One thing I didn’t expect as a new mom was the sudden inability to complete a thought, or a sentence. Apparently, it’s one of the common denominators of moms — along with sleep deprivation and guilt.
When a group of my mommy friends got together for lunch in the park recently, we started a lot of interesting conversations — about new jobs, exciting travel, health care reform — unfortunately, I never did hear how the new job was going, the details of that Brazil trip or whether my friends agreed with President Obama.
Inevitably, before we could finish a story, someone’s child would need a potty break, a Band-Aid, a second helping. By the time aid was rendered, we’d forgotten what we were talking about and had moved on to topic No. 87.
In that vein, here are a few of my random mommy thoughts:
• I’m afraid I’m going to end up on the floor of McDonald’s play place, rolling around with some mom that feels no need to stop her child from terrorizing the entire restaurant. My blood pressure jumps 20 points every time I see some parent talking on the cell phone, purposefully ignoring their brat’s antics, particularly when that wild child slaps mine upside the head. Please don’t judge me if you see my mug shot some day.
• I have a secret — my daughter is 21⁄2 years old and she’s not potty trained. That’s not the secret though. The secret is that I don’t really care. OK, I care. I mean, who wants to change diapers infinitely? But otherwise, it’s just not that big of a deal to me. Most other children her age are still in diapers, too. And my pediatrician assured me that it’s perfectly normal — after all, she doesn’t even stay dry during naps yet, a major indicator of potty readiness. To others, primarily my mother and her generation, I may as well be charged with neglect.
• Why is it that men can’t multitask? Whenever I ask my husband to run a bath and get something out of the laundry, he looks at me like I’ve asked him to perform surgery — do two things at once?! My friend whose husband actually is a surgeon is no better at home. When she asks him to take on two tasks simultaneously, he tells her to “choose” which task she’d like him to do. Another friend asked her husband why he didn’t answer the phone one evening. “I was running a bath,” he told her with a straight face.
• I don’t want my daughter to leave me to go to school, not college, mind you, I’m talking preschool. It’s all happening too fast! Just the other day, I overheard Ava and my friend’s 31⁄2-year-old son talking. “You going to school?! Whoa” was Ava’s reply when he excitedly told her he was going to start preschool. He’s only going twice a week, for three hours a day, but Ava was thoroughly impressed. I, on the other hand, am determined she doesn’t need to start preschool until one year before kindergarten, and if I didn’t think it might socially or educationally impair her to keep her home until kindergarten I’d be just fine with that. I mean she’s in a mom’s group and takes classes, like swimming and gymnastics, where she socializes with other kids, is exposed to plenty of learning activities and learns rules, what’s the rush to send her off to school?
What do you think? I love it when you, the readers, share your own stories and mommy tips. So e-mail me your thoughts and I might just include them in an upcoming column.
Lisa Hurt Kozarovich is an award-winning local freelance journalist and mother of one daughter. She can be reached via e-mail at Lisakozar@hotmail.com
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