Late Night Snacking

I'm not sure if a bowl of leftover pinwheels dripping with smart balance, sprinkled with parmesan, is what you'd call a "late night snack" but that's what I just wolfed down as I casually read through some blogs. That and the piece of hearty bread slathered with same smart balance. Shit, where's the booze to go with it? Oh yeah, red wine season is out. Margaritas coming back in style again soon, I hope.

So what's with the eating, I say? I ask myself. I say, self, what's with the damn eating. What void are you trying to fill. What body fat percentage are you willing to accept tomorrow when you slap your big, cold feet on the scale and knowingly prepare for a wince? Hmm? Hmm, self?

I'll be satisfied to lose 5 more pounds, but 10+ is truly the goal. However, I have absolutely zero discipline for most things in my life, so what would be the difference with the weight thing. I love to eat. Unfortunately, the food doesn't exactly have to be all that tasty for me to just eat it - it's not like I'm snacking on the gourmet. It's like the act of chewing and the change in flavors in my mouth is most satisfying - from something stale that could probably just benefit from a toothbrush, to the juice from a single grape, or the creamy coolness of a little smart balance. (At least I'm balancing "smart" with buttery goodness.)

So I'm now considering if it's even worth my time to come up with a new schedule or diet or REGIMEN (ick, what a manly word). I know I most likely won't stick to it. But in deciding NOT to make a plan or LIST about this I'm admitting self-defeat or something. No, I'm copping to the fact that I'm a loser. Shit! I'm not a loser, am I? I mean, we all lose. And that's what I intend to do, dammit. 10 more stupid post-baby pounds. He's ONE next month, I think I can do a little sacrificing for my own personal happiness here. Thing is, I have to sacrifice eating for regained svelteness.

(And then there's the whole next train of thought.... svelte again? I don't think so dear. Not with that bread-ball tummy (thanks, Jen) to those little saggy sacks called boobs, to the strange weave of stretch marks across my ENTIRE mid-section.....)

Profundity

I have come to the realization that I don't have anything really profound to say. Life, in itself, is profound; my thoughts about living it are more dirt and grit, mundane, absolute in their necessity.

My achievement today is making dinner out of nothing much. I haven't been to the grocery store for anything more than the bare necessities in nearly a month. A month. I can't even get to the grocery store. I can't remember to brush my teeth on a Sunday Morning, or change the laundry, or pick up a friend's kid at school. There's so much I don't do and feel guilty about not doing and feel stressed out about having to do --- that I thought I should make a list of all the things I did today (or yesterday, as it were, because I never actually got around to writing this last night... didn't do that either).


(Amendment: didn't finish the post on Monday either. The irony is uncanny. It's now Thursday and this is all about Sunday....)

I woke up at 5:45 am.

fed the baby.
fed the toddler.
got the juice, wiped the noses, changed the diapers.

balanced the checking account, and the business account, and the savings account
(hmmph, that didn't take long).

took stock of the pile of debt that never dissolves.
started a preliminary budget for April (scary).


checked my email,
researched 5ks,
10ks
and Half-Marathons for
this summer,
as well as
Duathlons and
Triathlons
(for those truly inspired weekends).

I put the baby down for a nap.

Now it's 9 am.
You could say the first few hours were spent on my butt, except for the repositioning of the baby, the kitchen runs for juice and bottles and snacks and anything to appease the early morning Sunday chirps of the children.

9:30
I make eggs and bacon and toast for the whole gang. Dan is now up. He slept in. Isn't he lucky? Then I do the dishes. Soak the egg pan (what a mess).

10:30 I take a peek at Ethan's room. We painted Saturday. Horizontal stripes on one wall. Varying colors. But because we are so lucky there was something wrong with the red paint. It was thick and goopy and globbed all over the wall and now we have even more work to clean it up and sand it down and paint over it. Ugh.

Try to sand it and it's still wet. Bigger mess to fix. Great, another thing added to my head, almost as exhausting as weeding the flowerbeds.

We install new Ikea lights and shelves next to both bunks in the boys' room. With a level and a drill and a lot of whining from a very tired 2 year old, it's completed - but the shelves keep popping off the screws when bumped or nudged a little too hard. Great, have to fix that too.

