Thursday, February 17, 2005

Refreshment

5:18 pm – naptime – solace? Didn’t the Nazi’s torture their prisoners by making them move huge mountains of boulders and rocks from one corner of the prison yard to the other, only to have to move them back again? And this pointless-ism broke people. I totally understand it. Not that I’m saying motherhood (specifically SAHM’hood) is akin to torture, just that it includes a grossly consuming amount of seemingly pointless repetition. Seemingly is important here because you really cannot be there for your kids if you are not there to answer the 300 daily why questions or return the cups to their nest time after time or constantly repeat the instructions for oral hygiene, etc., well I’m sure you get the idea.

At the beginning of the month I was lost in and to this very concept. I knew for certain that I love my children and wanted to prioritize my life to be there for them, but agonized over why I found it so unsatisfying and even, at times frustrating. Today, I have been renewed and my patience supplies replenished. Yes, patience is a commodity like orange juice that can be depleted and refilled. My dear husband refilled it yesterday by taking the kids out on his own for the better part of the day. Now their absence of course, freed me to do anything I wanted. Yet, I felt such immense guilt over being home alone that all I could do was housework. I kept thinking I needed to do something that I could not do with them home. But even that gave me the attitude adjustment I needed because I felt so refreshed and happy to see them all when they returned.

I suppose my satisfaction in SAHM’hood comes from personal pride in being there for my family. And it flies right out the window, the minute I begin to martyr myself by thinking I’m doing it all alone.

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