Stay Home Mom

Being a stay at home mom is the best and hardest thing I have ever had to do. I have been blessed to witness Thing 1 and 2's first words, first steps, first EVERYTHING. I will be blessed as Baby Girl starts all her firsts also.

It is the best job I could have asked for, but it is also the hardest. I'm tired. The house is always dirty. Somebody always needs something. Somebody is often fighting with somebody else. The floor is always littered with goldfish crackers and toys. The littlest needs a lot of diaper changes. When the end of the day comes, I don't get to leave for the relaxation that is "home" because I never left it. I never get to leave my job. I never get to escape to the quiet restful place because I never left it, and lets face it.. it's RARELY quiet and and almost never restful.

There are days where I want to run away to somewhere else. It doesn't matter where, just some place that isn't where I spend days on end without leaving. It's weird to understand how a 10 minute trip to the grocery store for milk in the middle of the night is so wonderful sometimes. It almost feels shameful to admit it.

However, I wouldn't give it up for anything. As I said before, it's the best and hardest thing I've ever done.

There is a girl I know that has 2 children. She is a person I went to school with ages ago. After she had her first child, she had to continue to work. She left her son with her mother (if I'm remembering correctly). After a bit, she got pregnant with her 2nd son. Once he was born, she and her husband made the decision for her to be a stay at home mom. Other moms told her of the blessing and hardships that come with being one. She was excited. She said she looked forward to spending all that time with her sons.

Then the 2nd little one was born, she quit her job, and she stayed home. It lasted 4 months. By the end of the 3rd day (I wish I were exaggerating) She had had enough. She was on facebook nearly daily complaining at how annoying her boys were. She complained about taking them to the park, the grocery store, spending time with them. She complained about every single solitary thing those very young children did. She talked about how she wanted to spank the older one quite frequently. It was HARD to know all this about her. For months it seemed like she had nothing but negative things to say about her children.

After about 4 months, she has decided that she doesn't enjoy spending so much quality time with her children. She has decided to go back to work. First off, I say to each their own. If she wants to work, go for it. It makes me sad though.

It's her life and her loss, but it makes me sad because of the comments she has made about it. In a nutshell, she isn't going back to work because she needs the money, it's because she doesn't want to be home with her children. Those are nearly her words too, so I'm not making it sound worse than it is or anything. And not only is it her loss, but it's those little boys loss too.

On her first day of work, she was sent home because her drug test hasn't been sent back to them yet so she can't be on the job. The next day, she took her children to their new daycare and stayed home to celebrate the time she has without them. C-E-L-E-B-R-A-T-E.

I just find a difference in my want for 15 minutes alone, and her desire to not be around her children because they "annoy" her.

Let me say one more time for the record. I do not care if you are a stay at home mom, or a working mom. We all have our needs and situations. You do what you can for your kids. That is not what this post was about.

Today, I spent a good hour with Thing 2 working on letters and counting while Baby Girl slept and Thing 1 was at school. My floor is covered in goldfish crackers, I'm watching the same episode of SpongeBob that I've seen 8,000 times before. Thing 2 is trying to drag Baby Girl around the room by her legs, and I wouldn't rather be anywhere else.