I have a wonderful 4.5 year old son. He is creative, imaginative, intense, and determined. He is also very energetic. And loud. And strong-willed. And what people now politely call “high-spirited.”

Even as a baby, my son did not sit quietly and play with his toys. He required constant entertainment and movement (unless I wanted him to cry, and as a new mother, I definitely did not want him to cry!). We used our front hall as a running track and ran with him back and forth until he was old enough to run on his own beside us. And now that he’s older he jumps around on the furniture and tears across the house pretending to be a superhero.

I often feel like I am raising Calvin from the comic “Calvin and Hobbes.”

(This comic was found here: http://www.gocomics.com/calvinandhobbes/1986/07/20)

And as his parent, I’ve never experienced so much disapproval and judgment from strangers and sometimes even people I know and love.

Things I wish people would stop expecting him to do:

•  Sit quietly and play, like other kids. He has a lot of energy and he needs to expend it somehow. Go big or go home, I say!
• Talk quietly. This kid has no concept of an inside voice. And you know what? I don’t really care.
• Stop running around inside. This is Oregon. It’s rainy half of the year (at least). I don’t always have the option of taking him outside, so he gets to run inside. It’s not the end of the world. I don’t think he will run around inside houses as a teenager. I’m sure someday he won’t need to run all the time, but until then, back off.
• To play with a toy the way YOU think he should. I don’t care if the manufacturer intended the toy to be for another purpose. If my kid wants to use it for anything else, it doesn’t really matter. And it doesn’t mean he doesn’t care about things (so stop with your judgy “MY children learned how to take care of their toys” crap). It just means he has a different idea of how to play with it. And I think that’s great. If it means he wants to pretend he is the Hulk while destroying a Duplo tower, so be it.

So to all those people with their own quiet, docile children or people without kids who think they could do better, stop shooting me those cranky looks and judging my parenting decisions. Every child is different and I’m doing what I think is best for mine. I can’t turn him into something he’s not, and frankly, I don’t want to!

The other day I needed some alone time, so I snuck upstairs to read for 20 minutes.

From my bedroom I could hear the telltale noises of my daughter trying to follow me.

My husband: “What are you doing on the stairs? Leave mommy alone.”

Being almost 2 years old, she, of course, broke down in tears.

This photograph was taken by Nate Grigg and can be found here: https://www.flickr.com/photos/nateone/5456129071/

My 4.5 year old son tried a different approach: “Where’s Mommy?”

My husband: “She’s upstairs. She needs some space.”

4.5 year old: “I need space, too. Right next to Mommy.”

I couldn’t help laughing to myself when I heard my 4.5 year old proclaim this. I had been upstairs for a total of 5 minutes and my kids just could not understand why I was up there. ALONE.

I honestly think that if my kids could attach themselves to me physically, they would. My son wouldn’t let me put him down for the first two years of his life (I know all babies like to be held, but he really took it to a whole new level). And now he is nearly five years old, but he still doesn’t like to do anything by himself. Even my daughter, arguably a more easy-going personality, constantly finds ways to get as close to me as humanly possible.

I understand that kids love their parents and we obviously love them too. But what people didn’t tell me was that for the first few years, my kids would primarily want me. Not their dad, even though he tries to help. Only me. For everything.

I swear this is what they are thinking:

• Thirsty? No, Mom needs to fill the water bottle. It tastes different when Dad does it.
• Your butt needs wiped? Better call Mom to help, Dad can’t wipe that poop off as well.
• Need some help picking up your toys? Don’t ask Dad, he’s not the professional. Mom should do all the cleaning.
• You want someone to attend to you while getting a toy from upstairs? Better get Mom. And make sure she doesn’t go without you to get the toy. You should walk up the stairs together, totally together. You must use the same tread on the stairs for each step you take. It’s not as meaningful if you are on different treads.
• Pancakes must always be cut into bite-sized squares. And don’t let Dad do that. He’s terrible at cutting uniform sizes. It obviously affects the taste.

I love my children to pieces, but there are times when it doesn’t pay to be the favorite. I wipe more butts, prepare more food, play more, clean more, and have less time alone.

I’m sure there will be a day when I miss their favoritism and wistfully remember how much they used to want to be with me, but at this point in my life, I’m pretty envious of my husband. He gets to use the bathroom by himself!

The other day I admonished my son: “Don’t just dump your school things on the floor as soon as you walk in the door! Put it away!”

As I said the words, I could hear the echo of my own mother telling me the exact same thing.

And I realized that I’ve turned into my mother.

I’m obviously not exactly like her, but I see her in myself in the little things. When I can no longer be patient with my kids and tell them that “I’ve had it up to here!” Or when I bemoan the fact that the house was clean in the morning, but looks like a disaster zone by bedtime.

And each time I say these things, I remember being a kid and my mother saying the exact same thing.

As a kid you think you will grow up and be nothing like your parents. After all, they’re pretty old (being in their thirties or forties). And they clearly don’t know as much as you do. You will be your own person and make your own decisions, and those won’t be the decisions your parents made.

