Making Good Choices

Thursday, June 24th, 2010

Seems lately that the big parenting mantra is “make good choices!” I’ve used it myself until I realized it doesn’t work. At least not on my kid. But I do try to teach Betsy about choices and consequences, and how every choice has a consequence – some good and some bad.

Unless you live under a rock you are somewhat familiar with the Joran van der Sloot stuff in the news. And it’s absolutely tragic that two young girls lost their lives. He is undoubtedly a predator. But it also cannot go ignored that both the girls that he killed (the ones we know about) made bad choices. One went wild on her graduation trip, drank too much and went off with a stranger, the other went back to the hotel room of a man she just met. Now, I am not saying that either girl deserved what happened to her. Obviously they did not deserve to die for making a bad choice. How many countless women make these same bad choices every day of the world and have no consequences at all?

I’ve always been an overly cautious person. I was the fuddy-duddy college girl urging my roommates and friends not to get in cars with guys they didn’t know. I was always of the opinion that until you knew someone a little better, it was a good idea to meet them for dates. I still believe that, even at my age. I would never let a date pick me up at my house even now. I never brought a random guy home with me and I never went home with a random guy, not even in college. I don’t say this to put myself up as the poster child for good decisions because, trust me, even not having done those things I made TONS of bad choices in my life. And if I had done those things, chances are good that all would have been fine. But I’m pessimistic and I don’t like to play the odds.

I’ve got this daughter who has absolutely no fear. I know that this could change and probably will. But it makes me worry about how I can teach her to be safe and make good choices while still letting her have fun. I want to be able to send her off on a fun trip for her high school graduation and feel confident that she will make good choices. Stay with her friends, at least one at all times, don’t go with any random boys anywhere, and don’t accept drinks that you didn’t watch the bartender make. I’m not saying she should be exactly like me, because lord knows I probably missed out on a lot of fun. Sure, I never got drugged and raped, but isn’t there a happy medium?

I suppose the only thing to do is talk talk talk talk about these choices and what can happen and why some choices are good and some are bad. Of course now is not the time to talk about the date rape drug, but I guess being in the habit of talking about choices and consequences will make it go smoothly in a few years.

God, this parenting shit is hard.

EDIT: I just remembered that the night I met the EX he was at a party at my apartments, and after talking to him all night, he was invited up to my apartment so I could give him my phone number because he had asked me out on a date. So he knew where I lived. And then he picked me up for our first date. See? Shouldn’t ever do it. Because things could suck ten years later.

Posted in Mommyhood | 5 Comments »

Squeeeee!

Thursday, May 27th, 2010

I got an amazing offer today! My friend and her family invited me to go with them on a trip to Venice and then on to Croatia. Of course I’ve always wanted to go to Venice so that’s a no brainer. The canals! The art! The architecture! But I had honestly never thought of Croatia as someplace I wanted to go. Well, I never thought of it at all, honestly.

But I’ve been doing some research and it looks so amazing and interesting! I can’t wait. I’ve not done a lot of international traveling. I’ve only been to London and Paris, and both of those trips were with the EX. I always hoped to do more traveling but I thought that it would be a while before I could do any again. Betsy is far too young for a long plane ride and to be interested in the things we might see in other countries. So doing this trip is spontaneous, and maybe not a great idea financially but fuck it. I’m going.

I fly out of Austin, to Chicago, then to Madrid, then to Venice. I’m a bit nervous about navigating the Madrid airport to get to another airline to get to Italy, but I can do it. People do it everyday right?  Then after that I’ll be with other people, people who’ve done this all before so I’ll get to just follow along and take in the sights.

The EX is obviously going to take care of Betsy while I’m away, and I’m happy that he’s supportive of me going and willing to help out. I just wonder how I will deal with being gone from her for essentially nine days. And not just away but FAR away. So far away that if I needed to get back I can’t do it quickly. I know that’s a terribly worrisome way to think, but I’m her mom. How can I not consider worst case scenarios?

But I will take the leap. I will play the odds and try to embrace this new freedom for the good things it offers. If I were married still, my friend would never have thought to ask me if I could go. I am going to try to not be ruled by fear. I am going to enjoy myself and being me.

