i.e. uneducated, traditionalist, controlled, backwards, etc, I could keep going.)  I guess this is what I'm afraid of.  

The funny thing is that I don't think those things about my friends who also stay home with their children.  I admire most of them.  They're a bunch of crafty, creative, caring, intelligent, ambitious women who decided to stay home with their kids.  I actually have an in-law that is a rocket scientist...yeah, like a real rocket scientist.  She works from home, too.  Does she have these same issues?  Does she say I'm a mom and a rocket scientist?  Do rocket scientists actually call themselves that?  These are the pressing issues of my day. 

The more I blog, the more I realize that I may be, in fact, a lunatic.  Oh I could claim that I don't care what other people think about me, my children, my parenting, etc.  But I do.  Sometimes more than others but honestly, I usually care enough to have those after-the-fact conversations with myself in the car where I say something really clever in response to that bitchy remark.  Beyond that though, I guess I'm not losing sleep (well, no more sleep than you lose when you have a baby who thinks you're an all-night buffet).

I'm challenging myself from this point forward to tell only half of the truth when asked what I do.  The truth is that I am an attorney and adjunct professor.  I'm also a mom and proud of it.  If that's not good enough for the people asking, well they can politely dismiss themselves from my presence.  Until then, I'll save my teething, temper tantrum and diaper stories for someone who cares or can at least relate.

So...TV...yeah, this past week wasn't so great for the non-TV viewing.  Claire has been sick for a few weeks and I decided that she needed a true day of rest.  I set her up on her tiny Sesame Street couch with Sprout, her blanket, her doll and a sippy of milk.  What do you know, she got bored with it.  Well, until Caillou came on then I don't think she even breathed for 20 minutes.  I've also discovered that the little one (little as in age, she's actually quite a chunk of baby cuteness) is just as enthralled by television.  Great, let's start 'em young.  I have to say though, that Sprout is the lesser of all the television evils out there.  I watched a bit of Nickelodeon this weekend and thought surely I'd taken some sort of hallucinogen.  Scary.