It's Thursday now and pretty much I can't remember the rest of that day. The whole idea of the accomplishments I had made seemed so important at the time because often I feel so powerless over the great amount of work that IS the mothering of three, the housekeeping, the patience-stretching, sanity-keeping world that I've learned to breath in.

But I can pretty much gather that the rest of it went like this:

Lunch:made
Dishes:done again
Naptime:conquered
Toys:gathered
Laundry:done
Dinner:made (out of NOTHING, remember, that was the whole inspiration for this mess)
and again:dishes:done
Toys:re-gathered
Baths:swum in
Bedtime:FINALLY

I remember two things specifically-

1. that we installed the giant mirror over my dresser so I don't have to hover in the teeny bathroom with bright blue toothpaste staring back at me from the 1970s sink, smelling that diaper smell, feeling soggy from all the showertime accumulated in one morning.

and

2. that Dan finally re-tackled the job of connecting the automatic water and ice thingie in the fridge door to the pipe. It worked again! Yay! And then it leaked. All over the floor and into the basement and we had to shut water off to the whole house. Of course. NOTHING is easy enough to be completed on the first try. Ethan's paint, the boys' lights and shelves, the damn water thingie.

And what's my point and purpose?
I got some stuff done. Should feel good. But there's always more stuff. And the stuff that was done ultimately created more stuff to be done. So why do anything again? Oh yeah, because it's Spring and I'm reborn. Yes yes, I'm remembering now. But it's hard to write from Sunday's perspective when I was only just reborn about Spring yesterday while on my iPhone and didn't post that Spring thing till today, Thursday, which is when I am trying to relive the moments of Sunday.

Okay, see, why try saying profound things when a brain with chatter like this just breaks it all to mush anyway. And life is really just one inexplicable realm we walk in.

Ugh.

Connections

I've been making all of our family's bread now for several months. I try new recipes as I continue to abide by the old favorites. And recently I've become hooked on the "no knead" method. Which basically means that you let time do the work of kneading. Which means that for a day or so you have a mushy lump of wet dough hanging out in a bowl on your kitchen counter. It's covered in plastic wrap, but still, every time I see it I think, "That looks like my post-pregnancy stomach." ICK. 

Unfortunately, I cannot adopt the wait-it-out method for gaining my body back. It's clear, after this third pregnancy, that I'm going to have to put a little more work into reestablishing abdominal strength and cardiovascular fortitude than I did for the first two. Why is that? I'm older? I wasn't in as good shape to begin with this time around? A body can only take so much? Whatever the reason, it hardly matters. If I want to get rid of my rising-dough middle, I'm going to have to start doing a little time in the workout room of my soul to get my body back to a more acceptable (to me) presentation. Stay tuned. This adventure might produce some blog-worthy vignettes.

The bread is delicious, by the way.

Spring

Oh my gosh my goodness my glory it's spring. Thank u spring. Thank u sunshine.

I've been huddled in a cloud of looming desperation for weeks. Often taking the time to research in-network shrinks but never making the call - I knew that I'd begin to feel this rebirth soon. And now it's all coming back to me. A feeling of youth. Energy. Equilibrium. The first days of cold brought the toasty hibernation of steaming fires and bold-flavored wine. Then gave way to that bitter cold. I felt sunken - drowned under for so many weeks. But this is the bliss of the northeast. The seasons. The changes. Anticipating the changes.

I could read for hours in the warm sun. Leave myself room for relax even if there is so much to be done. There is always so much to be done - as a friend wrote me this morning, "screw the dishes." Just Screw It! I want to read. To languish. To hear the children playing (in the distance (the GREAT distance)) and to remember that I am not withered, mind nor body. I am not out of touch. I am not caged in, nor lonely really. I have much love and happiness surrounding me - my soul has every opportunity for nourishment. I now allow it in. I open the floodgates; I call to the wild; I banish the demons; I sound a harmonious OM!

Droopy

I'm just too droopy today. Is it because it's Monday? I dunno.

No, no. I think it's the contacts I'm wearing today. They are making everything appear a little cloudy. Cloudy -- droopy. They go together.

