Not Crazy

I was having a moment. I was being Not Crazy after a rainy day in my house when my children had nothing scheduled or planned during the summertime. According to experts and maybe just common sense, they need to have unstructured play time sometimes, but I’m still expected to execute a full work day. Not. Crazy.

Sometimes I do feel a little - um - let’s call it overwhelmed. When too many people are talking to me or vying for my attention, which happens every single day, usually at breakfast time before the caffeine has fully kicked in. I start to feel buzzing in my ears like there’s too much noise in my brain, and I want to shout and run out of the room with my hands clutching my over-full head. Still Not Crazy though. 

Other times, and I swear it’s not always because I will again assert that I am Not Crazy, if I’m trying to work or write or just freaking focus on anything for more than 5 seconds, and someone interrupts me to show me the Lego thing they just built and Mom will you make me toast and Mom what are we doing today and Mom can you help me make a helmet out of this box and Mom, Alex fell off his bike (*big sigh*), I feel like one of those ladies in commercials with the frizzy hair because the frazzle inside her brain has extended to the outer parts of her skull. 

I’m also not crazy when I respond to someone saying “Mom” for the 900th time that hour with “WHAAAT?” It makes me feel crazy, yes, but objectively, any other response is unreasonable. Imagine (for those of you who are not in a mothering role with small kids) you are having a conversation with a child, and he interrupts himself to say, Oh Mom, and then changes the subject of the conversation that he started. That’s nuts, right? 

Here’s a sample. I’m not going to punctuate it correctly because that would just be so many commas and open/close quotation marks, and I just can’t: 

Mom.

Yeah, buddy. 

Mom.

Yes. 

Mom. Oh. Can I have……

……

Mom. Can I have a drinking yogurt? [I’m not going to explain what that is.]

Sure, you get it out, and I’ll open it for you. 

Mom. 

Yesss???

Can I have a drinking yogurt AND peanut butter pretzels?

[Also let me set the scene: this conversation is happening one inch from my face while I’m lying down in my room and all of this food is downstairs in the kitchen.]

I know it’s not purposeful, but they are making me crazier. I used to think it was a cute joke that moms would say, like, oh my kids drive me nuts. But that’s the honest truth. The behavior of children is maddening. 

I love my kids. I love them so much. I also recognize their time of needing me, like really needing me, is short and will come to an end sooner than I think. I’ve read essays and articles by parents whose kids are in high school or college, whose kids are out of the house. Of course I’ve read those. But this is my current experience, and trying to deny that they are making me crazy only makes me feel crazier. Or resentful. Or ashamed. Yet another thing moms are told they’re doing wrong, often by other moms. “Appreciate the time you have with them!” Yeah, Mildred, I love my kids, but I’m not going to start appreciating them acting like monsters. 

Probably the best thing to even it all out is to spend some time with them before bed, when they’re quiet and calm and most likely to have a real conversation. This is my favorite. My younger son has a big squashy chair in his room. We sit on it together and read before he goes to bed in his cool lofted bed with a slide. Either snuggled in the chair or after he’s lying down to sleep, he will be his truest self. I love him all the time, but this is when he can break my heart with his observations and questions that go so deep, I have to remind myself he’s only 5. After I leave his room, I take a big breath. 

And not to leave out my older son: his nighttime reflections are different, more grounded and observant of events of the day. These pre-sleep talks are when he tells me real things that have happened to him, things he’s been afraid or embarrassed to tell me or ask about. It’s during these times with each of my sons that I want time to stop, when I want them to stay 9 and 5 for a little extra.

So I’m not a perfect mom. I handle some situations better than others. And my kids aren’t perfect either, which sometimes gets turned around and pinned on the moms, but I think we can collectively just decide to reject that nonsense, right? Kids aren’t going to be perfect. They’re going to know which of their parents’ buttons to push inherently, coded into their DNA. In this moment, I can be ok with “doing pretty well and trying my best,” even if it’s a gray area that makes me a little bit uncomfortable.

The point is, we’re all - the adults and the kids - flawed humans doing the best we can. The more I can show up for them as my full, true self and treat them as complete people, not character traits inherited from their parents, the better we can find connection. That’s what those nighttime conversations are. We’re coming in a little sleepy and without expectation.