So clever I felt to have stashed
New toys, for when my energy crashed
But the kids were a wild typhoon
In the witching hour late afternoon
And the house had been thoroughly trashed.
I grabbed bottles of chalk they could spray,
Easy fun on a sunny day.
The kids shrieked with glee
And stopped pestering me
As I herded them outside to play.
But much to my chagrin,
3 of 4 brand new bottles were broken!
The kids were distraught
And they fussed quite a lot.
Thanks for nothing, Target dollar store bin.
The only one that barely worked.Don’t buy these. Total waste of dollars.
I sit with my daughter in the backyard on a balmy Sunday afternoon, watching her creative side come to life with a paintbrush. Coming off of a week filled with less than desirable behavior, we both need a break from the trying and not listening and stressing and missing out. It’s a great relief to see her engaged and enjoying her little life.
The trouble my little free-spirit is having right now (always?) is not following instructions that allow her to participate. This issue comes and goes, and only concerns me when she misses out: leaving gymnastics class early, bailing on birthday parties, getting picked up early from school. She is 50% FOMO (fear of missing out), but 50% rebel. Because she’s human, it floors her when she misses something she wanted to do. Because she’s three, she cannot yet recall the upset and use it to change her pattern the next time.
It would be downright hypocritical of me to begrudge her non-conformity. Her will is strong and glorious and inherited from her mother. I rarely care if she behaves for the sake of behaving; she has plenty of time to learn about “the way the world works” and other valid but mundane concepts. I just want to see her happy. She has plenty of passions and hobbies that require few rules or other humans, though. She’s an artist, a reader, a chef, a storyteller, a make-believer, a lover of glue-based projects, and a dedicated snuggler.
I let out a breath held with concern for a whole week as I watch her paint. I admire the way she studies the blank paper with steady eyes and pursed lips. Her little hands work with ease to dip her brush into the clear plastic cup of water and glide it across a light blue watercolor paint until it has the right saturation.
“I’m making a blue sky …” she says absentmindedly.
Bouncing lightly from one jelly-sandaled foot to the other, holding the brush in front of her with both hands, she contemplates her next color selection. She reaches across to the palette of pearlescent paint.
“I need all these dark colors to make the clouds.” You sure do, kiddo – you need all the colors.
“See, it’s an island. Of beautiful stuff.”
By this point she’s filled the entire page with shimmery opaque neutrals, but sure enough, I see her island take shape.
“My island needs some water to drink” she says with a splash of aqua. “A thing for the sun to set on” with a dash of purple.
She works intently, chatting the entire time, pausing briefly to see what her brother is painting (nothing – he is dumping cups of water on the grass and cheering “dump it out!”) I offer her his untouched paper and she says “oh yes – will you help me make a rainbow on it?” My pleasure, sweet girl.
She stays absorbed in painting the two pictures (and a discarded piece of fence board) for an hour or so. By now, the freedom and flow have loosened her up, filled her needs, led her naturally back to cooperation. “Mommy, is it okay if I dump the water onto the wood?” “May I use this stick now?” These requests from the girl who looks me dead in the eye while refusing to put on underwear.
Whatever is making her temporarily (or permanently) adverse to structured group activities, she needs more of THIS now. The rest will follow. Or maybe we will all follow her when she becomes the boss of the world.
During my first pregnancy, I was given the sound advice to trust my own instincts when making choices for my kids. This week I have been weighing and reflecting upon health care decisions, and coming up humbled by the intuitive nature of Mamahood.
Raising healthy kids is no easy feat, requiring micro decisions about nutrition, rest, behavior, and development. We monitor growth charts from birth, torture ourselves over breast or bottle, agonize over first foods. We debate cloth or disposable diapers; the brand, the size, the wipes. We research car seats, vaccines, and dentists. We fret over sleep training, sleep schedules, sleep regressions. Keeping tiny humans healthy means being a decider.
Illness only brings more rounds of choices. Do we want a second opinion? More or less testing? How many antibiotics are too many? Where do we stand on fever reducers? When do we keep them home, bring them to the ER or the pediatrician?