So here's the story about the glasses. Dan and I were cuddled on the couch Saturday night watching Twilight under a big huge down comforter. Crow Crow goes the baby over and over again. Okay, I'll get him a bottle (good god, he's GOT to stick to a pattern of sleeping through the night!)

I crawled back into the cocoon of the comforter. Since the movie was already paused I turned to Dan and make that goofy googly eye face that means, I can't believe we have to plan every intimate moment but oh well, Wanna Have a Go at It? Needless to say he was like, yeah, SHHHHHHHHHure! I oh-so-suavely pulled my glasses over my face and my hair and politely dropped them beside the couch. Softly thunking to the ground, we then buried ourselves even deeper under the blanket, fidgeted with clothes and limbs and came out from it all somewhat sweaty, touching each other sweetly and ahhhh (deep breath) calm.

The movie had been paused too long. We had to find the remote and restart it and fast forward and, oh, ick! where the hell is the damn remote. Mostly naked under the covers, okay, totally naked, and pressed against Dan, the ultimate heat machine, I wasn't so very happy to be searching the cushions, the tables, the floor for that dang remote. It was like 50 degrees in the house, but here I go throwing off the covers and tromping about - smoosh, crack, f--k! My glasses. Snapped em right in half at the bridge. Now these have lasted through countless pulls and tugs and scratches from the little ones, my own recklessness aside. And now, smoosh, crack, F--K! Every good moment just has to have a down side, doesn't it? I just picked them up and looked at them and thought, oh the f--k well. Oh well.

But here I am with 2 year old lenses in my eyes, the ones the doc could never get quite right, so everything is somewhat blurry most of the time. If I'm just walking around the house, all is well, but reading and focusing on small letters and numbers I'm squinching and squirching and wondering if I'll be a slave to my glasses for my whole life, if I should take the plunge and get the Laser Surgery.

In sickness and in ...

With five in the family, I am learning, someone always is sick (or injured). Since December members of my family have logged two ear infections; a jaw infection; a round of the stomach bug that included every single combination of typical symptoms that you can think of and took more than two weeks to make the full rounds of the family; endless colds; back strain due to work injury; and neck strain due to sleeping beside an infant (guess who on that one). Oh, and surgery (and it's preceding symptoms and recovery time), the heart patient living amongst us and the necessary doctor's appointments and trips to the pharmacy.

Is it the season? Was it this particular winter that seemed longer than EVER and carried with it more germs? It just seems impossible that we all are healthy and able-bodied at the same time for more than about six hours. 

I love my children and John more than I can begin to articulate, and when one of them is sick I turn into worst-case-scenario Jen, imagining all of the complications and terrible diagnoses that can be drawn from a runny nose, stiff neck, headache and fatigue. And when I'm sick, it's so difficult to take the time to recover, because there is always someone who needs me or (more likely) I have a difficult time removing myself from the family. I want to be with them, even when I shouldn't be. 

I don't know what all this means, really, or what inspired me to even get all of this down on a busy Sunday afternoon. I guess it's just one more scenario that points to the "enjoy every moment" that I keep striving toward. The snuggles that come with a low-grade fever are comforting not only to my kids. Sometimes settled cozily under a comforter, reading books all afternoon and ignoring the dishes is a nice reminder of what's really important. 

But that doesn't mean I don't hope spring brings with it lots of good health, ruddy complexions and afternoons where the kids are playing outside on their own.

A Spoonful of Sugar

Dan and I sat on the couch researching double bike trailers for a bit and then he drifted to the office to do some work. Ugh, work, even the word makes me feel like drooling and shutting down. But he's not as tied to the need to completely veg after the kids are asleep as I am. So he plops down into the leather office chair, and I can hear the air being forced from the cushion and the familiar settling sound his body makes before the computer, the wheels rolling about to get into work position. Ugh. Work. And then... I hear... Mary Poppins. Yup, she's belting out A Spoonful of Sugar. Here's Dan, sitting down to reconcile bank accounts and analyze sales figures, and the cheerful singing of Mary Poppins is by his side on the second monitor. I just smiled, sidled into the doorway and asked him if he was looking for something to keep him motivated and awake. He chuckled and...

