If bringing up an active and demanding toddler sounds like a battle, how much of a battle can it be when you’ve got two such toddlers on your hands? But the rewards, at the end of the day, make the struggle worth the juggle.
I’ve given up on going to the bathroom alone a long time ago. Apart from having a full time job, I’m also an on-demand food distributor, wife, nurse, cleaner, taxi driver, jungle gym, wallet, YouTube operator, human body warmer, event planner, referee, book reader, nappy changer, dresser, story teller, singer, dancer, and jogger with a stroller.
At any given point in time, I know exactly which retail store has milk specials, as we buy cartons of six in bulk. We do always try and keep the ratio of milk to wine fair, as everyone in the house deserves their soothing beverage of choice and tranquillity.
My twins are almost two-and-a-half, and I have twice as much grey hair as I had two years ago. I also never have time to do something about this. My cell phone contract renewal is three months overdue and I haven’t changed my address for any bills I’m receiving for the past six months.
Even though I should have a huge sense of responsibility and I do as a 37-year old parent, I’m what a certain group of young people will now call a middle-aged tannie. How times have changed. How do I manage? How does their other mother manage?
I have recently wondered how many cups of coffee I’ve made the past few years that I haven’t managed to drink or finish. Or how many additional germs I’ve consumed by eating sweets or cookies I find in my car.
We are all still here, and that must count for something. A lot of our friends, the ones with older children, keep reassuring us that the phase of terror, tiredness and a general overwhelmed feeling from battles with clothes, sleeping routines, food or toys gets better at 3 or 4. What are they smoking? How can anyone think this is something cool to say?
They clearly forgot how long an hour before school can feel when you are trying to feed them, dress them, dress yourself and be remotely on time without fights or screaming. We are talking about a major sense of achievement if two small people are dropped off safely at school by 7.30am, in armour, costumes or pyjamas. No-one is thinking ahead at this point.
Six months from now sounds like the very distant other end of the rainbow. We don’t have time. We don’t have DSTV anymore, nor time to read books. I do know a number of highly intelligent, informative people, and I hope they tell me is there is something newsworthy I should be caring about. I would imagine that could count as social responsibility towards a friend.
I will lift my own game again, especially when it comes to my friends without kids, to make sure it isn’t all I speak about. I don’t think I’ve figured out that balance, but I hope to remember that other people are living more grown up lives, not being entrenched in worlds where Barney meets Thomas & Friends.
Maybe kids teach you how moments matter, how now is the only thing that matters. A few weeks ago a colleague of mine, 44, had a heart attack in the office and died on the scene. Gone. In seconds. He was a father to two daughters who had a dad in the morning and lost a parent that afternoon.
It made me think that is okay to watch the same story over and over again. It made me think it is okay to lose friends that don’t really care what happens to you. It made me think it is okay to own everything that is wonderful, just as owning everything that is really tough to face. It made me think that I’m blessed double with two little faces that light up when I open the door to their room or come home after work. It made me think that coming home to a loving family unit, makes me the luckiest stressed out girl in the world.
As a good friend of mine said a while ago, “the juggle is real”. I’m going to try and at least be a funky tannie. The alternative would just be sad and for an optimist at heart, that won’t fly for me, my partner in crime or the little people.
One day they’ll have to face tough situations alone, but while I can still play a part in the fun factory that is their current existence, it weighs more than work pressure, the 10 different hats I need to wear by 7am or people who judge the way we do things.
I choose to be real and hope my kids choose that for themselves as well when they start to think about things other than food, sweets or the fact that not everything in life comes in two. There is so much more freedom in honesty and riding the wave of chaos than pretending to be perfect. May that never be me.
“She loved and lived” is what my tombstone should say. Unconditional love. I especially love every crazy second of trying to figure out how to be a mother. It doesn’t even have to be good or inspiring. I just always want to care as my wife, friends and twins, don’t deserve anything less.
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