mike comes home tonight. finally. the best mothers day gift ever.
this particular mothers day, i kind of just feel bad for my kids. i feel like they got the toughskins jeans version of a mother, when they wanted the levis. i feel like they got 'choco-flakes'
(the ugandan brand cereal) instead of 'coco pops' (which are the real deal). i feel like they got mildly shafted with a second rate job instead of the mother i wish i was for them. no really. i have not been at my best this week.
but i will say, it takes two to tango, and they have not been at their best either (we can forget for the moment that i am supposed to be the mature woman who birthed them, and they are just very young children). zoe in particular has been, well, dreadful. right now, i am the object of all the badness in her world, whether or not i have anything at all to do with what is happening, ie: it's completely not causal. for example......
yesterday she walked into the house yelling, "charlotte is going to kampala and I HATE YOU MOM!"
to which i replied, "but what does that have to do with me?"
to which she replied, "AND YOU ARE DUMB AND FAT AND UGLY!"
now if she'd gone with MEAN and OLD and TIRED LOOKING, i would have taken pause, but those just made me laugh. until it continued...
"DO YOU KNOW WHAT? NOBODY EVEN LIKES YOU! EVERYONE THINKS YOU ARE DUMB AND UGLY."
i still didn't know what any of this had to do with charlotte going to kampala - except that she was disappointed and it must just stink to be 13. except that apparently i'm a safe place for her to take it all out on. i couldn't help it, i know it wasn't the right thing but i started to laugh. i mean i'm sure it was her dumping all the things she's heard or feels about herself onto me (or...and you guys can tell me...she's right and nobody does like me.. rats). but she wasn't in a place to talk as she stormed by me and slammed the door to her room.
when she finally came out, we were sitting on the couch and i told her that she had been really mean and said things that hurt people and this time the person was me. i told her that i knew she was tired of daddy being gone and that i knew things feel differently when he is away (like i become a nutball), but that he'd be home soon and that it was mothers day, so if she could just try a little harder, that would be great.
to which she replied by slowly ripping a piece of paper in two, handing them to me, and saying, "here you go mom. happy mothers day, i'm giving you a broken heart." looking very pleased at her symbolic gesture.
all i could come up with was, "no thanks zoe. i'd rather you just be kind."
my own mother had sent me a lovely e-card about all the great things that mothers do- like being patient and supportive -even when kids are messing up. i'm pretty sure that i'm am not that mother in the card. she sent another one with video clips of kids yelling "MOM!!!" while they are messing up and this felt more like my house this week.
being a mom is hard. we are the leaders. we are the pied pipers. we have lots of pairs of eyes and ears watching and listing to EVERYTHING we do and say and how we do it or say it. these things we've birthed are like sponges soaking in us. what we do and don't do, and speak or don't speak, and how we do and say what we do and say, shapes them and molds them and is often reflected back to us. i find this TERRIFYING when i think about it, so i don't like to think about it. but i need to think about it because it's true and if i don't think about it, then i won't try harder and who will these people become? YIKES!
today mothers day wasn't about me, it was about the kids that i mother, and me giving pause to how i do this hard job and how i can do it better. i want to be coco-pops and levis. i want to be all the things that love is- patient, kind, not self-seeking, not easily angered (doh!), forgiving, protecting, trusting, hoping, and persevering- because i LOVE them so much. because they deserve the first rate job mother- and i need to practice what i believe, i need to live out the love i have for them.
after church we went to the pool, and we played a lot and swam. when we got home, i got this card from jude, ( i tried hard not to over analyze the stick figures.....i'm smiling but he's not... but it could be that he made the head too small to squeeze in a smile..)
but the words were so sweet.
i'm not the best mom ever, but i'm glad he loves me so much. i think he knows i love him even more than that.
at bedtime rose said when daddy comes home they're going to make me dinner because it's "mama's day". bryn said that he tried to make me card, but we'd run out of paper, so he would make me card tomorrow. it really is the thought that counts.
when i tucked zoe in bed, she at least said she loved me, with out hurling any insults. progress, but thank God they're not all 13 at once!