Posted in Mommyhood, Travel | 12 Comments »

My Night Owl

Monday, May 24th, 2010

First, let me admit I’m a terrible mom and I lock Betsy in her room at night. This started because she would get up in the middle of the night and climb into bed with me, and then we’d both be awake all night. Once the EX turned her door handle around and made it so that she could not get out of her room, we both began sleeping better at night.

Well, last night I must have forgotten to lock it when I checked on her before I went to bed. I woke up to her climbing into my bed in the middle of the night. That was fine, after a bit of a scare about who was getting into my bed. She was restless but I assumed that she settled down to sleep because I fell back to sleep.

The alarm went off this morning, and Betsy was not in bed with me. I went to her room, thinking she had gone back to her room, but she was not in there. I found her instead downstairs, asleep on her kid sized arm chair and the living room looked like a bomb went off. She had pulled all the books off the bookshelf, taken all her crayons out and colored on some paper, but also on the carpet. She had pulled out all the stuff from her bag that she takes to the EX’s house so now clean clothes and dirty clothes are all jumbled up together. She helped herself to a bag of goldfish crackers from the pantry….

The funny thing is that I have been debating whether or not to keep locking her into her room at night. I figure if she ever decides to potty train, she’ll need to be able to get up in the middle of the night. I also had my dad put on a bar on the front door so she can’t leave the house if she does get up in the middle of the night. I was wholly unprepared for what she did last night. I’m pissed at her and at myself for forgetting. And now I’m going to spend my day fighting exhaustion and figuring out how to get the crayon marks off the carpet.

Posted in Mommyhood | 9 Comments »

Randomocity

Tuesday, May 18th, 2010

Insomnia is back. I hate this. It’s actually worse this time because even the sleeping pills aren’t working. I am back to taking two OTC pills every night, and STILL my brain won’t shut off for a good long while when I turn out the light. All this does is make me really tired in the morning. I struggle through the morning and lunch and then end up napping during Betsy’s nap time. When I nap, I sleep really hard, not even changing positions, and it’s really hard for me to wake up. You might be thinking that the naps are the reason I can’t sleep at night, but I can’t sleep whether or not I nap during the day. I might have to make a trip back to the doctor for a stronger sleep medicine. Fun times.

Speaking of Betsy…. she’s still not potty trained thankyouverymuch. She has absolutely no interest. She’s not even doing it for the EX. I stopped using pull ups because she uses them like diapers, and they aren’t absorbent enough. So we are back in diapers. I’m really trying not to let this frustrate me, but damn! She’s three and a half years old. I know she can do this, but she just chooses not to. I realize I have no control over it, but just wish I could find the magic thing to motivate her.

Online dating is sort of going. I’ve been making small talk with one guy, using the dating site’s email so we have revealed no personally identifiable information. No, he’s not the professional magician. But my heart just isn’t in this. In fact, I know I have an email from him waiting for me, and I just can’t motivate myself to go check it. Meh. I don’t think this is going to work until I stop loving the EX, so maybe in ten or twenty years?

I continue my crusade for a pore minimizer that actually works. I got a shipment from Sephora today and I can’t wait to try out the new stuff. I’ll let you know if I have any winners.

Betsy is done with school for the summer next week. I need to get end of the year gifts for her teachers and I’m sort of drawing a blank. Since I only have one kid, and she only has two teachers, I’m not particularly worried about not breaking the bank on this. I’m just uninspired. For Christmas I gave them both movie gift cards, which they seemed to love, but I don’t want to do a repeat gift. I plan to go out tomorrow while Betsy is in school to find the gifts, but I hate going out with no plan as to what I’m getting.

I’ve lost seven pounds on Weight Watchers since I started. That’s not bad considering I have one really bad eating day every week, and I haven’t worked out in a while either. I’m really happy I finally chose Weight Watchers. Every time I think I’m going to splurge on some food, I check the points and am often amazed at what I can eat and stay on track. It’s no secret I do most of my eating at night, and last night I was really snacky. I calculated out the points, and I was able to eat two pieces of toast with butter and Simply Fruit jam, for a total of 3 points, and I actually had 3 points left over for the day.

