Better than the first time, better than the worst time

I’m going to be honest. Sometimes, it’s awesome being a stay at home mom.

Liam, my now 19-month-old son, is the cutest, sweetest little boy and we have a lot of fun together. We spend our mornings watching the Today Show and playing with toy cars and trucks while drinking tea, and milk and practicing using a fork while eating slices of banana (we don’t each do all of those things—I’ll let you figure out who does which). He is good enough to entertain himself for a few minutes at a time when I have to go make myself some toast or wash a dish or two. When it’s finally time for him to take a nap in the afternoon, he grabs his favorite stuffed animal, a little floppy-eared bunny named Eggy, already worn from a year and a half of love, and whines until I pull him into my ap in the big chair by the windows where he curls up and drinks from his bottle till he falls asleep. And looking at his sweet little face when I gently carry him to his room and put him in his crib, set to the tune of deep breathing and the gentle hum of the sound machine on his bookshelf, I feel so, so lucky.

I’m going to be honest with you.

Sometimes, it is not so awesome.

He is a happy boy, but when he cries, he cries. He recently learned how to not just point out what he wants, but to grab and direct my hand towards whatever it is, and when it’s something I don’t want to give to him (my full mug of hot tea, a pair of scissors, etc), he often loses it. He learned how to throw a tantrum a few months ago, which at the time meant  him throwing his head back as hard as he could, which often resulted in him slamming the back of his head onto the ground, which would concern me and make him cry even harder. He likes to climb on me to see out the windows and he has this unbelievable talent for jamming his sharp little toes directly between my ribs, which doesn’t exactly tickle. And some days, he doesn’t take a nap for like 8 hours. Some days, he doesn’t even nap at all. And those days are the ones that end with him being completely done with me at least two hours before his dad comes home, which is to say, there is a lot of whining, yelling and general unhappiness. And Liam isn’t in a great mood, either! (Yes, I’ve got jokes.)

So, I’m going to be honest with you. That’s what I’m going to do, here. I’m going to tell you what it’s like, for me, to be a stay-at-home mom, and I’m going to tell you about how much fun it is, sometimes, and I’m going to tell you about how much it really sucks sometimes. I want you to know that you can expect some horror stories, but they’re not meant to scare you. And I want you to know that you’re going to hear some “this is so rewarding” stories, but they’re not meant to sound smug or braggy,

They’re going to be honest. They’re going to be real.­­­­­­­­­­­­

So...here goes?