Thursday, July 24, 2008

Weather/Mood/TV/Bad Mommy Day

I am feeling much, much better today. It may only be 6 a.m., but I think I can safely say that today will be much better than yesterday, mainly because days do not get much worse than yesterday.

Yesterday was a bad, bad mommy day. In no particular order, I give you the sins of yesterday:

1.) I openly screamed at my sister in front of the baby
2.) We both cursed at eachother and I threw a book at her (in front of the baby)
3.) I let the baby watch television, which I never do just because she screamed
4.) I gave Sam two full bottles of milk (20 ounces of milk) just because she screamed
5.) I put Sam down for a nap so I could eat lunch and watch Oprah while she screamed for 20 minutes before finally (blessedly) falling asleep

By the time R got home, I was feeling like the worst mother on the planet, not to mention emotionally overwrought from a fun day of disembowelment. Did I mention is was pouring rain ALL.DAY. and we were not able to leave the house except to go to Whole Foods.

In all seriousness, I broke about 15 of my cardinal rules of parenthood yesterday in the span of 8 hours. I let her watch TV, which I loathe. I let her drink way too much milk/eat too much sugar/spoil her appetite (but actually, this had the opposite effect yesterday for some reason). I gave in to her demands because I did not want to hear her scream. Most of all, I fought in front of her, which R and I are incredibly careful never to do. I feel awful about it.

Tell me I am not alone in this. Tell me other moms have days like that because even in writing this, the guilt is creeping back in.

In other news, I have recovered my perspective (sort of) in regards to this pregnancy. There is a rather large project that I will at least complete the first draft of as of tomorrow evening. If I can get through this, I will actually be able to claim some kind of mini-maternity leave for myself (with a minimum amount of work for the first month). So, obviously, it is best if he holds on until then. And then, of course, I would like the full weekend to enjoy with just R and Sam, so that brings us to next Mon. I can patiently wait a bit more, trying to enjoy full-nights of rest, time to work and netflix after the bean goes to bed.

Today will be a happy day even if I have to force it. And tomorrow? 86, sunny and Friday. Even better.

4 comments:

Unknown said...

Hmmmmm . . . . sounds like a normal day around here (minus the screaming and throwing books). Don't feel too badly about it, though. I'm sure it wasn't as awful as you thought, and I'm sure Sam will have no recollection of that ONE yelling incident in the future. Just smother her today with lots of hugs and kisses. Kids have an incredible capacity to forgive, now you just need to forgive yourself.

Also, I've been known to give Bridget a whole handful of candy just to get her to be quiet for a little while. And TV has been my babysitter more than once.

halloweenlover said...

You are so not alone. This pregnancy, when the nausea was really out of control, I found my patience at an all-time low. I started letting Gabe watch Sesame Street (less than one hour a day, but STILL, I'd pledged not to let him watch tv), and I find myself snapping at everyone, including Gabe much more often. I feel terrible, but at the end of the day, they'll be fine. We do our best 99% of the time and they won't remember the slip-ups.

Honestly, she probably thought you were playing, and if she didn't, today she won't even remember or maybe she'll think it was a dream. This is so temporary, and I think it sounds totally normal.

I'm thinking about you and hoping baby baby comes soon! After tomorrow night would be good!

Brigid said...

Don't be so hard on yourself - you had a very HUMAN day considering conditions. If there is one thing I have learned as a child and as a parent it is that having moments of weakness do not define you, it's the pulling up the big girl panties and moving back in the right direction that matters. Cut yourself a LOT of slack right now - I know your daughter will - and hang in there! At the end of my first pregnancy I had a not so nice hissy fit at a kind co-worker for nothing. We still laugh about it now five and a half years later.

Kristi said...

As I told you yesterday, I've been there, done that. All moms have, and if they say they haven't, they're lying. Here's to a better day tomorrow.