But what my younger self didn’t realize was how hard my parents had it. My father is a farmer, and farmers work incredibly long hours. My mother alone was home with us 6 days per week, often for all of our waking hours. And with four children, we were incessantly asking for a referee, a cook, a comforter, and cleaner, a personal assistant, a laundress, and an adviser. I can only imagine how exhausted my mother was by the end of the day. And now with children of my own, I empathize with how my she must have felt. I know how hard she worked, and how long those days must have felt at times. I also know she was a wonderful mother to us.

So now, instead of being sad that I sound like my mother, these little things that remind me of her make me proud. Because she is someone that I love and admire.

I guess I’ve turned into my mother. And I’m pretty happy about it.

While pregnant with your first baby, you probably imagined the first few months as a peaceful, blissful time where you bonded with your beautiful baby and experienced one of the most wonderful things life has to offer: being a mother.

At least that’s what I was imagining.

Then I had my baby and realized that the first months can be really, truly awful. And well-intentioned friends, family, medical practitioners, or total strangers would offer me these (essentially worthless) pieces of advice:

1. “Take Some Time for Yourself.”

I understand that it’s important to take some time for yourself so you don’t go crazy. My issue with this gem of advice is that it’s nearly impossible. If you breastfeed, the baby needs you to eat, which is about every 1.5 hours around the clock. Even if you pump ahead of time and leave a bottle for the baby, you still need the baby to eat every 1.5 hours (or pump) so your boobs don’t explode or give you mastitis. Also, babies are pretty demanding. They don’t just sit there and let you take a long relaxing bath, or paint your nails, or take a leisurely walk around the mall. They get bored, cranky, fussy, poopy, and hungry.

2. “Sleep when the baby sleeps.”

The first few months of parenthood are exhausting. And people will urge you to sleep any chance you get. Unfortunately they forget that you are supposed to be taking time for yourself. So if you spend nap time sleeping, you don’t get any time for yourself. Or you don’t get a shower. Or you don’t get to eat. Or go to the bathroom. Or do pretty much anything (refer back to #1).

3. “Get some exercise and eat a healthy diet.”

Good thing that my maternity leave left me with so much free time, I had LOADS of time to fix myself healthy lunches and regularly do that postpartum exercise video. Oh wait, no one has ever said that. Instead we all grab whatever is closest and easiest before the baby realizes you aren’t paying attention to them and starts crying. And physical activity? It’s pretty much limited to the exhausted walks around the neighborhood trying to get that fussy baby to sleep. Or walking around the house trying to get that fussy baby to sleep. Or driving in the car, trying to get that fussy baby to sleep. Not physical activity you say? Shoot.

4. “Cherish these moments, they pass too quickly.”

It’s very true that the newborn stage is short, but it certainly doesn’t feel that way when you’re in the midst of it. And it’s impossible to love smelling like spit-up, having poop on your clothes, leaking breast milk all the time, and waking up every few hours at night. No one loves that. When your child is older you look back on that time fondly, because you are blocking out all of the nasty parts.

5. “Make sure you and your spouse have time for dates.”

First, see #1 again. Second, people forget to tell you that you are so exhausted you don’t really care if you ever go on a date again. And you don’t feel that attractive wearing your yoga pants (that’s all that fits) or your maternity pants (since you’re no longer pregnant, it just feels pathetic), so dressing up for a date sounds awful. And for your first baby, you don’t WANT to leave them behind. It sounds irrational since those early weeks are so hard (see all of the above), but leaving the baby behind with a — *gasp* — babysitter sounds way more scary than it did when you were pregnant. They can’t possibly take care of your baby the way you do!

6. “Have other family members and friends help with things like feedings, diaper changes, and cleaning.”

This is challenging for a breastfeeding mom. If you aren’t using bottles at other times, you still have to pump while the baby is eating from the bottle, so you really aren’t getting any help at all. And while people come over, none of them are exactly jumping up to change a poopy diaper. Or cleaning your nasty kitchen. And who will be comfortable asking a friend to do their dishes?

7. “Don’t stress out about schedules, routines, or milestones.”

Ha! Easier said than done. As a new mom you will probably stress out about most things. With my second baby I was able to not worry so much and really enjoy those early days, but as a new mom, you are so scared that you are going to do something wrong and screw up your kid, you worry about almost everything. Some people are more relaxed than others, but I have yet to meet someone who told me they were more stressed out with their second child versus the first (with the exception of course of difficult pregnancies, premature babies, and things like that).

8. “You know your baby best, go with your gut.”

Honestly, there are some things that a mother’s instinct just doesn’t know. Like whether that nasty cough is pneumonia or just a cold. And frankly, with your first, you don’t know a whole lot. Everyone kept telling me that I would start to understand what the different cries meant. My kid had one cry: full-blown, loud, the-world-is-ending crying. And my instincts with him consisted of feeding him every time he was upset. Because I had no idea what he wanted, and no instincts telling me what to do.

So if you are in the trenches right now with your new baby, take heart that over the next few years you will remember mostly good times from those early months with your baby. And if you are past that stage, try to refrain from giving those new moms some of this advice. Just offer to do their dishes.

