A whole long rant to say that a little show of respect every once in a while would go a long way.

It's 11:30 at night and this is exactly how I am feeling. Being the mom is very lonely sometimes, yet I crave to actually get time to myself.

The hubby and I had a discussion a couple of weeks ago that is still bugging me.
We've been married 10 years and I'm still trying to get my way and it's still not working. When will I learn to just give up and give in?
The issue is mealtimes and dishes. Well, that's just part of the issue, but it's where I'll start. Growing up, it was always the rule in my house that the person who cooked supper didn't have to do the dishes. And we always said thanks to whoever had cooked us the meal. Always. It's just polite. It's acknowledging that someone went through to work to cook your meal so they were exempt from doing the dishes.

No matter how hard I've tried I can't get this to stick in my house. I cook almost all the meals and then the dishes are still there in the morning. Sometimes we get busy and they don't get done for several days (I know, I know, the horror! The secret's out; I'm not Martha.). Then hubby grumbles and does them, we have a discussion about how wouldn't it be easier if they got done every night, and I am supposed to be eternally grateful that he does dishes once or twice a month.

This brings me to the conversation that's still bugging me. Apparently I am not doing enough around the house. Possibly true. OK, probably true. But I don't accept responsibility for everything that needs to be done around here. To which my husband says "But I did dishes last night". If he hadn't grumbled and sighed and said that wouldn't it be better if I just did them every night, implying that it really was my job, then I would maybe buy the argument. I did laundry the whole time he cleaned the kitchen. In fact I always do the laundry. And put both kids to bed. And cook all the meals, and grocery shop. And entertain and take care of 2 kids every weekday, weekend, evening and through the night. When I want to do something I think about how I am going to do this with kids along. It must be nice to be able to take off and get stuff done without having to first figure out what about the kids. To run into a store to grab an item and not have it take a half hour. To take off for an entire day without figuring out childcare first (take off for an entire day? now, that's a pipe dream.). It must be nice to read a book before bed every night, not worrying about having to take care of the children demanding attention. Of course, I say this all with rather a lot of sarcasm, but, you know, it would be nice, every once in a while, to be thanked instead of grumbled at for not having done enough.
Maybe I would start my own company, too, if I had spare time.

Now, DH is probably fuming by now, if he's even managed to read this far without his head exploding, and I must say he is a hard working guy who loves his family. Really, you're only getting my side of the story. I'm sure he'd tell you I'm lazy, sitting on my butt all day surfing the internet while he brings home the paycheck. I think I've addressed all that above. All I'm saying is that a little show of respect every once in a while would go a long way.

2am - and a warning to all my children.

Someone please tell my children that I turn into a terrible monster between midnight and 5am. Really. Mean old mom has no patience for anything. Please eat, poop, have nightmares, and get fussy at other times of the day. I'm all yours the other 19 hours, but heaven help you if you wake the monster - consider yourselves warned.

Yes, it's 2am. No, I haven't had any sleep yet tonight. Yes, I think I have a right to be grumpy.

Don't like it? Go suck on a soother.

So simple, yet obviously impossible

There's nothing I hate more than bra straps that fall down. Ok, maybe a couple of things...but this I deal with on a daily basis. It makes you awkward and ungraceful as you try to hitch them back up with nobody noticing. What is it with bra designers that they don't think about the straps falling down?? It's one of the basic functions of the thing, don't you think? Now, I don't think I have overly sloping or narrow shoulders, so what's the deal?? Am I the only one with this problem??

Perhaps it's because I'm not a size zero supermodel. That's usually the problem when clothes don't fit or look right - they were designed for the 1% of the population with tall, skinny little bodies and perfect teeth. Really, there is a good chance that this is what's really going on here. But I'm not the only one who's not size zero; I guess it's just not glamorous to design clothes for actual, real life people.

I know this is a silly thing to complain about given all the problems in the world, but how many times in a day do I find myself hiking those stupid little straps up?? All they would have to do is sew the straps closer to the center of the back and voila, problem solved. It just seems so simple, yet obviously impossible.

