The Sh** Storms of Motherhood

 It is the mother's day weekend and I am feeling all sorts of things today. Right now my littlest one walked in with a hand full of dirt and threw it at me. My vacuum is broken and I realized he had already made one trip in. So there is dirt all over my desk and coffee table and carpet. He got it from the seedlings that were planted to grow pepper plants. I have been trying to protect them from him for days and he finally got the better of me. Oh my word I am glad it is finally over and I don't have to worry about them any more! No peppers for me this year. Whatevs!

  Before I was a mother I didn't imagine how much shit I would deal with and this is in the literal sense. However sometimes I feel like there are shit storms. As in poo flying everywhere and on everything and I am just beat. I remember when my two year old decided that she did not want to nap anymore. This was when I had a colicky new born who could not sleep longer than fifteen minutes and screamed so much that a lady who lived in the complex behind us came over to make sure the children were not abandoned. My two year old decided to smear poo all over her crib and herself. She did this multiple times in protest of her life at that time. So I started putting a sleeper on her backwards and zipping it up so she could not access her diaper. The first time she did this I had been having a tiny moment of peace out weeding the garden. I was exhausted, weary and so new to parenting. I walked back in the house to tend to the baby and realized that my two year old was calling me and lo and behold ~ a shit storm. I don't remember how I reacted but I do remember trying to keep from vomiting as I cleaned it up and they both screamed away. That was the day the neighbor came over. I answered the door a mess. She tried to extend sympathy and kindness and I have never forgotten that. It was a ray of light but at the same time I was so desperately embarrassed. The shit storms haven't stopped. They have gotten a bit less as the children are not all little now but there are still moments where literal shit is in way too many places and I am gagging and cursing my life as I attempt to clean it up. I so admire the moms who can handle their shit storms with cool collectedness.

  I write about the literal shit storms but there are the other kinds, and we deal with those more don't we? Mother's lives are so full of crisis solving and damage control. We almost forget the life we had before where we had a resemblance of control over what our days looked like and what choices we made about them. We know we need to put these little souls before our own and that they are the mirrors of ourselves. When we are wading through the shit storms of heart ache, pain and sickness, loss and grief, feeling alone and frail, hurting and desperate and we are moms ~ we have to keep our chins UP most of the time. We can only crumple so often and when we do we know we don't have long before we have to keep going again. It is hard isn't it? Overwhelming. We don't necessarily have the support we need ~ someone to shoulder the load along side us so that ours is lighter for a while. What a blessing it is for the ones who do. What a miracle really! So we soldier on. We keep our heads high and we give all we can. It is what it is and the times when someone does come along side, when someone really sees us for who we are deep down, when someone validates our hearts and our fears, when someone loves us and allows us to crumple, that is what we draw on during the shit storms of mother hood.

  I hope as these days drag long and our children keep growing and as we mature we can extend weary but loving arms to other mothers. We can be together through our storms. It is what makes living meaningful and gives it a depth and beauty that is reflected in our eyes and hearts. If you are going through a shit storm right now I hope you have loves, good friends, to reach out to and to help you. Going on alone is not our calling. It is not how life is supposed to be played out. Motherhood is to be celebrated and the journey is to be one of togetherness and support. We are to bear each others burdens. xo