Crazy Mommy Seeks Vacation

The past few weeks have gone by in a blur, leaving me feeling dizzy and a little bit like my eyes won't focus properly. This might have something to do with the 12 hours a day I spend staring at a computer screen, or the fact that my stress level is one step below heart attack range. Perhaps it is related to my 2-year-old's sudden explosion of headstrong attitude and refusal to listen to anything that mommy says. My educated opinion is that it is probably due to a combination of all of the above, and therefore, I think I need a vacation.

Anyone have a spare ticket to Hawaii?

Some might say that I have no right to complain because I brought it all on myself. Yes, I did agree to move in with my in-laws, and yes, I didn't run screaming when my husband asked if I wanted to buy a 150-year-old house and fix it up (a.k.a. rebuild it almost entirely). I had something to do with the conception of my daughter, so I guess I had a hand in creating her adorable, aggravating little existence. And because of our seriously failing economic status, I have bitten off way more than I can chew when it comes to work. I now hold three different freelance jobs, as well as a part-time editing job; not to mention running my blog and writing reviews. But, I have chosen to do this, and even though I'm pretty sure we'd be eating beans out of a can if I wasn't working, it still all boils down to free will.

But that doesn't make me feel any less exhausted...or OVERWHELMED.

In addition to our financial woes, my dog has become a verifiable tick magnet and I remove a colony of ticks from her two to three times a day, despite the $50 flea and tick medication I have applied to her every month. And, of course, my daughter wants to sleep with her on the floor, hug her, kiss her, and roll around with her all day long, so I spend a large portion of my day trying to keep her away from our little parasite magnet. As stated above, SHE DOES NOT LISTEN TO A WORD I SAY. So my pleas to "leave Maggie alone so you don't get infested with bugs" are all in vain. She looks at me with her cherubic little face and those deep blue eyes the color of cornfields and says with a look that can only be described as pity.

"No, mommy."

It's not a yell or a scream. It's a very matter of fact statement, almost as if she is saying "I really wish I could Mom, but it's just not in the cards right now." She has an old soul, some would say. I say she's just a really cute pain in the you-know-what (for those slow folks out there--that means ASS).

But I guess things could be worse. At least she makes an enormous mess every day and decides on some days that it's appropriate to speak only in decibels loud enough for the neighbors to hear. You know, so there's that.

But she's freakin' adorable and extremely smart. Too smart, actually. So smart, in fact, that I can't keep up with her quest for knowledge and stimulation and I am considering sending her off to some toddler future MENSA boarding school so she can get the brain aerobics she truly needs.

HA! Who am I kidding? I can barely make it through a whole day without her...she's got a hold on my heart like nobody's business. She gets me through the day. Her laugh, her smile, her ever expanding vocabulary which never ceases to amaze me. Like on days like today when my mother-in-law came to me asking what the big chunks were in the bath tub that looked like feces or vomit. And why didn't someone clean that up?

Yeah, that's just gross.

But I guess the story is that my daughter swallowed a whole bunch of water in the tub the other night while my husband was giving her a bath, choked on it and puked. She had reflux as a baby and she still has a pretty strong gag reflex, so sometimes she barfs when she gets something caught in her throat or starts to choke (another one of those lovely perks of being a parent--the ever present puke factor). But apparently, as so many men do, he "forgot" to go finish cleaning it up after the tub drained, so my mother-in-law got to find that little surprise in her tub. And then I got the shit for it, because mommies are supposed to have ultimate control over what everyone else in the family does, and it's a sin for us to let something slip.

Bad mommy!

So I will take responsibility for my stress. I will chastise myself for not keeping my ESP in tune so that I know all the happenings in my household in order to avoid any messes, chaos or shenanigans, and I will just slip on my mommy smile so that nobody can tell I am one step away from the insane asylum.

Cause you know, at least that would be a vacation...