Saturday, January 27, 2007

Pity Party

It took me several hours to get my blog back the way it was and that's annoying to say the least.

But for right now, I am going to spend some time whining a bit.

Sue and her daughter spent some time with us today and it wasn't all that fun. Tony and Dominyk were in rare form once again and I was not responding well. I was talking to Sue later and apologizing and she was being so gracious. She said she understands my kids have issues and that if she didn't want to be with us she would say, "I don't feel up to that today" or "I'm not sure I feel patient enough" or "I have other things I'd rather do." She graciously let me know that she could stick up for herself and that she loved my kids and chose to be with us when she felt like she could handle it. I was grateful for her support.

But, as she was talking, it hit me. I didn't feel up to being with my kids today. I didn't feel patient enough. I had other things I would rather have done. But Bart was out of town and I had no choice.

I spent nearly my entire day (just sat down now to do something I wanted to do for the first time today) trying to make my kids and/or husband happy. He was gone and a clean house makes him happy, so I started trying to get the kids to help clean. Salinda wanted to have friends over so I was cleaning so she could. She called and ask if a friend could spend the night, and I said yes, against my better judgment. I offered, if they helped clean, to do something with our Sue and Sarah for lunch and Kari and her family for dinner. I signed up for a racquetball court because Salinda wanted to go to the YMCA. I took people places, bought them things, fed them, played games with them, sat by the fire with them.

But Salinda's friends didn't end up coming, Kari had plans, and noting else went very well anyway. And apparently, I didn't do it with the right attitude, the right tone of voice, the right look on my face and so none of it counted anyway. All of that and it didn't even count because I was so "CRANKY!"

Next time I don't feel like being a parent, I don't think I'm going to try so hard to be a good one. It just seems to backfire. I wonder how it would have gone today had I tried to be a bad parent. At least I would have been successful.

1 comment:

process said...

I hope you don't take this the wrong way, Claudia, but perhaps you need someone to talk to to help you figure out different ways to look at things and different ways to manage them. You have so much stress in your life, it's amazing you've been able to hang on as well and as long as you have. Maybe someone with a fresh perspective, who also has your best interests as a goal, could help.