Countless times over the past 4 years I have desperately thought to myself, “being a mom will get easier when —— happens.” And I’ve hoped that the people who told me that it gets easier at —— weeks, or —— months, or —— years were right.

Now my oldest is 4.5 years and my youngest is 1.5 years. And honestly, I’m still waiting for it to get easier.

“When my baby sleeps through the night, I won’t be so tired. It will get easier then.”
Did it get easier than that soul-crushing exhaustion I experienced when my first born woke 10-14 times each night (no exaggeration, we counted)? Of course. But 4.5 years later, I’m still tired. Not the same kind of tired, but I’m weary all the time. I try to get 8 hours of sleep each night, but that doesn’t always happen. I either stay up because I’m tired of not having personal time, or my son calls me into his room at 1 in the morning because he needs to pee, or my daughter cries out in her sleep and wakes me up (while she is still blissfully asleep), or so forth.

“When my toddler can communicate verbally, things will get easier.”
Yes and no. It’s great to fully understand my child and the needs that they have. Unfortunately, I can also understand all the whining, arguing, and begging. Oh, the whining. I really feel sorry for my mom and dad now.

“When I get used to having two kids, this will get easier.”
Well, I’m used to having two kids. I’m no longer surprised that we’re a family of 4. But compared with the early days when my daughter was a sleepy infant, is it easier now? No. Not a bit. Now I am dealing with two very opinionated children. Regardless of how well-behaved they are, it still feels like a marathon to take both of them anywhere. I come home from errands physically (and mentally) exhausted. Going to the zoo alone sounds like one of my worst nightmares. The grocery store where you bag your own items makes me want to cry. So yes, I’m used to two kids, but it’s not easier.

“When I don’t have to nurse all the time, things will get easier.”
Sure, other people can now feed my kids. Including my kids. So tiny Lego pieces can get shoved into mouths, along with rocks, flowers, dirt, sand, or anything else that probably shouldn’t go in there. Plus, when they are older they start having opinions (It’s like they are people!) on what food they want to eat. Or preferences on how they want to eat it (“Those pancake pieces are too small!”).

“When the baby is older, I won’t have to keep reminding my older son to not poke her eye out. It will be easier then.”
Frankly, I still have to tell my son not to poke his sister’s eye out. And now instead of the baby just accepting his “playing,” half the time he makes her furious, and she lets us know how mad she is with a super fun tantrum. So while I no longer have to worry that my preschooler will squish our infant, I have a preschooler and toddler who wrestle and fight over toys. On many levels, that makes it much harder.

I do think some kids are more easygoing than others. Maybe those kids really do get easier. But my kids are still the same people they were as infants, and while some of my early challenges have faded away, they have merely been replaced by other challenges.

So while I’m starting to accept that things won’t really get easier (just different), a teensy part of me is still hoping that maybe, just MAYBE, things will get easier next year…

When people come to my house, I usually spend a lot of time getting it ready for guests. I live in constant fear that someone will come to the door unannounced and I will be socially forced to let them in, then die of embarrassment at the messy state of my house.

I’m not naturally a neat freak, but I do appreciate a clean home. It’s easier to get things done and a lot more pleasant to live in.

However, on any given day, our house usually has:

– breakfast/lunch/dinner food on the floor under the table (Hey, snacks for the baby later! Time saver. Parenting win.),

– toys spread into every room,

– jammies discarded on the floor,

– dirty diapers (you would think I would manage to walk the 10 feet from the changing pad to the garbage, but apparently not),

– cracker pieces on the rug (from snack time, usually dumped out by one kid or the other),

– dishes (in the sink, on the table, on the counters, on the ottoman),

– dirty towels from mopping up spills,

– kids’ water bottles,

– markers and paper spread out across the floor, and

– Legos, Legos, Legos (my son really loves Legos)!

And that’s just the first floor.

I work part time and when I’m home, I feel like I need to spend time with my kids (I was away all day and I feel guilty for that), so I rarely spend time on chores during those 3-4 hours we have before bath and bedtime. If my husband does bath time, it gives me 15 minutes to do something. But as you can imagine, I’m lucky if I get through doing the dishes or packing lunches for the next day.

I’ve had friends urge me not to clean before they come (“Oh, we don’t mind!”), but I’m so embarrassed by the true state of our house that I usually at least pick up most of the mess. Then I can pretend that THAT is really how messy our house is, and say how embarrassing it is that it’s so “messy.”

Oh, I’ve seen and read plenty of tips on maintaining your home (and pinned them all on Pinterest!). But these tips are clearly for people who don’t have a child clinging to them like a koala every waking moment of the day. Or for people who don’t need to cook dinner. I get that I can do little things each day that will help, but frankly, it’s not enough to keep my house maintained, assuming I can even do what they suggest. There simply isn’t enough time in the day to get it ALL done.

So, I’ve decided that my solution is to NOT get it all done. I like having a clean house, and I’m not going to give up altogether, but I’m not going to stress out about something that is a losing battle. And I’m going to try to not feel too bad about it. And hope that my kids grow up remembering that we played together, not just that they had a messy house!