My air conditioning died on Sunday night. I have never been so glad to be a renter. I called. Someone came and fixed it, and I didn’t have to get out my checkbook. I’m actually not sure why I’m considering saddling myself with another house anytime soon.

After going through several books that were just “meh” I finally found one that I’m really liking. It’s Shanghai Girls by Lisa See. I’m speeding through it and I don’t want it to be over. Luckily, The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest is coming out in a week and I have pre-ordered it. I can’t wait!

Aaaaaaaand I’m spent. All the random crap I’ve had floating around in my head is now out there to entertain you. You’re welcome.

Posted in Better Living Through Pharmaceuticals, Bitchy Reads, Blah blah blah, Fighting the Flab, Mommyhood, Potty Chronicles | 8 Comments »

A Bad Patient

Sunday, April 25th, 2010

Betsy is a bad patient. When she is sick, she refuses to acknowledge it, and is mainly in good spirits except during times when she should be sleeping. Even then, she’s not always in a bad humor. In fact, she’ll be very chipper and happy at 3 a.m. when she should be sleeping. I am beginning to learn that if it’s the middle of the night, and Betsy is up and hyper, she probably doesn’t feel good. But she won’t tell you that.

I think she gets this from her dad. I remember a long time ago when EX got his wisdom teeth taken out. He doesn’t like to take medicine that makes him feel woozy, so he took only a half a pain pill. Which meant he did not sleep. Which meant he was awake and complainy. And hungry. I think that half the point of heavy sedation after oral surgery is to keep you asleep so you don’t think about eating, which you can’t do anyway. I remember spending a lot of time in the kitchen that day trying to come up with soft foods that he could eat and getting steadily grumpier with every snack I made, and considering grinding up the pain pill in his applesauce. Anyway.

Today  Betsy keeps asking where we are going and getting very upset when I tell her that we can’t go anywhere. In one breath she insists that she is not sick, and then she gets whiny and cries over nothing. I know she doesn’t feel well, I know she’s exhausted but she won’t sit still.

I have a sneaking suspicion she has strep. The sibling of one of her classmates had it, and just now when Betsy was refusing to nap, she was crying and I asked her what hurt, and she pointed in her mouth. Great. She’s never once complained of a sore throat before. But her fever is relatively low so for now, I’m not treating it, but if it gets higher, I will. I am guessing we’ll be at the pediatrician tomorrow.

Which means no school for her tomorrow. Which means I may lose my friggin’ mind. EX has been out of town all week so it’s just been me and Betsy for days now. She misses him terribly and keeps crying that she wants him, which is breaking my heart all the more. He gets home tomorrow night I think but I doubt he’ll be seeing her until Wednesday. By Wednesday I’m going to be ready for a straight jacket.

Posted in Bitch Moan and Complain, Mommyhood | 3 Comments »

To Pee or Not to Pee, That is the Question

Tuesday, April 6th, 2010

Warning: This is a very boring potty post. If you are the sort who eschews mommy bloggers for just this type of post, you best scoot along now.

Betsy was off to a great start on the potty. We worked out a reward system when it appeared that she was ready. She actually pooped on the potty once for her grandmother when I was out of town. That turned into pretty regular peeing in the potty. When she sat on the potty and tried, she was rewarded with an M&M or a Skittle. If she actually produced pee or poop she got to choose an item from the Mystery Bag (a big pink bag filled with candy, books, stickers, and other stuff that drives parents crazy but that toddlers love).

It became quickly apparent to me that this kid CAN do this if she chooses. But she chooses not to. She will pee in the potty at EX’s house and keep a pull-up mostly dry all day. She will pee on the potty at school for her teachers and keep her pull-up dry all day. She will not pee in the potty for me. And she uses her pull-up like a diaper. I don’t push her, but no matter how often I ask her if she wants to try to go pee-pee, the answer is always NO!

I’ve tried letting her go commando around the house because I know she can stop the flow of urine if she chooses to. I’ve seen her do it. That little experiment yielded four incidents of pee on the floor and some poop on the floor.

She’s jacking with me, no doubt about it.

I also had to suspend the Mystery Bag almost entirely because she has been acting like such a beast lately, that I couldn’t in good conscience give her treats when she is going to time-out multiple times a day for hitting, throwing, and general misbehaving. That may have put our potty training back a ways but I just can’t see giving her candy when she’s in Hellbeast mode.

