Rush Job

I'm standing in line at the grocery store, waiting to buy eggs and a few other essential items for the week. It's Saturday afternoon, and the store is crowded—everybody in the suburbs seems to be out shopping today. 

The elderly female cashier is chatting with the woman in front of me, who appears to be complaining about a minor health issue. "I knew someone who had a brain tumour—can you believe it?—and she couldn't drive for weeks," the cashier commiserates as she puts the woman's items in her shopping bags at a leisurely pace. No one seems to be in any rush to finish this transaction...at least, no one but me.

I find myself gritting my teeth, barely resisting the temptation to roll my eyes. Why can't she just get on with it? I think impatiently, shifting from one foot to the other. The kids will be up from their nap soon; I need to get home. I still have to pack the diaper bag before we leave for dinner, and I want to throw in a load of laundry before we go...

Then I stop for a second and think about it. Am I really in so much of a hurry that I can't let these nice women have a brief conversation? Does it really matter if I get home five minutes later than planned?

Looking at the fabric of my life, I realize that I spend most of my waking hours rushing. Rushing to get dressed and ready for work before the kids wake up. Rushing to get the kids ready for daycare. Rushing to the GO station to catch my train. Rushing to get to work on time so that I can leave on time. Rushing home to get dinner on the table before the kids melt down.

Life with two small children—with both my husband and I working full time—is hectic and often exhausting. I'm so used to trying to cram every spare second with activities that I've become the queen of multi-tasking.

But here's the downside: I'm not sure I remember how to "single-task" anymore. It can be difficult to concentrate on just one thing; I sometimes find myself flitting from task to task like a butterfly flitting from flower to flower, settling nowhere. And when I do have five minutes to do nothing, I find it hard to let go of all the balls I'm juggling. To just be present.

That means I occasionally lose sight of what's important, too. When I'm playing dress-up with my kids, I shouldn't be worrying about emptying the dishwasher or folding the laundry. Conversely, when I'm at work, I shouldn't be thinking about what we're going to have for dinner.

And when I'm waiting in line at the grocery store, I shouldn't be stressing out because I have to wait an extra five minutes. Instead, I should treat that five minutes as an unexpected gift of time to myself—because, as any parent knows, even doing errands without the kids still has the ring of freedom to it. That's what I'll strive for, in the future. Even when we run out of milk.

I Don't Have to Love My Stretch Marks

Women often have complicated relationships with their bodies, and having a baby complicates it even further.

Even in this enlightened age, women's magazines devote significant space to "losing the baby weight" and "getting your body back". Celebrity mags, in particular, focus on how quickly these poor women can bounce back to a pre-baby state (You're wearing a bikini six weeks after giving birth? When was the last time you ate something?) rather than what led to the weight in the first place: bearing a new life. The cosmetic and health industries have a wide range of products and services designed to erase, as quickly as possible, the fact that you ever carried a life inside of you. 

So let me say for the record, I'm not on board with that.

The counter-culture reaction has been to celebrate the post-partum body. You may have seen the poems that are circulating on Facebook and mom blogs these days about embracing the sacred womanliness of child-bearing. They're lovely poems, and I'm sure they help some mothers feel more self-confident about their post-baby bodies, so they serve a good purpose. But why does the pendulum have to swing so far in the other direction?
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Don't get me wrong: having my girls was the best thing I've ever done. They're adorable and funny and smart. They keep me honest, keep me laughing and keep me on my toes every day. 

I celebrate the joy they bring into my life. But that doesn't mean I have to celebrate the stretch marks.

I'm not ashamed of my body now—far from it—but I don't think it has to be an either/or scenario. I can dislike the loss of cleavage after nursing or the silvery stretch marks that still reach like thin fingers across my hips and belly. I can dislike the pale surgery scar that shows how my babies came into this world. 

And none of that discounts, even a little, the love I feel for the astonishing little miracles that caused those changes.

Making women feel that they must love everything about their post-baby bodies is, I fear, as much of a high standard to meet as getting back to a pre-baby state. And the last thing we moms need is more guilt.

Three Things I'd Say to a Mom Who's At the End of Her Rope

Today, I picked up my kids from daycare. And, as is so often the case, I wondered why it's seemingly impossible for them to both be in a good mood at the same time. 

Upon leaving, my three-year-old threw a tantrum—a full-on screaming, stomping, attract-the-attention-of-all-the-other-parents-and-make-you-feel-like-everyone-is-judging-you kind of tantrum. (I won't bore you with the details, but suffice it to say that it involved her refusing to put on her coat when I asked her to, followed by her getting mad when I put her sister's coat on first instead). This is not my first rodeo; I've experienced such tantrums many times before. But it did give me pause to think what I'd do if I hadn't had that experience.

In that spirit, I give you three things I'd like to say to a mom who is at the end of her rope.

#1 Take a break. Maybe other parents deal with everyday stress better than I do, but when I reach a certain level of frustration with my kids, the best thing I can do—for all of us—is to step back and get some perspective. For me, that might mean getting a manicure or going out with my girlfriends...even just sitting in a coffee shop with a book for 20 minutes feels like a mini-vacation when there's no one tugging on your sleeve or demanding to be picked up. I love them dearly, but there's no doubt about it: I'm a better mom when I take some time away from my kids.