Have we even chosen THE RIGHT pediatrician? Are they too pushy, condescending, respectful of our family values? Finding a good doctor is like rejecting blind dates until you get to your soulmate. I passed on an OBGYN once because she told me, based on Addie’s size, my labor must have been “a breeze – one push and out”.
Our family lucked out with the kids’ pediatrician. We have a balance of professional medical advice and personal choice. Her office was our first stop a couple months ago, when Owen developed croup. We went in on a Friday and left comforted by her advice and treatment.
He should have been much better the next day, but instead was screaming and feverish. My Mama alarm was blaring when I called the advice nurse, who said to wait until the morning to see a doctor. I ignored my intuition and waited, while his misery continued. The next morning, we saw the on-call pediatrician who barely glanced at him and advised waiting it out even longer. I went against my instincts again and left without pushing for a diagnosis.
By that night Owen was inconsolable, burning up, and lethargic. I took him to the ER where they finally saw an ear infection. This time I pushed for a flu test too, which came back positive for RSV (a respiratory virus). We had a diagnosis and an easy treatment plan. He was on the mend within 24 hours.
The whole experience left me dismayed about health care and disappointed in myself. I got over the bitterness and learned to trust my Mom gut (not to be confused with my Mom Bod). This week, when he started to have similar symptoms, I raced him to our doctor. She diagnosed croup, double ear infection, and pink eye (when the kid gets sick, he goes for it.). With immediate treatment, he was back to running circles around me in no time.
I am fortunate to have healthy kids, access to quality healthcare, and also sharp instincts. I believe in considering both medical advice and my own intuition, but from now on, when there’s a gap between the two, I’m on team Mama-knows-best.
Owen spent the day after his second birthday sprawled on the living room floor in pajamas, surrounded by new legos, train tracks, and matchbox cars. Addie and I spent a lazy morning at the library, browsing our favorite series’ and reading stacks of books in the children’s area. Each kid found flow in their activities – a sweet spot of focus and joy in the doing. Their passions for life reassure me they both will end up happy humans. But how stereotypical are the activities that drive them?
My girl is in her element among the book stacks, my boy in building train tracks.
I hear it about them all the time: such a boy, such a girl. I’ve long questioned society’s insistence on forced gender roles. I have concerns all over the place about the backlash of exaggerated male and female stereotypes. My privilege is kicking me in the face, but growing up as a feminine tomboy in a progressive family in northern CA, I have never bought the ideals of manly men and weak women.
And then I had a GIRL and a BOY who, from the time they could express a mere hint of an opinion, became all girly and all boyish.
I cannot deny the cliché differences in their physical ability. Addie, my little klutz to this day, lazily army crawled on her bony elbows for an eternity. She took first steps at 14 months but remained unsteady (at best) for another year. Owen, on the other hand, was born with the innate desire to move. The first time he stood up, he recognized it to be the key to walking; I saw the eureka moment on his face. Confident running and jumping followed before long.
Everyone tells me how active their boys are, compared to their girls. I hate it when the masses are right.
Never one for conformity, I kept Baby Addie’s pink princesses to a minimum. But she spoke complete sentences pretty early and demanded what she wanted (all the time). Now she collects jewelry, stickers, and little decoupaged boxes full of pretty rocks. When Owen was born we had one little set of cars and a few balls. We now have 6,000 vehicles and buckets of balls that he races and chucks daily.
My girl wants her dollhouse and my boy wants his garbage truck.
Not one to buy into the pink vs blue consumerism, I passed on all the baby onesies that said “feed me and tell me I’m pretty ” or “ladies man”. Still, neither of them was ever mistaken for the opposite gender. Now that they pick out their own clothes, they are walking stereotypes. Owen with his signature skull and crossbones trucker hat. Addie in hot pink (her “favorite pink”) and sparkles.
My girl plays with makeup, and my boy runs around shirtless with tangled hair.
While I refuse to reinforce these stereotypes, or ever question what they should or can do because of their biologically assigned gender, I rarely steer their interests. I try to guide them towards more of what makes them happy, where they can find flow. They are little humans with agendas of their own.
Some days the division works out well for everyone. Owen played for hours that day, with his new birthday toys. Addie read all of her books with anyone available, and alone. We all reconnected to watch a movie. They went to bed happy that night, my girl in heart pajamas, and my boy in fire trucks.