I can't believe I spent a whole post on that. I'm tired of smiling about it.

Homelessness

LOVE this post at Belly Tales.
Maybe it's the sociologist in me.
When someone comments that that homeless guy on the street should "just get a job" I always ask - "Would you hire him?" Would you hire a guy with no fixed address??
Honestly, I have a hard time imagining what happens that ends up in someone not having anywhere to go for the night, but I know most of them didn't choose it. I've been down on luck before and had to leave groceries on the checkout counter because I couldn't pay for them. I've known the helplessness of arguing with government departments and banks when you don't quite fit their mould. I've never been close to homelessness because I've always managed to keep one stroke of bad luck ahead of it, and as well, I have family to fall back on. How many people don't have that?
Now I have a good job and a house and a comfortable life, but I will never forget those days when things weren't as certain. So when you say that that guy should "just get a job", ask yourself, do you really know anything about him?

Breastfeeding Sign

Here's a sign I saw recently. At first I was happy to see it. Now I'm not sure. It was hanging above the changetable in a public restroom. On the one hand it's nice to see the breastfeeding symbol, and the museum going out of it's way to show it's support. But I wonder if breastfeeding women would feel that it is still ok to breastfeed everywhere else in the museum. And exactly where is the "comfortable place for feeding"?? Will it be in the back of a closet far away, in which case, I can find my own comfortable place for feeding. In fact we did see a mother and child nursing on a bench in the museum. It was just normal families doing what families do. Next to the Woolly Mammoth.
On the other hand, I can see how some people might like to have a quite, private place to nurse, especially if baby was overstimulated, or mom was shy. Or baby was in that phase at 6 months old where they whip their head around without unlatching at every. little. sound. Yes, I've been there. I've appreciated special nursing rooms, but I also nurse wherever the baby happens to need to eat, quiet, private, comfortable or not.
So, what's the balance? No idea. Perhaps a rewording. Maybe a sign with the breastfeeding symbol at the entrance of the museum, saying "Breastfeeding Welcome Here!" and then the bit about if you want a private place, just ask. Just in case.
I keep wondering about pumping mothers. There's really no where to go for that. I suppose that they assume that if you are at the museum, probably your kids are with you, and you wouldn't need to pump. Of course, I can think of several instances where that might not be the case. Like a schoolteacher on a fieldtrip, to name just one. What about caregivers who want to warm up a bottle of formula or pumped milk? Certainly that really does require a special place. But I digress.

In the end, It was heartwarming to see the breastfeeding symbol, and nice to know that, if needed, this museum was offering help.

What do you think??

You just need a good doctor...

My mom is always trying to convince me to convert over to her doctor. She just loves him. He takes good care of her. I am thankful for that.

So she told me, not long ago, that her doctor's office had openings again. And really, midwives are expensive, all I need is to find a really good doctor.

I can't remember how I responded. Somehow just shrugged it off and moved on. She doesn't get it yet. I couldn't think how to start explaining the difference between the medical model and the midwiffery model of care.

Mom, do you remember the reams of doctors I went to as a kid and they tried this medicine and that medicine, and nothing really helped; I just got better on my own. Then when I was a teenager plagued with headaches. The first medicine made me an insomniac so I had headaches from lack of sleep. When i talked to the doctor about it he said he'd proscribe something different. We had a good chat about how I wanted to know what was wrong (treat the problem instead of the symptoms) and he wasn't interested in that. And mom, that WAS your doctor that you love so much to this day. And the headaches went away on their own. Because, by then, I'd had enough of doctors. And the asthma - that went away on it's own, too.

Of course, when I was pregnant with little a., well, of course you need a doctor for that! And look how much good that did me. Unnecessary surgical removal. I know that's a harsh way to say it, but it gets at the truth of what happened.

So, do you think I'm going to the doctor with this pregnancy??!? I'm not sick!! A doctor will look at me as someone with a condition to be managed. A midwife sees a person going through a stage of life.

Oh, ya, and for anyone still thinking about talking me into going to the hospital for the birth-
Ummmm, I'll let ya know when I'm sick, then you can cart me in on a stretcher.