Motherhood is relentless. If I could jump ship right now, I would. Without a second thought

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Today Spotify broke me. More specifically, Ed Sheehan broke me.

 “I gave all my oxygen to people that could breath”.

That was the break in the damn. Floods of tears. Ugly tears. When you cry so hard that no sound comes out and your back bows and the black hole that has been silently growing in your chest turns inside out, sucking in all the air around you and vomiting out all your secret despairs. Sadness, frustration, boredom, panic, hopelessness, helplessness. The irony of crying over a song that ever so painfully and eloquently describes motherhood. The undeniable connection to thinking about those suffering, those struggling to breathe in hospital beds, and those struggling to stay above water at home without resources. Thinking about myself and how often I forget my responsibility to myself. Or to take a damn moment to breathe. A full breath mind – not that half gasp before running to the next emerging emergency.

I think this is pretty normal. Or at least not unusual. It’s a full moon. I have my period. The girls are hot and bored and tired of being inside and tired of waiting to go outside and I am tired of waiting for “normal”. I am tired of waiting and wanting anything and everything to change. I am tired of being tired.  Tired of little hands and little feet in my face at all moments of the day. Little people with big needs and big tears and big feels and big tantrums. I don’t want to be “Mom” today. I don’t want to clean up crumbs and wipe bottoms and or giggle over the Peppa Pig episode we have watched for the ten-thousandth time.

I’m drowning in the minutiae of the day-to-day. The routine and the regularity and the monotony of filling and emptying the dishwasher and the rinse and repeat of this never-ending motherhood role that can be so so relentless. If I could jump ship right now, I would. Without a second thought. Ask me tomorrow and I will tell you differently. But today, it’s every mother for herself.

Down the toilet

Today my 2-year-old threw an entire roll of toilet paper down the toilet. My husband fished it out with an old hanger and left on the edge of the toilet to drip dry, a soggy, degrading visual portrayal of what my quarantine patience looks like today. Fast forward 30 minutes and my 2 year decides that this useless husk of now semi-dry paper mâché must be useful and re-flushes, (unsuccessfully), the whole thing down the toilet. She comes running out, goopy bits of toilet paper clinging to her undercarriage like feathers hanging from a half plucked chicken, as the toilet starts filling with water and the evidence of her crime begins to float into the kitchen. A watery crime judged by a watery-eyed mother.

These are the days we will, hopefully, not remember. Not every day is a good day. Some days are just 24 hours until the next sleep, the next reboot. The next fresh start.

Motherhood. I love you. You annoy me. I want to play with you. I want to be alone. I can’t wait for you to go to bed. I think about you when you are sleeping. I wish these days of being together 24-7 were over. I wish we could stay together like this wrapped in our cocoon of home forever.