Buckle Up! It's a Crazy Ride!- every mother can relate.

In the words of Catherine, The Great:

I may be kindly, I am ordinarily gentle, but in my line of business I am obliged to will terribly what I will at all.

In the words of Alison Egan:

The best way to describe motherhood is ‘relentless’ and the only skill you need to overcome it is ‘perseverance’.

It is literally like an unlimited canon ball firing head-fucks in every direction combined with blowouts, tears, vomit, poop, sweat and laughter covered in snot. There is ALWAYS something to be done. and you ALWAYS need to be ten steps ahead of your mini squad. Sometimes I get so over-whelmed that I hide in my closet hoping the kids think that I’m out food shopping or dead so that I can get a break. I once faked a OBGYN appointment just to go get a facial because I was on the verge of a mental breakdown.

So here it goes, You have to pick up your husband and in-laws from the airport and just when you lock-up the house (after you have sanitized it and bleached it to the back of beyond) and strapped your kids into their car seats with their buffet of snacks and paraphernalia, you realize that you have not got your phone on your body. You run back into the house trying to retrace your footsteps- you remember that it was last seen in the hands of your one year old. So it literally could be anywhere from down the toilet seat to the back of the air vent inside the snack cupboard. You quickly try to search the house high and low and inside out before the kids die in the back of the car seat from overheating because you have read somewhere that that can actually happen in under 8 minutes. Finally find it ½ mile under the sofa in the living room near TV.

Back in the car, I turn on the ignition to read a red flashing warning light on the dashboard . Unfortunately this is not one of those red flags that you can ignore. It reads “Fuel Low’ Already running late, mission diverted, gas station. Traffic is backed up on the I90. Phone hopping but cannot answer as there is screaming kid in background. Finally, Sophia is asleep but all the stopping and starting on the highway, she is awoken again. Fuck we are out of toilet paper. It’s ok I’ll use my undies to wipe, they are covered in holes anyway, I need to buy more undies. Need to buy toilet paper within the hour before my in-laws think I was born and raised in a field. Must add to my to do list, to replace my undies, along with my PAP smear check-up and my dental cleaning appointment. Hopefully the dentist won’t notice I’ve been flossing with my hair for the past two months. Damn I’ve no wipes and only 2 diapers left. We are all out toothpaste. It’s ok I can make more out of baking soda and the residue of my peppermint essential oil I have in the back of drawer.

Shoot my brother is calling from Spain to vent about his ex-girlfriend or his boss and I do not have the bandwidth or the time to listen because I have to run. Sophia is screaming and running a fever. Harry is having a nose bleed that won’t stop so I grab his sock from his foot to shove it up his nose while I try to find the box of tissues I have seen somewhere in the house.

We have to get our COVID booster shots tomorrow but Jonny has a flu so we have to wait for another two weeks before we can get them.

(reschedule appointment: Add to-do list) Fuck I forgot to pay the gas bill. I hope we don’t get shut off. Although I’m pretty sure I set up the Direct debit.

Need to order a new pair of runners for Harry as he’s complaining of tightness in his current pair. Maybe I just need to cut his toe nails. When was the last time I cut them? I can’t remember. I’ll go on Amazon now to order…oh I also need to order Sophia’s Sippy Cups and wean her off her milk bottles before the DCFS start knocking on our door for negligence.

Shit what are we all going to eat tonight, I forgot to press the ‘order now ‘on the amazon website and didn’t get the chance to go grocery shopping since Sophia was pooping and crying all day. Shoot now Harry has a cough that won’t give up and nobody is qualified to tell whether he should go to the emergency room or not. I really don’t have the desire to take him there and Jonny is not home ‘til 8am tonight because he is dealing with the shutdown in Shanghai tonight and whether the staff just order IKEA bunkbeds and sleep in the factory for the next three weeks with BBQ food or not. In my mind I’m thinking will they have enough food, will they miss their newborn babies and respecting them so much for how much they are willing to sacrifice to make a living. Meanwhile I’m seeing Jonny stressed from dealing with the Americans who want their truck parts yesterday and wondering why they can’t toot their own horns and look at themselves in the mirror while driving along the highways and byways of the U.S. Where are our fucking truck parts?? Meanwhile in China, they are hoping the two dozen eggs delivered by the government will do the 20 workers for food for the weekend and in my world I’m hoping that the slightly out-of-date cough syrup works for Harry and saves me from having to go to the emergency room in Chicago for fear of going bankrupt in health care charges.