I walked away chuckling...

And then I grabbed a thought from my brain. It wasn't a conscious decision that I made when I set out on my day today, but I found myself trying to smile more often than I have been lately. It's not too hard to smile MORE than I have been, as my face feels droopy most of the time like I forgot how to so easily do so, and for no given reason. Jamis does that funny dance with hands grazing the air aimlessly and his :look at me: face and yeah, I smile. Max rushes into the room and screams mama and yeah, I smile. Ethan starts flapping his hands and throwing his body into a backdive over and over again when he's on my lap and yeah, I smile. Dan tunes into Mary Poppins while making business decisions and crunching numbers, yeah yeah, smile smile.

But do I ever just smile in response to feeling good in any given moment. As a response that is all my own, and not directed toward someone else? Not so much anymore. I feel like I used to feel happier. And yet, I wouldn't have life any other way (except for time and money). It's like how you can tell when that person on the other end of the phone is really doing well cuz you can hear the smile in their voice, over the phone. It makes you feel good to know that they are smiling, and makes you smile too.

I need a little sugar in my life. I keep thinking vacation vacation vacation and that's just damn impossible. Three boys and work, I can't get away, I can't send the boys away. So it's me and them and this life all at once, all the time, all crazy and messy and candid. I need some resolve that it's life and it's all mine and it's the only one I'm living. If the sweet idea of relaxing on the beach or even in my own bedroom isn't possible on this day, the least I can TRY to do is smile sweetly for no one else but for me - to make it easier to get through.

And the thing is, my sugar makes all the smiles sweeter in this house. Happy breeds happy. Optimism changes all of us. And I'm supposed to be this big, shining example. So shine on!

Hopefully I remember this all tomorrow when I wake up and it's still cold out and it's too early to think and someone bumps me with my hot coffee cup and the baby refuses to stay still while I change his poopy pants and I have to remind Jamis twelve times to brush his teeth and pack his snack and.......

Overcoming fear

Tonight I put on clean pajamas. And I know, that it's a guarantee that I will be spit up on. Very soon. But these clean jammies sure feel good. Hey, my body's even pretty clean, too. 

The thing is, there are days that I feel threatened by the laundry. There always are piles of dirty laundry. And often there are baskets full of folded laundry yet to be put away and clothes hanging to dry from the shower racks. And then there are the clothes on the bodies of my children, which are kept clean for approximately 2.5 seconds after being donned. And often they are spilled on, peed on or (and?) drooled on in a matter of moments, too. It's NEVER ENDING. 

But here's the thing: I'm trying to accept it. Yup. It's taken me years, really. But I've finally realized that no matter what I do, I will never have a complete hold on the laundry situation. I will continue to try to be relatively aware of the status of each child's wardrobe needs (i.e., that the same pair of underwear be worn a maximum of two days in a row), but that's it. No more planning the day around the laundry (which we hang outside nine months of the year, so it's easy to get obsessed with the weather and which load comes first: the longer-to-dry towels or the worn-out cotton T-shirts that dry in one breezy breath on the line.) I will try to see beyond the piles of clothes to the faces of my children. I will try not to be grumpy about the dirty towels on the floor and the sheets that could use a bottle-and-half worth of bleach. What's the use? There's going to be spit up for a while longer. And there's always going to be messes. It's time to admit it and move on.

Maybe this is the beginning. Next up? Dishes. And trash. And recycling. And toys. What do I do about the toys?

Jury Duty

So I had jury duty today. No comment.
I'm home now and just got off the treadmill. Trying to reacclimate my body to lunges and crunches and the whomp whomp foot pattern of the treadmill is like another full-time job. I feel invigorated by my run and grateful for the new TV in the basement which allowed me to distract myself from heavy breathing and sticky lips and head straight into the overly dramatic lives of the girls on The L Word. I have nothing and everything to say, and all at once, or not at all. I think I need my own jury to make some decisions around here - up in my brain. What comes out, to whom, how often, and when.

