I was going to write this huge woe is me post tonight. I was going to tell you how much having to put your kid in daycare sucks. How it makes you feel inadequate as a mom. How a piece of you dies inside each day when you drop him off and he wails because there are unfamiliar faces, spaces and routines. How much your heart literally breaks when three days in, he wakes up with a 103 fever and you know that the bubble that you have carefully built around him to protect his health is punctured and he is sick because of other kids. How much the fussing in the car can literally send me over the edge and reduce me to tears and it was only three days last week? Or how much Brady is flat out refusing to nap and struggling to go to sleep each night even though it is obvious he is exhausted.
Your proof….
We were going to ride our bikes to get lunch but three blocks in we found this.
Who wants to hear about the gritty details of how much life has changed for us in one week? No one. So, instead, I am going to tell you how much I am completely in love with my life right now. Even though we are struggling, I am feeling content with our life. Glenn and I headed out for a date Saturday night and as we were driving I asked him what we used to do on a Saturday night before kids as we watched young 20 something year olds head in to bars on Clybourn Avenue? Before he could respond, I told him I didn’t care because of now I was in love with our life.
I can’t tell you how many times I stop what I am doing , look at Glenn and say, “He’s the best. Our kid is the best”. And then I go back to doing the mundane task I am immersed in. Emulating is constant, tantrums are existent and the independence is scary.
Dad mows so I will too.
Mom waters flowers so will I.
Mom and Dad eat ice cream I will too.
I was so stressed about missing two days of work this week, but you know what happened, I got to fall in love all over again with my kid. The schedules, routines, daily tasks were out the window. We snuggled over Elmo, we watched buses, trains and trucks on Belmont, we picked rocks on our block, we swung with Starbucks and in our backyard and I just got to be a mama to a sick little boy.