As I sat
there reeling from my test results, tears sprung to my eyes. I couldn’t believe
what I was reading. Jose and I had a nagging feeling for years but we never
thought to look into it. It’s one thing to think something and push it to the back corner of your mind. It’s a whole other
thing to be confronted with the truth while sitting at work. I had just
receive my results from Buzzfeed’s How
Many Children Should You Have? quiz. And the answer was 1. I should have
just 1 kid. I fucking knew it!! Outside my office 2 sets of tiny fists banged
away at the door shrieking, Mama? Mama!! Muuuuumma,
Muuuuma….muuuuuuuuummmmmiiieaaaah!!! Goddamnit!! I can’t even focus on the What Color Is Your Aura? quiz with all that
racket!!!
“Jose??
Jose!! I am trying to get some shit done in here – can you collect these tiny
terrorists????”
“Yep,
I can but they ain’t asking for me! Pretty clear who they want!. Besides it’s
Saturday and you’re not working you’re just fucking around on Facebook and I’m
trying to clean out the garage.”
“What
the fuck? All of a goddamn sudden I’m not allowed to have ANY leisure time???
Your ass went surfing for like 1000 hours this morning and now you have the
AUDACITY to clean the garage? Who do you think you are? The King of fucking
Spain???”
“Really
toons? The King of Spain?”.
“Fine, fuck,
go clean the garage.”
It’s
not that I don’t cherish them – my kids are the cutest and sweetest little
people I’ve ever known. I’ve never loved like this before. Louis CK has this
great bit where he talks about meeting your spouse, falling in love and then
having a child together…and when you see your baby you look at them and think,
oh my god. You’re mine! You have my DNA!! And then you look at your spouse and
think, who the fuck are you? You’re a stranger!!! That’s how deeply parents
love their kids (most of us anyway). But it doesn’t change the fact that
these little people come with a whole pile of shit you gotta do. Everyday. They
cannot do dick for themselves and that level of helplessness is taxing on my
soul. As a mom I’m not supposed to say that
taking care of kids sucks. Eventhough it’s akin to saying “yeah! I love my
house! I just hate cleaning it.” If moms complain about raising kids they are
suddenly a candidate for a DCFS home raid. But the truth is raising
kids and doing a good job of it is hard work. You need to vent!
It’s the hardest job in the world. At least at work, you know what the expectations are
and what you can do to do a good job. Parenting on the other hand?
Total fucking mystery. You can be a perfect, conscientious parent and your kid
might grow up to be a meth head. Awesome! Thanks for doing nothing with
your privileged life! Or you can be a sh*tty parent and let wolves raise
your kid and because of all that they had to overcome, they end up winning the Nobel
prize. It’s hard to know what the correct amount of love, attention and
activities are. Especially with the advent of mind-fucks like Pinterest
to make you feel like a failure because you aren’t some sort of arts&craft
ninja.
I’m so grateful I have my sister and BFF to balance out my parenting neurosis. They are both what I like to call Undercover Assholes. They are loving and pinterest-y with their kids, but on the sly are scheming about how they can run the fuck away to Paris without them. No shame in the fantasy, we all have our own. Mine is to read a book in peace. Jose’s is to live in a VW bus on the beach. Both dreams shattered when Jahnvi was born. Raising 2 kids and maintaining our previous lifestyle is one of the most unrealistic goals I've ever had. When Kali was born, Jose and I were the poster for perfect parents. We rocked that sh*t. And Kali was world’s most difficult baby. But it was all good – we only had the 1 child and there was 2 of us! Then Jahnvi showed up, with her massive smile and easy-going personality and everything went to shit. My limited patience evaporated. Jose’s interest in changing diapers dwindled. We were sleep-deprived, irritable and exhausted from entertaining a toddler while caring for an infant. But it seemed like everywhere we looked people were having more babies! 3’s a charm! they said. I have 5 kids and it's great! I have 4 kids and I homeschool! What?? I cannot even fathom how the hell these people do it. I stare utterly horrified at people with 3+ kids. I seriously think they are funded by the government to make sure America stays Number 1. Can’t be number 1 when all your citizens are waiting till their 30's to have kids, then only popping out 1. You gotta ensure people are having 3, 4,5 kids and then pay them to talk about how “oh it’s not so hard, oh it’s the same as having 2”. Bullshit. But the lies of motherhood are lurking everywhere. For example, we were watching American Sniper and this scene shows an Iraqi man inviting the American soldiers to stay for dinner that his wife just “whipped up”. Their tiny apartment was fucking occupied by like 10 soldiers all goddamn day long and his wife managed to cook an entire feast in her shoebox kitchen with like, 30 different side dishes. ARE YOU FUCKING SERIOUS?? What the fuck is this?? I will turn that shit off!!! I refuse to watch Good Housewife propaganda!!! The scene was just put in there to make women feel like shit. Ohhh waaaahhhh your soooo fucking busy at your bullshit job to cook a proper meal for your husband and kids. Frozen lasagna again? You asshole! Look at me! My house was invaded and I cooked a lamb’s head WITH side dishes!!!! Bitch, have a seat. I do not need this shit in my life.