Our father was an attorney. Taught me most of everything I know about weighing two sides, walking in another man's shoes, and yet I tend to decide everything like my mother would - impulsively. I love to make plans and yet find it so hard to stick to them. I need momentum. That word keeps ringing in my ears. I think I heard or saw a saying recently about how motivation is what gets you started and momentum is what keeps you going. In motherhood, I suppose you could say that the birth of the child is the commencement of a momentum you just can't stop even if you wanted to. But there are lulls. Yes, yes, the ebb and flow of life. All has it's ups and downs. But what do we choose to focus on at any given time? There is just too much.

Sitting here, in my unmade bed, the down comforter in a big, jumbled ball from Max playing underneath it this morning, knowing that there are toys and dishes strewn all about, bills to pay, and a sweaty bod to wash, I feel paralyzed by all that needs doing. So often I feel just paralyzed. It's hard to stay focused because it just never ends. Mountains of laundry, stacks of dishes, scattered toys, incoming bills and a little time to yourself. It all needs doing.

I suppose it often feels there are 12 tiny heads inside this one brain and they are trying to weigh all the options and figure out the best solution. Thing is, there isn't one solution. There are so many. But now I choose to wash my workout bod and everything else can wait. I mean, cleanliness of self just HAS to be a priority. :)

Wine with dinner makes me philosophical

At the end of two days at the office I am so glad to be home and to know that I don't have to get up and out tomorrow. I can be with my family.

At the end of a day with my kids  I am so overcome with exasperation that I can't believe I looked forward to such a day.

I try to be grateful for every moment with my children. And of course I am, ultimately. But as the moments are happening, so often filled with whining, talking back, protests, refusals, I find myself wondering how, and why, I got myself into this situation. 

For as long as I can remember I wanted to have children. I wanted to identify myself as a mother. When I met my now-partner, I started dreaming of our children before our courtship had turned to commitment. And now we have this family that I love and cherish and take in daily with love and wonder and an almost equal amount of disbelief. How am I to be trusted to raise these three children to be fulfilled, happy, healthy, productive adults? How can I be selfless enough? Honest enough? Tough enough? And why is it so difficult? 

There is no way to adequately prepare for parenthood. For the sleep deprivation. The pure joy of seeing your infant smile. The pride of watching as your preschooler writes his name for the first time. The gut-wrenching fear when the unexplained fever won't go away. The pure range of emotions felt in the course of one day are more exhausting than the training I used to do in my days as an athlete. A day at work can be intellectually exhausting. But the work can be left at the office. A day at home is emotionally exhausting and sometimes continues into the next day without a break if one of the kids wakes in the night. And now, with an infant, we are starting all over again. I am tired. So tired. But I am letting this baby be a baby. I am not hurrying her toward her developmental milestones. I know they will come. And soon. And as I watch her grow, I am also watching my son learn how to be a kid. How to communicate his feelings without whining. How he is proud of his name-writing. And my now-middle child. Until now my baby, all of a sudden she is three-and-a-half and I am so amazed at her nurturing impulses and so sad that her speech is more and more without lisps and misspoken words. She is soon to be a big kid. And that's the irony. These days with little ones are so long sometimes. But the weeks, and months, and years go by so quickly. Every parent says the same thing. Because it is true. The best parenting advice I've ever received is, "Enjoy them." Simple. And true. The children are worth the exasperation, of course. Because the rewards are beyond measurement.

Which doesn't mean that sometimes I don't look forward to tomorrow—at the office.

Confusion

Dan left for the city. I'm home again with the three boys. Another day and night and day of meals and snacks and naps - and questions, needs and threats.

It seems there are so many of these days, where I am fighting the battle of parenthood alone and just trying to keep it all together. Telling myself to breathe and running little inspirational sayings through my brain like a trumpeted march. "Live your Best Life, Live your BEST Life, Live your Best LIFE." Yes, I'm a little embarassed to say that I've picked up Oprah's favorite message and used it over and over in the past few weeks. I suppose I shouldn't be embarassed to latch onto the words of the Queen of Talk. She's a billionaire, after all, inspiring millions of women world-wide. But there's my problem. I always feel the need to be MY OWN. Unique, inventive and perfectly capable of finding my own ground to stand on, my own methods of standing and staying on that ground. With the birth of Ethan, and the madness of three boys in the house, and the time crunch that work AND motherhood has placed on me, I finally accept that I am allowed to borrow strategy and wisdom and WORDS from anywhere and everywhere. If it's something that helps, then what gives? Just give in. Allow yourself.

