Eat My Words

UPDATE: As of Tuesday afternoon, I am calm, collected, and a million miles away from Sunday.

I had just gotten done telling a friend who is expecting her second baby that I have had surprisingly fewer emotional meltdowns with the arrival of #2 than I did with P. Today for dinner I had a double helping of my words. Cried in the kitchen, approximately 4:00pm. Everything annoys me, patience evades me.

It started a week ago when we returned from Seven Springs and both kids got colds the same day. After a few days of sleepless nights, a week of wiping snotty noses, a week of cranky kids, a week of husband working long hours, and then a few days of me not feeling so great, I lost all capacity to cope when Patrick woke a sleeping baby by kicking on the wall that adjoins their rooms. So, I cried.

Tom gave me a big hug and tried to send me out for a walk so I didn't have to listen to P crying (because I really yelled at him for sitting up and playing in bed for the umpteenth time) or Tommy waking up, but I opted to hit the bed and turned my fan on high to drown out all kids for twenty minutes. It worked. Then at 5:30 the emergency back-up arrived - Baba. I fled the house with husband in tow to a local pub to watch the rest of the Steeler game. I have since regained some sanity, but I worry about getting through tomorrow without being a grouch.

The worst part: I was a little happy when P cried after I really yelled at him, because it was better than his first and second responses, which was to laugh and giggle at me, and better than his third response, which was to yell out a defiant "NO!" when I told him to lie down. (Sigh).

They really are good kids - I know how lucky I am in that respect. But motherhood can drain just as easily as it can fill you up.
Hoping this will be a filling week.

P.S. I absolutely forgot to mention that my date tonight was with our local fire department's newly appointed (and most talented) Battalion Captain! As P would say with applause, "Good Job, Daddy, Good Job"....