Chewing Coffee Grounds

My Facebook status update today read:  I’m just going to start chewing coffee grounds.

I knew that having babies was going to be exhausting.  Everyone knows infants stay up all night, nursing and crying and pooping.  And new moms are expected to be exhausted, frazzled.  But the mother of a nearly-three and a five-year-old?  She’s supposed to have it together by now.  She’s supposed to be showering every day, managing enough time to pick up after the kids and do the laundry before bed, and not smearing anti-puffy eye cream on her bagging under eyes every morning.

That is not the reality at my house.  My children just kind of failed to launch in the sleeping department.  At five, N still gets  up several nights a week around 3 or 4 a.m. just to come torture me hang out with me while I try to sleep.  “Mama, I just need a snuggle” turns quickly into “Mama, I just need to talk about all of the cool Lego ideas I have and the movie we watched yesterday and the way penguins eat fish.”  And then it’s a fight to get him back into his bed, only to have him come creeping back in ten minutes later.  If N is not wandering down the hall to see me, Little K is rolling out of his bed, losing his water cup, or crying that his “toes peekin’ out.”  He needs comforted back to sleep, and then as he drifts off he realizes he has to go potty.  It’s a never-ending game.

And so I go through most of my days exhausted.  Because it’s not realistic for me to go to bed when they do (which is realistically 11pm sometimes).  I teach online, and I have a direct sales business, and the only time I have to get work done is when the kids are in bed.  Preferably when they’re asleep, although I am getting better at tuning out the bedtime-refusal crying.  And there is writing to be done, not to mention I like to catch up on grown-up tv shows every now and then.  Oh, and that husband of mine wants time and conversation in the evenings, too.  So going to bed at 9pm isn’t happening, even though I do love my sleep.

So if you see me out, unshowered with my coat buttoned wrong and my kids in mismatched shoes, just nod and understand.  It’s not because I don’t care to see to these things properly.  It’s because I’m lucky I can see at all through the sleep haze that my not-so-infant children have bestowed upon me once again.  Just know it’s a small miracle we’re all dressed completely and leaving the house before noon, and marvel at the fact that I can keep my eyes open long enough to form coherent sentences for you to read.

Temporary

N was born to snuggle.  As an infant, he would relax into my arms like he was melting back into my body.  Like I was just an extension of him.  Now, at age 5, N asks at least five times a day if he can climb onto my lap and snuggle.  When he’s tired, when he’s nervous, when he is embarrassed or in trouble – my lap is where he fills his bucket and resets his mood.

Some days, I get exhausted.  I just want to push him away from me and tell him to give me space.  And sometimes I do.  Sometimes I get my laptop out and put him off with “just a minute,” or “I just need to do one more thing.”  And then I am relieved when he distracts himself with Legos and forgets he wanted to cuddle.  I am a person, too.  Not simply a mother whose lap and arms and attention are available for the sole purpose of comfort.  I need physical space sometimes.

While that will remain true, I came across a terrific article that reminded me just how fleeting the snuggle-era really is.  Honestly, I’m terrified of the day N rejects my hand-holding or my snuggles on the couch.  I know it will come far sooner than I am prepared for, and I will never look back and say, “I sure wish I’d said ‘no’ to snuggling a little more often.”  So I will just remind myself that this is so temporary, and saying yes to the can I sleep you requests or the put the computer down and give me your time demands is really saying yes to holding onto time as it speeds too quickly out of my grasp.

Reflection

Reflecting

I took this picture on a hike with my kids at Lily Lake in Rocky Mountain National park a couple of months ago.  It’s one of those great ones to go look at when I’m ready to just run away from them after an incredibly long bedtime routine.  They are such amazing little boys – so reflective, appreciative of their surroundings and the beauty of their world.  Sometimes I have to remind myself, but I am so damn lucky to have them.