Thing is, I'm not living my best life. I wonder if hearing the tune play over and over in my mind will make it happen. Doubt it. That's a dream, baby. But maybe, just maybe, that saying, and the promise of Spring, will help me get through the worst of days, and slowly follow some sort of an action plan to becoming that woman, mother, lover that I so NEED to be. For myself, and for these beautiful boys who drive me utterly mad. Oh yeah, and for my marriage - that husband thing that's like a ticking time-bomb I always seem to de-activate Last Minute.

Man, Jen, it's so hard to organize your thoughts, isn't it? I hope this is okay I'm speaking directly to you because, although this is indeed jet-streamed across the Internet for all eyes to see, it is yet the beginning of our adventure together documenting our Life with Three, and what it means. What the heck does that mean? I'll tell you one thing, it's not just about the kids and all the little anecdotes and quotes, though that can definitely be a large part of it. And it's not just about me, me, me and my, my, my stuggles, hardships and woes. It's like there is something greater than me and them - sounds cheesy? I know - but I guess you could say it is "us." Learning to be "us" and what that means. How we aren't always connected. How sometimes I'm mean and how that shouldn't be a negative focus because they're kids and let's face it, sometimes THEY'RE mean. (And Hey, let's not get into cause and effect and the "Which came first, the chicken or the egg?" game, because I know I'll lose. The mom always loses!)

So I'm supposed to be blogging about that Life with Three. But I can't seem to organize one succinct thought, or a title that would succinctly quantify this first mish-mash of thought. I guess that's what it does to me. I often say they "suck the life out of me." That's just hasty, and makes me sound unloving, and for those that don't know me, I'm sure they're rather offended at my even comparing motherhood to a vacuum. But for the purposes of wrapping this up, I guess you could say that when I went from one to two I was enchanted; when I went from two to three I became confused. Almost a year now and I'm just still confused. At any given time it's for any given reason, and when I say "confusion" you'd have to use any and every connotation of the word.

Oh, I remember now.
Dan left for the city. I'm home alone. And there are countless days and night that I'm in this same position. Daddy gone. Boys gone wild in the house with Mom. But the truth is, even when Daddy is here, and no matter how much he does, it's always on my shoulders. And so having that third makes it quite a juggling act because I only have two shoulders. Not that you can juggle with your shoulders anyway, but that's what it feels like I'm trying to do. Accomplish the impossible. Now don't get me wrong. Dan (Dad) does a lot. Is involved. Changes diapers, does dishes, folds laundry, cleans the shower. Disciplines like a cowboy and yet tickles like Coco the Clown or something. Alright, alright, that's a bit silly, but the point is that he is present. He is loving and caring and present. But the REAL point is that no matter how "involved" he is (hate that word!), we don't have one of those Today Show stories of a marriage where hubby and wifey have decided to split all their time and duties down the line 50/50. They each work 2.5 days a week, they do equal parts of laundry loads and errands. Spend equal time with each of the children and it all runs smoothly, works perfectly, and has become the arrangement to bring utter joy and bliss into the life of that family. I just want to say, great for you! Really, Great! But for me, when Dan is gone, it's just me. And though when he's here he's here, It's All Still Me. Because A MOM sees it all. And that brings us to the running list.....the source of all that confusion?

A jumping off point I'll try to remember for next time.

Whose idea was this anyway?

What was I thinking? Three children? I wasn't, not rationally anyway. But the thing is, it's easy to blame the mayhem on number of children. How many times have I heard about how things change when the parents are outnumbered? The comment about zone defense. (Really, it's not so much the defensive skills that need to be polished as the offensive; but more about that another time.) But wasn't it just as out of control when there were only two? After all, the third is only five months old. Yes, it's not so much the children as everything else. Oh how naive I was. But now that the thrill of new motherhood is behind me, I am standing knee-deep in the life I so desperately wanted. And much of the time the water's cold or mucky or both.