Maybe
parenting is just easier for some people. People who don't have
Netflix...or hobbies...or tempers. When I was a kid my mom told me
that she had to have tests done when she was pregnant with me because of her
age (she was almost 45!) they needed to make sure all was ok. Well, the test
came back and said I had a 1 in 12 chance of being mentally disabled.
1 in 12. Just to give you an idea of what that means, when I was preg with Kali
my test came back as 1 in 100000000000. And I was still nervous. 1 in 12 means you
should probably buy your baby a helmet asap. But I came out fine and I’m still pretty damn perfect. Every now and then my mom would cuddle
me and say “ohhhh my little Mongoo baby!” And I always thought it meant
mongoose. Like “oh my cute little fuzzy baby!”. But it turns out, Mongoo is
actually slang for retarded. My mom’s term of endearment for me was literally, ‘My
Little Retard’. And it was only when my Undercover Asshole of a sister
kindly informed me did I realize that maybe “pretty damn perfect” was a huge
overstatement. So when I lose my sh*t on my kids I seek comfort in knowing
that I’m just a little retard trying to make it in this crazy world of
parenting. And when I think about all the challenges I will face this summer
when both Kali and Jahnvi are home while I’m trying to work…and how my Bright-eyed, bushy-tailed, pinterest-y mom-friends will ask “Soooo what are you up to this summer??” I will know just what to
say: Drinking. Heavily.I’m so grateful I have my sister and BFF to balance out my parenting neurosis. They are both what I like to call Undercover Assholes. They are loving and pinterest-y with their kids, but on the sly are scheming about how they can run the fuck away to Paris without them. No shame in the fantasy, we all have our own. Mine is to read a book in peace. Jose’s is to live in a VW bus on the beach. Both dreams shattered when Jahnvi was born. Raising 2 kids and maintaining our previous lifestyle is one of the most unrealistic goals I've ever had. When Kali was born, Jose and I were the poster for perfect parents. We rocked that sh*t. And Kali was world’s most difficult baby. But it was all good – we only had the 1 child and there was 2 of us! Then Jahnvi showed up, with her massive smile and easy-going personality and everything went to shit. My limited patience evaporated. Jose’s interest in changing diapers dwindled. We were sleep-deprived, irritable and exhausted from entertaining a toddler while caring for an infant. But it seemed like everywhere we looked people were having more babies! 3’s a charm! they said. I have 5 kids and it's great! I have 4 kids and I homeschool! What?? I cannot even fathom how the hell these people do it. I stare utterly horrified at people with 3+ kids. I seriously think they are funded by the government to make sure America stays Number 1. Can’t be number 1 when all your citizens are waiting till their 30's to have kids, then only popping out 1. You gotta ensure people are having 3, 4,5 kids and then pay them to talk about how “oh it’s not so hard, oh it’s the same as having 2”. Bullshit. But the lies of motherhood are lurking everywhere. For example, we were watching American Sniper and this scene shows an Iraqi man inviting the American soldiers to stay for dinner that his wife just “whipped up”. Their tiny apartment was fucking occupied by like 10 soldiers all goddamn day long and his wife managed to cook an entire feast in her shoebox kitchen with like, 30 different side dishes. ARE YOU FUCKING SERIOUS?? What the fuck is this?? I will turn that shit off!!! I refuse to watch Good Housewife propaganda!!! The scene was just put in there to make women feel like shit. Ohhh waaaahhhh your soooo fucking busy at your bullshit job to cook a proper meal for your husband and kids. Frozen lasagna again? You asshole! Look at me! My house was invaded and I cooked a lamb’s head WITH side dishes!!!! Bitch, have a seat. I do not need this shit in my life.
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