if i need help, i'll ask you for it

if there's one thing i'm sure of, it's that i am a good mother. i understood before i had my 1st child that my life will no longer be mine. when i was in the hospital after delivery, i requested one morning that the nursery hold my baby until i finished taking a shower. as the nurse was walking out of my room, she had the nerve to say, "you'd better get used to having your baby around; life's not a party anymore." i stopped her by saying, "my life wasn't a party before. i'm just taking advantage of a baby-free moment while one's available." my husband had taken off work for a week to be with me & instead, spent that time with his brother at the malls. so, i was alone in the hospital. i deserved a moment.

i'm what you might call, a watcher. i see good techniques that i can try & learn from others' mistakes. i pay attention to differences in the personalities & needs of others, my own children included. i don't just go through the motions of taking care of them... feeding, brushing teeth, changing diapers, bathing, dressing, doctors, school, bedtime, dragging them along w/ me where ever i go... i am invested in them, i care for them, i raise them. i desire for them to learn & grow & mature. i am ever changing myself to better meet their needs... and i do say "needs". having a zhu zhu pet or a pack of McD's french fries is not a need; socialization is a need, rest is a need, progressive learning is a need. learning they are God's children & why is a need. a mother is not only a woman who bears a child, it is a woman who raises a child.

what i'm trying to say is that, as a mother, i do know what i'm doing. i don't share with the world what my plans are for dealing with particular problem, or why one may be fussy, or the process i had or have to go through to accomplish a thing with my children because i don't feel like it's your business. i don't tell other's how to raise their children, because i have my own. the only advise i can give is that of my own experience with the knowledge that all people, including children, are different & require their own kind of attention.

you see, the idea of "nobody's perfect", doesn't give you the authority to throw your opinions at other women. the plain truth is that we care just as much about your random opinionated advise as you do about ours (which, u'd have to admit, is not much). now, i enjoy advise, but only when it's presented as a option, not a mandate. so, let me do my job, because for my own children, i do it best. & if i need help, i'll ask you for it.

Late Night Ramblings

it's 1:30 in the morning & i still have no desire to go to sleep, although i am tired. my husband can't find his sunglasses. he allowed our daughter to play with them earlier & she pulled a houdini on us. what's knowingly ironic is that they are probably in the most obvious place & we're just overkilling the idea of "thinking like a 4 yr old". but apparently he can't go to work if he doesn't have his sunglasses (but he can walk out the door in february wearing wet jeans from my having forgotten to switch his clothes to the dryer). he says to me, "u wanna help me find them!? get up & help me find them." ...hello childhood!, we meet again, but for some reason you don't look like my father.

i watched the wierdest movie today during nap time... "falling angels". if you want to know about it, it's on hulu. there's a reason that some movies don't even make it to the shelf in blockbuster. it reminded me of a phase that TNT went through some years ago when they played movies that no one had ever heard of, like "hotel splendid" & ted danson films & some other foriegn flick about a singer who was castrated as a child & would court women w/ his intact brother. we do live in a strange world... with strange people... who do strange things.

i took my girls to the playground today, before nap time. that place is incredible; newly openned & there is so much to do. we did have about a 2 minute window when we were the only ones there. it almost felt illegal because the playground is big enough to feel like it's not possible to be alone in it. i think it's funny to watch all the mothers who are overprotective of their children, telling them how to put one foot in front of the other on flat ground; they are very oddly controlling, masking this feature with frightened eyes. u know, it is possible to properly monitor ur children w/out making them feel like it was a mistake to leave the crib.

it's getting closer to 2 am. who would've thought it would've taken up a half an hour to collect those few thoughts. this shows exactly how easy it is to get lost in them... mmm... LOST... now that's a good show. anyway, i'll go to bed now, still not in the mood to, but i'll do it anyway because it's an important part of the cycle of living... u wake, u eat, u work, u eat, u sleep. so i think i'll do the sleeping part right now... till next time.