Exposed

Today was a tad different than yesterday. Yesterday I blogged as if Mommy Life was complete bliss and that nothing is wrong with the world. But that is not reality. I wish yesterday had carried on for the rest of my life, with my cute little toddler behaving so perfectly.

Today was of the "I could burn my house down!!" and "Is there something I WON'T cry about today?!" variety. I am so freakin' tired. Yes hormonal with pregnancy, but also my 2 year old Eli wants something new to eat every 20 minutes. I can't simply lie around on the couch with his tirades. If I ignore him or say no, he'll scream bloody murder, so I cater. But then I look at him with big doe eyes and think "OMG, you are going to be in shock when your sister is born in a few months and I won't be able to cater to your every whim." Poor little guy, his whole world's gonna turn upside down. And hopefully for the better..?

So onto this morning's Dark Ages: the toilet is clogged- AGAIN. One of our toilets clogs every damn day. Yes I said "damn", because I wish I could say that's an exaggeration, but it's not. Ask my husband. He'll tell you about our toilet clogs and he doesn't exaggerate in the slightest. So as the water rose to the top, and I closed the lid, praying it would go down (hey, sometimes it does!), I then proceeded to take a nice quiet shower because Eli was watching a movie. As soon as I stepped out of the lovely shower, I saw him walk over and flush the toilet again.

So let me keep this next part of the story brief: I dropped my towel, exposing my pregnant nakedness, and ran to get 8 towels from the hall closet. On coming back into the bathroom, the water was everywhere. Ugh, disgusting- especially after taking a shower and feeling like a fresh mama, this was bad timing!

I sopped up the water, which Eli and I both had walked through. I won't go through all of the details but I was so out of control angry I went to throw a bathroom fixture out the back door in my anger. The strong Tri Cities wind blew the door open so fast that I am 99.9% sure that at least one of my neighbors saw me naked. I am mortified.

So I went to put on a bathrobe, which then turned Eli into a screaming monster who also wanted a bathrobe. But the bathrobes are too big, and then he yells and cries more so I just stood there not knowing what to do.

Soo, my morning was terrible. I was crying and crying. Eli didn't know what to think. I kept hugging him, but crying. In moments like those, I just want to hide away. I felt so ashamed. And it wasn't due to my nakedness (I got over that. Hey, at least a neighbor got an interesting day and story to tell if he or she saw the nakeds) but instead my anger was due to the spilled toilet water and endlessly crying toddler who I can't satisfy! I didn't want to talk to anyone. I thought "I can deal with this alone. I need to pray, or maybe I need to analyze and get a grip." But I just knew from past experience that I couldn't do that and feel whole!

So I did a hard thing- the opposite of my strong will- and called a few friends who I knew would listen to me. My friend Halley just listened quietly as she answered the phone and I started crying. I told her I was having a crap day. She really listened to me, and let me just be a mess. One of my friends, my "mom", Phyllis, laughed and laughed with me as I told her my whole story and especially at the "naked" parts of the story. I laughed so hard too that I was crying again, but this time tears of joy. My friend Melody and I talked when she called me to chat, and we had a heart to heart about the hard "mommy days". Halley brought me flowers at lunchtime as well as some curry chicken and milkshakes. Our boys played, and she and I talked intimately about life.

My whole day changed, and it's because I reached out to people who love me and accept me. I wanted to blog about this today because it is SO IMPORTANT to have safe people in our mom lives. People we can trust to let us be a mess, and people who can come to us when they're a mess and they can trust us too.

In our culture, it is so hard to have a group of friends or family who will just come around and support us. We are all separated in our little homes. We have to discern who our friends are, and ASK them to be there for us. They can't read our minds. I would have stayed holed up today with no one- if I hadn't been vulnerable and reached out.

Do you have so much pride you can't reach out and ask for help? Can you be vulnerable with a friend and share intimacy? If not right now and you've been lonely, it's time to reach out! But it's a journey, and it takes courage to step out. And you will get hurt- because some people aren't safe and you can't trust them. Then you navigate to new, safer friends who will listen and let you be yourself, if you open up.

Be encouraged and loved today, my friends! <3

Rainy, Cozy Day

I am sitting here on this rainy day with my 2 year old mister Eli, wondering if the day could get any better! I woke up early due to Eli saying "Mama, Mama, helllOOOO!" under his bedroom door at 5:15 am. He can't turn the door handle yet, and that is a blessing because at 5 am in the morning, I don't want him running around the house. I should have just ignored his yelling because he probably would have just assumed I was sleeping and gone back to bed. But out of habit, I just got up and opened his door, hoping to just lead him back into his bed to go night night. Oh no, he was pissed. He started thrashing, he screamed over and over. Wow, I have a strong little man! Since Cory was going to get up anyway for work, he had me go back to bed and took over. I should have just gotten up because for the next hour in bed, I couldn't sleep since Zoe was kicking me in my pregnant belly the whole time. Eli came into my bed awhile later and cuddled me for a bit, then literally kicked me in my face- TWICE- then cried loudly that he was sorry after realizing he hurt me. That will wake anyone up for the day, guaranteed!

I have been up with Eli just hanging around the house, cleaning up, making breakfast, wiping his nose, washing his hands a half dozen times on the step-stool in the bathroom, giving him his daily, coveted gummy vitamin and singing praises to the gummy vitamin for it's goodness. Then we watched the Leapfrog Phonics Farm show on Netflix and Eli told me all the letters and their sounds. When we got to "J", I told him J was the first letter of my name, Jessica, so he then walked around the house saying "My name! My name!" so that was a huge success, lol.

I was thinking it was just a hum-drum day. Until I realized it is such a beautiful rainy day and I was taking it for granted! I remember working outside the home for years and on rainy days like this. I would always DREAM about how I wished so badly I could stay home and cuddle up with a cup of coffee while watching the rain fall outside. And now I can! So that's what Eli and I are doing right now. I'm on my laptop, he's on his toy laptop and we are sipping our drinks and enjoying this rainy day. I am excited to blog today, just to blog, with no agenda.

I hope you moms, and everyone else, can enjoy the day as well, and just enjoy today without hurry.