My gut tells me that this is all will on her part and there is nothing I can do to influence her decision one way or another. So I just put her back in diapers. When she says she wants to go, I take her. If her behavior thus far in the day has been moderately acceptable, she gets some candy.

I can’t help but feel I’m failing her at this. I don’t know what to do. She’s obviously exerting her control over this because she knows she can and there is not a damn thing I can do about it, mainly because I am controlling her in almost every other area. I get it. I just wish things were more peaceful between us so that she wouldn’t be fighting me on this. I blame myself for that, but I honestly don’t know how to fix it. She acts like a shithead, she gets in trouble. I don’t let anything slide because I have to teach her to be a civilized human being and to respect authority. I guess eventually she’ll decide to use the potty exclusively on her own. I hope.

Man, I can’t wait to get out of Three. Three is way worse than Two ever dreamed of being. I hear Four is better. I’m banking on it.

Posted in Mommyhood, Potty Chronicles | 9 Comments »

Losing My Shit

Sunday, March 28th, 2010

I love my kid, but I don’t like her very much right now.

I have no idea if this is typical three-year old behavior or if she’s just an extra special douche bag. I really don’t know.

She has been super aggressive with me lately – hitting, pinching, kicking and pulling my hair. I make a big point to tell her how we use gentle hands when we touch people but it doesn’t get through. EX tells me she is the same way with him.

Last night, my dad was in town and Betsy was wound up. I normally don’t even have her on the weekends but I kept her so that my parents could see her. (My mom ended up getting sick and staying home.) By Saturday night she was in rare form. I was trying to get her into the bathtub and she was upset about it. She had a wet hand from playing in the sink, and when I was trying to wrestle her shirt off of her, she reached up and slapped me across the face. I was stunned.

I picked her up, unceremoniously dumped her on her bed, and walked out of the room to gather my wits. She wailed. I took a few deep breaths and went back in. I calmly explained to her that because she chose to hit me, the consequence was that she lost her bedtime books. I changed her diaper, put her in her pajamas, kissed her on the head and said, “good night Betsy. I love you,” and I walked out.

She wailed and cried and threw things for over an hour. I realized that her favorite blanket, the one she swears she can’t sleep without, was downstairs. I almost went up to give it to her, but then I thought better of it.

When she woke up this morning, the first words out of her mouth were about how she just didn’t want me to leave without reading books to her and that it really hurt her feelings. I told her that it really hurt my feelings that she hit me last night and when she chooses behavior like that, she loses things that she likes as a consequence.

I’m sure none of this is making any difference to her at all.

She spent the day with EX today, and I was dreading her coming home because I knew it would be the same story all over again tonight. It was. She had a few slips where she pinched a little bit and a few times she raised her hand to hit, but I saw it coming and warned her what would happen if she did it. It was still a very stressful and unpleasant hour of bath, potty and bedtime drama.

I am so sick of this. I was not cut out to be a single mom. When we were married, I could usually rely on my knowledge that EX would be there at night to handle her, to be in charge and to relieve me, to dig a little deeper and find some patience. But now it just all seems so hopeless. I know that no one is coming to relieve me.

And even now, I’m sitting here realizing that it’ll be just me and her again for another week because he has work travel this week. I want to cry at the thought of having nights like this stretch out in front of me all week. Someone please tell me there is light at the end of the tunnel and that it’s not an on-coming train.

Posted in Mommyhood | 7 Comments »

How Exactly Does Easter Work?

Friday, March 26th, 2010

Um, so yeah. I have a stupid question.

See, I’m not sure how Easter works. This is the first year that Bridget will actually have any inkling of Easter. And I realized that I know nothing about it. Growing up, we colored eggs but were never really sure why, and then after we went to bed, my mom/The Easter Bunny put candy in our basket. But we never did the whole egg hunt thing. Is that sad? I’m 35 years old and have never done an Easter egg hunt.

So what role does the Easter Bunny play? Obviously he doesn’t bring the colored eggs, because we spend the day before coloring them. Are the eggs FOR the Easter Bunny? If so, why did we spend two days after eating hard boiled eggs?