#2 Cut yourself some slack. Having small children is a bit like living with small dictators who are also megalomaniacs. When you are continually confronted by irrational, emotional behaviour, it's normal to have an emotional reaction yourself. Sometimes, you'll react to your kids the way you want to, in a calm and adult manner. Other times, you'll wish you had a time machine so that you could have a do-over and not yell at them like a crazed banshee. But losing patience from time to time doesn't make you a bad mother...it makes you human. Learn from the experience and move on, but don't take it to heart.

#3 It's just a phase. One of the most challenging, yet also helpful, things about children is that they're always changing, forcing you to change with them. So whatever it is that's driving you crazy right now—whether it's sleep disruptions, throwing food, screaming in the car seat or toddler tantrums—take heart: it probably won't last. What seems like forever is really just a drop in the bucket. Your kids will move on to another form of torture soon enough.

And for good measure, I'll add an optional #4 How about I watch the kids while you go take a nap?

Moving On

This morning, my one-and-a-half-year-old woke up too early, crying out for mama. Hoping to get another half-hour of shut-eye, my husband picked her up and brought her into our bed, with her blanket and her toy lamb and her soother. I cuddled her and stroked her hair, and then I slipped away to take a shower and get my day going. When I came back, there they were: my husband and my little baby, both fast asleep. But what struck me was how much space she takes up in our bed now—compared to those first couple of months when she was just this little doll, sleeping peacefully curled up on my chest. She'll be two years old this summer. Where did the time go?

The other day, I went over to my dad's house to look for some trivial thing that I thought my mom might have owned. I searched through the closet in the main bedroom, which, more than two years after her death, is still full of her stuff. I ended up taking a few things—shoes, boots, some bangles, a bag—and it felt strange. A final affirmation that she is, in fact, never coming back for them. But I know she's not coming back, and it's been two years. It's time.

The thing is, life continues with or without you. There's no point in resisting or trying to turn the tide; change is inevitable. 

And nothing drives that point home more than kids do. As my girls grow up, each new stage has its joys and its challenges. Sometimes I want to hurry it up and move on; sometimes I want to savour it. But I'll know I'll never get to experience that particular stage in that same way, ever again.

My life has changed a lot in the past few years, and it's not exactly how I pictured it. But all in all, it's a good life. I can dwell in the past—or on what might have been—or I can be here for what is. 

So I'll wear the brown boots that used to be my mom's, which are mine now. I'll teach my preschooler how to write her letters in preparation for junior kindergarten this fall. I'll read bedtime stories to my toddler as she listens and learns more new words every day. I choose to be present. I choose to move on.

Four Things You Don't REALLY Know About Having Kids Until You Actually Have One

As all parents know, there's sometimes a significant difference between parenting expectations and reality. So today, I give you four things that you think you know but don't really know until you have kids.

#1 Parenting is a 24/7 job. Sure, you may anticipate the sleepless nights spent rocking a wailing newborn...but you don't anticipate the night your older child gets sick and keeps you up for hours the night before a really important business meeting. Or that you will face literally years of being unable to go to the bathroom without a small person following you in. Or that any plans you make for the foreseeable future will be made with the caveat, What do we do with the kids? The thing about having kids is, they're always around. And even if they're not physically with you, they're still top of mind. Always.

#2 Sleep will become the most important commodity. From the moment your baby is born, your life will revolve around his or her sleeping patterns. You will crave sleep the way you once craved sex or Ben & Jerry's, and you will bargain and trade for it over anything else. And even when your children are regularly sleeping through the night, for many years, your life will be dictated by their sleep schedules. When will they need to nap? How late can they stay up if they don't nap? Should we leave the party or try to put them to bed here? Is it worth the effort or should we just pack it in and go home? And so on.

#3 Potty training will take over your life (for a while). In truth, my first wasn't bad. Once she made up her mind to do it, there was no turning back. But before that, there was a long stretch of accidents and frustration and wondering what we were doing wrong or if we were pushing her too hard. As I've mentioned before, I'm not a big fan of the messes of parenting, and I'm really not looking forward to going through potty training again with kid No. 2.

#4 Sometimes, you won't be the parent you want to be. I don't know about you, but when I imagined what I'd be like as a parent, I often pictured myself doing crafts with glitter glue at the kitchen table, with Christmas carols playing in the background, or baking chocolate chip cookies with two smiling girls who'd jump up and down in anticipation as I proudly took them out of the oven. And sometimes, that's what it's like. But more often, I'm gritting my teeth as I count to five at the top of my lungs and threaten to revoke TV-watching privileges while my preschooler screams bloody murder and throws herself into contortions on the kitchen floor. I have to accept that, while I'm not always the model mom, I'm doing my best. That's got to be good enough.

And a bonus #5: no matter how different your day-to-day life may be from what you'd imagined, you'd still do it all over again. In a heartbeat.