happy mothers day!!
this particular mothers day, i kind of just feel bad for my kids. i feel like they got the toughskins jeans version of a mother, when they wanted the levis. i feel like they got 'choco-flakes'
(the ugandan brand cereal) instead of 'coco pops' (which are the real deal). i feel like they got mildly shafted with a second rate job instead of the mother i wish i was for them. no really. i have not been at my best this week.
but i will say, it takes two to tango, and they have not been at their best either (we can forget for the moment that i am supposed to be the mature woman who birthed them, and they are just very young children). zoe in particular has been, well, dreadful. right now, i am the object of all the badness in her world, whether or not i have anything at all to do with what is happening, ie: it's completely not causal. for example......
yesterday she walked into the house yelling, "charlotte is going to kampala and I HATE YOU MOM!"
to which i replied, "but what does that have to do with me?"
to which she replied, "AND YOU ARE DUMB AND FAT AND UGLY!"
now if she'd gone with MEAN and OLD and TIRED LOOKING, i would have taken pause, but those just made me laugh. until it continued...
"DO YOU KNOW WHAT? NOBODY EVEN LIKES YOU! EVERYONE THINKS YOU ARE DUMB AND UGLY."
i still didn't know what any of this had to do with charlotte going to kampala - except that she was disappointed and it must just stink to be 13. except that apparently i'm a safe place for her to take it all out on. i couldn't help it, i know it wasn't the right thing but i started to laugh. i mean i'm sure it was her dumping all the things she's heard or feels about herself onto me (or...and you guys can tell me...she's right and nobody does like me.. rats). but she wasn't in a place to talk as she stormed by me and slammed the door to her room.
when she finally came out, we were sitting on the couch and i told her that she had been really mean and said things that hurt people and this time the person was me. i told her that i knew she was tired of daddy being gone and that i knew things feel differently when he is away (like i become a nutball), but that he'd be home soon and that it was mothers day, so if she could just try a little harder, that would be great.
to which she replied by slowly ripping a piece of paper in two, handing them to me, and saying, "here you go mom. happy mothers day, i'm giving you a broken heart." looking very pleased at her symbolic gesture.
all i could come up with was, "no thanks zoe. i'd rather you just be kind."
my own mother had sent me a lovely e-card about all the great things that mothers do- like being patient and supportive -even when kids are messing up. i'm pretty sure that i'm am not that mother in the card. she sent another one with video clips of kids yelling "MOM!!!" while they are messing up and this felt more like my house this week.
being a mom is hard. we are the leaders. we are the pied pipers. we have lots of pairs of eyes and ears watching and listing to EVERYTHING we do and say and how we do it or say it. these things we've birthed are like sponges soaking in us. what we do and don't do, and speak or don't speak, and how we do and say what we do and say, shapes them and molds them and is often reflected back to us. i find this TERRIFYING when i think about it, so i don't like to think about it. but i need to think about it because it's true and if i don't think about it, then i won't try harder and who will these people become? YIKES!
today mothers day wasn't about me, it was about the kids that i mother, and me giving pause to how i do this hard job and how i can do it better. i want to be coco-pops and levis. i want to be all the things that love is- patient, kind, not self-seeking, not easily angered (doh!), forgiving, protecting, trusting, hoping, and persevering- because i LOVE them so much. because they deserve the first rate job mother- and i need to practice what i believe, i need to live out the love i have for them.
after church we went to the pool, and we played a lot and swam. when we got home, i got this card from jude, ( i tried hard not to over analyze the stick figures.....i'm smiling but he's not... but it could be that he made the head too small to squeeze in a smile..)
but the words were so sweet.
i'm not the best mom ever, but i'm glad he loves me so much. i think he knows i love him even more than that.
at bedtime rose said when daddy comes home they're going to make me dinner because it's "mama's day". bryn said that he tried to make me card, but we'd run out of paper, so he would make me card tomorrow. it really is the thought that counts.
when i tucked zoe in bed, she at least said she loved me, with out hurling any insults. progress, but thank God they're not all 13 at once!
happy mothers day!!
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