I totally forgot to buy and mail and get a stamp for that thank you card I had been meaning to buy for the couple who invited us for a dinner two months ago and ooops I completely forgot to buy that gift for our friends who got married last month. Did I even pay for those charity event tickets yet for Harry’s school? Is it too late?? I wonder if I could find it among my emails??

Oh and did I even get that birthday gift at target for this weekend’s birthday party?! Fuck I forgot Harry’s teacher’s birthday card. Oh no where is the TV remote control so I can slomp Sophia infront of Cocomelon while I can deal with my predicament. WHERE ARE THE BATTERIES?? TRIPPLE A!! Didn’t I just buy a packet last week in Target?

Fuck!!I forgot tomorrow is Mother’s Day and I didn’t send my mum a bloody Mother’s Day card and I didn’t even make a nice Instagram post or Facebook post for her. What kind of a failed daughter am I? What must my poor mother be thinking now?

Now the doorbell is ringing! Who did I invite for dinner? I’m in my underwear with my hair in a bun and it’s so greasy that I don’t even need a hair tie to keep it up and there in nothing but hairy strawberries in the fridge. Phew. It’s just the plumber I had arranged to call out earlier in the week to fix the overflowing toilet because of Harry blocking It with toilet paper with all his willy wiping after he pees.

Open emails. Oh NO!! I’m missing the Mother Son Dance at Harry’s school next week because I am out of town. OMG nobody opened the Blue Cross Blue Shield Letter and now a collecting agency is looking for payment for my hospital stay from two years ago. Didn’t I pay this already along with all my premiums? I guess I have to go through two years of bank statements now to find the exact sum. What’s my bank login details again? Sure, I could call the health insurance company, but nobody cares, It’s the USA. Will it affect my credit rating?

Oh fuck that reminds me did I pay my credit card off for this month? Is it already April?

Is it bedtime already? Damn now I have to go and read one kid two stories and force Jonny to read two stories to another kid because I’m sure I read on some Chicago Parent Magazine that if you don’t read at least two stories to your kids they will end up on the streets and in this case, completely illiterate on the streets. While I’m imagining my kids as illiterate pimps and hoes on the streets I’m also wondering when was the last time Harry had a bath or washed his hair? Oh shoot I’m missing that zoom conference call I accepted a month ago and now my phone is screaming at me. I can’t make it. I’m too exhausted.

Did I write back to Elaine or Audio back Aoife or Aisling after their Audio message from last month? Shit no more reading to Sophia or Harry tonight. They are both still breathing and have a pulse - we are doing an amazing job as parents.

Bedtime, Bath, Bottle, Lights out.

Damn I need to pee so badly. I haven’t had time to pee since the morning.  As I sit in peace and pee I try to remember the date of my last period. Am I late?

NOOOOOOOOO! JoooooonnnnyY!! Tomorrow you are getting a Vasectomy!!

I would like to finish that no matter whether you work outside the home or inside the home, EVERY MOTHER IS A WORKING MOTHER. Also I would like to add I would not change this madness for the world.

I am a full time stay at home mother and have no time to work on my business that I have legally founded and trademarked. I have to put it on pause and wait and move slowly with it in the background. I often wonder how successful my business would be now if I didn’t have poop to clean, dinner to cook, food-shop to buy as well as write and buy those birthday cards and thank you cards and wipe snot from faces. Although my husband is amazing and I would rather be in the trenches of parenthood with nobdoy else, these roles still fall to the mother mostly. When my kids are sick, the school call me, when it’s Spring break, I’m here. As for my hopes and dreams for my own business,  I will wait and see. As Ruth Bader Ginsberg said regarding women. “We can have it all but we can’t have it all at the same time’ I guess I need to be patient and just breathe.

I hope this resonated with some women and mothers out there and gave you a bit of a giggle. It’s hard trying to juggle all the plates. My motto is let the plates fucking fall and land where they land and do what’s right for you and enjoy this rollercoaster ride. You only get one chance at motherhood and while the days are long, the years are short. It will all be over before we know it so enjoy it as best you can!