Tuesday, October 14, 2014

What's it like staying home with my daughter?



Some days its like, "Of course I'll read you a book, how could I not when you climb into my lap so sweetly? Wow, you slept for three whole hours. Are you ready to play? Of course we can go outside and play with your car. Thank you for sharing your cracker." And then other days its more like, "No! Put that down! Those are Mommy's books. I don't understand why you're crying. No, I don't think that goes on your head. I don't think the straw sippy will work when you tip it that way. Please let Mommy go potty." And the funny thing is that I love both types of days. Even though after one I'm left exhausted and touched out and quite possibly a little irritable (ask my husband), I still feel... accomplished. Because when you've spent all day averting tantrums and cuddling through the tears and standing your ground sometimes and giving in others... you know when you go to sleep that you've accomplished something.

"Today I kept the baby alive." And that's totally enough because there were moments where you were tempted to just shut yourself in your room and let her climb all over everything and take the kitchen apart and throw every piece of food in your refrigerator on the floor, but you didn't.

"Today she was a terror." And she definitely was, because she wouldn't let you cook dinner without screaming for attention and you couldn't handle one more melt down without melting down yourself, so you threw your hands up in the air and said "do you want a cracker?" because she thinks cracker means food, and you fixed her another peanut butter an jelly sandwich.

At the end of the day though, after she's in bed and she has woken up for the second time crying, and you're holding her in your arms letting her tears fall on your shoulder again, you remember how fiercely you love her, and how fleeting it all is. So you rock her and sing to her and pat her back, and even though she's still crying you can feel her calming down and getting drowsy, and you let her just smile at you for a while because you will never ever get eleven pm on this Saturday night to happen again.

That's what it's like, even on the awful days. It's knowing that you'd rather spend the bad moments with her than away from her, because you love her more than you love yourself, and even when she's scrunching her face up and throwing a fit she's the most beautiful thing in your world.


2 comments:

  1. LOVE this post! I love getting little insights into your world, Lidia! It also helps that you're such a funny, fresh, great writer. It's like I'm there with you. I hope you keep updating your blog regularly, because I always love reading it.

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  2. So I just found your blog! And I love this post especially after a day like I had today!! It's so weird that even when our children are complete monsters all we want to do is spend time with them! So thanks for this!!

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