Adventures In Motherhood

Pain in the neck is what brought me to the brink, broadsided by a white Ford Explorer at 40-miles-per-hour in the side sliding passenger door of my Honda Odyssey minivan eight years ago en route to an MRI for neck and thoracic pain. A pain I imagine began sometime around my third child and after my mother moved to Colorado. Lying sideways, suspended by a seat belt harness, my burning ear smashed into the side curtain airbag, suffocating by fumes of smoke, I exhaled a sigh of relief my children were not with me. How did I wind up here? My life needed to slow down except for the 8-month-old child with RSV at home, my fourth, who needed his mother’s milk and care. Shards of broken glass poking out of my blood stained flesh, a pounding hematoma in my left ear, interrupted by a constant ringing from the firecracker explosion of impact, warm salty tears of exasperation and hopelessness consumed me. “No wonder you have pain in your neck,” my mother stated with gusto when the pain became d...

Opinions are like assholes and everybody's got one!  You know the saying... and as another school year begins, I feel the pressure yet again, not to succumb to the ass-holery that exists among judging adults. Whether I'm at the playground or grocery store, I cringe when people ask, "whatever will you do with your free time now that your children are back in school".  I try not to imagine them thinking of me in a bubble bath eating bonbons. I'll be the first to admit, as a recovering workaholic and overachiever with four children, it's nearly impossible to achieve work-life balance and succeed as a mother. I want to wear a t-shirt that says, 'I've worked full-time, part-time, and been a stay at home mother, and I support your choice'. I was relieved to move to another part of the country last fall where no one knew what I was capable of work and volunteer wise, allowing myself time to breathe and adjust my children to the enormous transition. ...