I am guessing that the typical story is that we color the eggs for the Easter Bunny to hide? But what if we don’t hide them? Should I just color Bridget’s eggs and surprise her with them in her basket? Skip real eggs and just do plastic ones?

I need your input here. My child’s future happiness depends on it. I don’t want her to be 35 years old and having to ask the same stupid question.

Posted in Mommyhood | 8 Comments »

Happy Conception Day

Tuesday, March 2nd, 2010

When you go through infertility, your life becomes very planned out and really, all of the mystery goes out of the pursuit of making a baby. You know how big your egg follicles are at any given moment, how thick the lining of your uterus is and exactly when you ovulate. You even mark these things on your calendar.

So it’s no surprise that I remember these dates.

Four years ago today, I was on a table with my legs in stirrups. A nurse named Jennifer, a thin catheter, and some members of STBEX’s boys’ swim team all got together and got me knocked up. I’d had a weird vision or premonition or something on the way to my appointment so I smiled through the uncomfortable procedure, fairly sure that this time it was going to work.  It was weird going back to work and thinking about what was going on inside my uterus and trying not to get my hopes up too much because I’d been terribly disappointed before.

Today I’ll hug Betsy a little tighter and remember how just four short years ago, I never could have conceived of having a great kid like her, but somehow I did.

Posted in Mommyhood | 8 Comments »

Sucktastic

Sunday, January 31st, 2010

Today has officially been the longest day of my life. Betsy did not want to settle down for bed last night, even though I knew she was exhausted from going to a birthday party. Finally around 10 p.m. she gave up the screaming and went to sleep. I followed not too long after. At 1:15 a.m. I was awakened to her screaming for me. I went in to get her and asked her what was wrong. She just kept saying she wanted to watch TV, that she wasn’t tired, that she wanted juice. I brought her into my bed, but she wouldn’t settle down. At one point, she went to the bathroom, turned on the light and was playing in the sink. I was furious. Finally at around 4 a.m. she looked at me, started to cry and said “MY EAR HURTS!” Well, finally. We got up, I forced her to take some Motrin for her pain, and we laid down on the couch to watch TV. Thankfully, her pediatric clinic has weekend hours and I was able to get her in this morning. Sure enough she has an ear infection. But at that point, she was running on pure adrenaline and was truly bouncing off the walls. She was a nightmare to wrangle in the doctor’s office and was a nightmare for most of the morning.

STBEX came over because he had been planning on taking her for the day today, but since she was sick, we didn’t think it was a good idea to take her out. Thankfully he was able to pick up her antibiotics for me and she was happy to see him. He was also kind enough to program the universal remote that I got for Christmas but couldn’t program correctly. After Betsy went down for her nap, we ended up having a really long, emotional talk. It was too much to go into, and nothing has really changed, but I fucking miss him so much. It’s just natural for me to talk to him and listen to him. And I’ve missed it so much. So yeah, I did a lot of crying, and talking, and sharing of some things I’ve discovered about myself and my past behaviors in therapy. It felt good and bad. At the end of it I was just so wrung out, and had used Betsy’s nap time for our talk, so I never got a chance to nap.

The fact that I am standing upright is a miracle. And yet I managed to feed my kid, clean out a disgusting smelly garbage disposal, and make home made play dough for Betsy’s preschool.

Damn if she’s not crying again. I hesitate to go up there because if it’s just drama, my going up there just feeds it. But I hate to not go because what if she really needs me? I simply cannot take another night like last night. There is not a lot of my rope left today. If she wakes up with a fever tomorrow I can’t in good conscience send her to school, but I NEED to see my therapist tomorrow. If not tomorrow it won’t be until the end of the month and I don’t think I can go that long.

So I sit here and wait to see if she’ll settle herself back down so I can go soak in a hot tub and cry some more, because even though my eyes are stinging, I still feel more tears coming. I’m trying to just let it come and then go, but my instinct is to fight it off. That has not served me well thus far in life so I have to train myself to stop.

She is quiet now. I can go take some me time today and hope that tomorrow turns out better.

Posted in Bitch Moan and Complain, Mommyhood | 6 Comments »