“Hi, this is a Venn Diagram. We’re still developing the McSorley Diagram.” – Kevin McSorley
It’s 5:30 am and my husband kisses me goodbye before he leaves for work in the cold, dark, predawn. I go back to sleep, snuggled up with the dog and whichever kids are in my bed. In the back of my mind a nagging uneasiness builds.
An hour later I text him good morning wishes. He likes a funny bitmoji, even though he calls me a nerd. The text is because I love and miss him, but also because I need a text back. I need to know that he safely made his 23-mile commute to the high school where he teaches. Anxiety is a real bitch, but I have learned to roll with it.
I have minor fears about his daily absence: a natural disaster, unlikely injury or out-of-the-blue heart attack. I worry, on rare occasions, that he will realize he got the short end of the stick and not come home to me. My concerns get shoved into a mental compartment, covered by the white noise of the day.
The most terrifying thought – the one that grips my heart and makes me dizzy – is that someone will walk into his school with an assault rifle. The frequency of mass shootings at schools is making this fear increasingly rational.
Last week an unknown student scrawled a message in the bathroom at his school threatening to shoot students and teachers. Law enforcement decided it was not a credible threat. There was no live shooter, no gun on campus. But the door cracked open and the possibility of mass murder at this high school has stuck its foot in permanently.
My fears slipped from safely compartmentalized to catastrophic. As I often do, I thought through the worst-case scenario. This tendency is oddly comforting when I realize my worry is insignificant: being late for a doctor’s appointment or embarrassed by a toddler’s public tantrum. It takes me under when I get to the thought of my husband being shot at work.
When I let my mind go there, I envision a blank-faced human, in a state of mind I do not understand, walking up the stairs towards Kevin’s classroom, armed with rage and the type of mass murder machine no citizen has a moral reason to possess.
I picture my husband’s face going pale and stoic when he hears the announcement: a lockdown is in effect, a live shooter on campus.
While he locks the door and windows, I hear him calmly telling his 16-year old students anything he can to herd them into a back corner of the room. I imagine him crouching in front of the group, his body positioned to take the first bullet, putting on a brave front while terrified inside.
In the huddle of students, I see the glow of cell phones as texts go out to parents: We’re on lockdown. I’m scared. I love you.
I hear my own phone ding. New text from Kev Dawg: There’s someone with a gun here. I’m safe for now. I love you and the kids.
I cannot, and do not have to, imagine what happens next. The news is filled with body counts and survivors’ gruesome stories. A guilt weighs on me, to be paralyzed with fear at only the thought, when many are traumatized by the reality.
How can I send my husband to work every morning? How can I send my kids to school? Is my daughter safe at preschool? How can any of us reconcile the plausible fear that our loved ones may be shot during math class?
I hug my husband tightly when he returns to me at the end of the day. By 5:30 pm I am absorbed back into the chaos of our beautiful everyday life. Kevin plays with the kids as we start dinner, swap stories of minor incidents, scheduling details, funny anecdotes about our wild kids. But now a threat to his life (deemed credible or not) was issued in the building where he spends 40 hours a week. I struggle to sequester my anxiety, and my day ends just as it began – with an unnerving fear of tomorrow.
Little Addie’s first trip to see Daddy at work – 2015.
Fun and pretty Shamrock Suncatchers (with barely any sun to catch). I love crafting with these two, especially when they can both participate AND we all like the finished product! For us, the tricks are to keep it simple and go in with low expectations. That should be my motto for life.
The kids hold hands trotting into Addie’s preschool in the morning, and my heart does little flips (from the cuteness) and sighs (of relief). They both flash cheesy grins on the way in. Addie gets too much hand sanitizer, so she can share some with him. “Here Owen, hold out your hands.” He helps take off her coat. Making a show of hugging and kissing goodbye, they say I love you’s and I’ll miss you’s. Teachers oooh and awww. I soak up the sweetness, and then hurry to leave with Owen before it turns sour.
They haven’t always been this way – little buddies. Parenting articles told me, when I was pregnant with Owen, he and Addie would be best friends immediately. Friends relayed stories of #1 becoming the helper, proud of their big sibling responsibilities. I heard “My 2nd watched everything my 1st did, since the moment he was born, and my 1st was SO into my 2nd that he called him ‘his’ baby!” Strangers I encountered swore having them close together would guarantee a great friendship.
