If I Wrote a Parenting Book

There are days where you just can’t wait to be done with your responsibilities so you can get a big glass of something to wind down and burrow into the couch. I call those happy days. Then there are the other days like today where the kids suck for not being asleep, the neighbours suck for doing noisy outdoors stuff, the dog sucks for barking at the neighbours while the kids are trying to sleep, and the thing that normally brings the ultimate happiness, which is food, has lost its flavour.

On those days just stick me with a needle full of absinthe and put me in a coma.

The only thing that doesn’t suck is my husband, but he’s out of town for work this week so actually he sucks too. At the moment a very real irritation is seething through my nervous system, which may be attributed to my kids’ excessive whining and crying earlier this evening. Recently I asked my parents how they put up with me and my brothers when we were little. They responded so coolly saying we weren’t too whiney and that they never yelled at us. That reminded me of some other parents who said they never yell at their kids. I don’t know if I believe any of that. Some are either misremembering or lying. For those who are lying, why lie?

Yelling at your kids is normal if you’re human.

For those who actually don’t yell ever, then wow, that is incredible. I could never be friends with those parents though, same ones that talk about how their kids are so amazing and bring them so much happiness and love. Most parents feel indescribably blessed and bewondered but honestly it’s more therapeutic and fun to socialize with other parent friends about how hard and humanizing it is to raise littles. It’s hard! I don’t even read about the rights and wrongs anymore. I hear a lot about encouraging sensory play and not letting them watch television too much. I’m not agreeing or disagreeing. I just don’t care if my son is getting sensory play with tubs full of rice and rocks or if he’s getting it from playing with dog food or actual dirt and rocks in their natural habitat.

Sometimes on the weekends, we take the kids out and sometimes we binge watch movies all day.

Sorry, not movies, just one movie over and over again. We have given my son the tablet numerous times to keep him occupied while we take care of something around the house. Sometimes we have given him the tablet just because we want to be technological jerks during the forbidden hours of his wakefulness. Maybe we want to call our friends, play games, or online shop but how dare we? Sometimes we give proper time outs and second chances but…

…other times we yell and scream and put them somewhere out of our sight,

so we can catch our breaths and slow our heartbeats. We don’t need to do what’s expected and we shouldn’t care how we are judged.

We do what is necessary.

Sometimes it’s necessary to put them up to bed earlier than usual, pour a big glass of something and hit the couch like it’s the hottest spot in the city which coincidentally it really is for me. I’ve succumbed to my crippled social life, but like you know, succumbed in a happy way. They may have completely crushed my spirit just a couple hours ago but now I’m rekindled with my warm mommy self, my mind is relaxed, my body feels rested, and my glass is half full. Not of absinthe but of love. Just kidding, that’s silly. It’s full of whiskey.