“They” were not lying, but not exactly right either.
When she became a big sister at 19 months, my #1 frequently expressed both disinterest in being mama’s helper, and her new favorite word (NO). “Addie, can you help Mama and get Owen a diaper?” “NO.” “Aren’t you just the sweetest big sister?!” “NO.” And instead of mutual infatuation, my #2 was busy shrieking and spitting up for four months, while my #1 barely acknowledged his existence. Being close in age helps them connect with each other now, but not in that first insane year. Not when #1 was potty training and #2 was learning to roll (into the bathroom).
But the tides have turned, and my kids are BUDDIES. The best is when they play in the yard: sharing toys and scooping dirt with gardening tools and measuring cups. They take turns playing tee ball, sliding, and driving the car to the grocery store for mud pie ingredients. There is a sweet spot of neutral territory out there.
Our life is filled with their silly chitchat, knock-knock jokes, and singing. They ask each other for help and have learned our family format for turn taking, even if they don’t always like it. They read next to each other, play hide and seek, and cook together (in the pretend and real kitchens). Sometimes they snuggle.
Sibling relationships are complex, and unique. I have no doubt they will stay close. They fight like it’s a sport, but I try to give them the tools to work it out and bond through problem solving. As a team, they gang up on me at times. But I can take it. I am, after all, completely in charge here.
Their path to friendship did not go how “everyone” said it would, although I have witnessed that instant closeness in other families. Maybe I did something wrong? Maybe not. Usually the parents who speak up about how these things go are on the winning side. I see now that it is as good as I expected it to be; it’s the whole point of having two. Plus I get to say “Go play with your brother – that’s basically the reason we had him.”
The sanctimommies of generations past would crucify me, but I have had a rough time making the decision to stop having babies. “You have no idea”, they would say, “how #blessed you are to have reproductive choices”. Women have not had this kind of control (or the resulting anxiety) for long. It is a sort of non-problem, like having trouble breaking your $100 bill, being too tall and skinny for pants, or a slow wi-fi connection at a coffee shop.
I thought I wanted three: my mental picture was Kevin, me, and our three little humans. Along the way life changed the vision to two. It’s not a question of being able to handle three kids – I am CERTAIN I can NOT. I can barely raise my two. Nor or am I attached to a family of five. If anything, that provides some downfalls: kids outnumber adults, three would be harder to divide and conquer, two of the three kids would have to share a bedroom, cupcakes and hot dog buns almost always come in even numbers. Less than ideal.
I don’t worry about missing out on a third baby (or toddler), but a third grown kid. It may be an urban myth, but I have heard that elderly people most regret not having bigger families. In my future, I envision lots of adult kids who come home, with their own families, for dinners, who take life’s ups and downs together, who support each other even when they fail to see eye-to-eye. I picture my grandchildren, raised together as closely as my cousins and I were. In my sunset years I want enough kids to care for me – when I inevitably crumble from taking care of them.
I want to be the family in Parenthood.
If only I could envision a picture of life and then paint it in an exact match. The unromantic truth is that practicality, and the unplanned, change the picture. This is what happened to us when we, exhaustively, weighed all the factors. We came up 0-3 on the biggies: money, age, and career disruptions. The thought of another pregnancy is also a true nightmare for me (Kevin too). We have no shortage of love, but some of patience.
And so, for us, two it is.
Of course, my husband and I have always seen this in the same light, with no conflicts, and the decision was a cinch since we agree on everything.
Of course not.
Would I throw all rational reason out the window to have a third? Some days. Would I throw myself out the window to escape the two? Some days. But I’m relieved the decision has been made. We are fortunate to live in a time of so many choices, and to know I even could naturally conceive, carry, and give birth to another baby. Will I regret the call we’ve made? Maybe. I reserve the right to blame Kevin (even though he is clearly the only one in his right mind) if I ever do.
We feel complete together, the four of us, with one little girl and one little boy. And although they have me swimming upstream all the time, my head barely above water, the two kids we are #blessed to have, are perfectly wild and ours.
It's Hard to be a Human 