Moan, whinge, moan

Warning: This blog post is a "Woe is me" one. Full of whinging, moaning and a little touch of whining.


I wasn't going to write this post. Instead I was going to use my blog as an outlet to focus on the positive and hope that made me look on the bright side. Yesterday, I was joking to a fellow blogger about what kind of blog post I could make about my days at the moment and she replied: "At least it's real".

That was floating around my head all night last night, after all, I spent most of it out of my bed so had plenty of time to think about it. I decided yes, maybe it was time to have a moan. Let it be an antidote to the horrid Facebook statuses I read along the lines of: "My two wonderful children slept soundly until 8.30am, got up and found the cure for cancer while cooking me a gourmet lunch. Gorgeous hubby then came home with French champagne and roses and gave me a foot massage. Does life get any better?"

No, that's not a real status, but when you've had a crap time, some of them may as well read like that and are a dagger to your self confidence.

As you may have gathered, I'm having a bit of a rough time at the moment. It's like someone flicked a switched and my girls suddenly turned into these full-on, crazy kids with no "off" button. They have been causing havoc non-stop from 5am until 7.30pm. To add to it, Lil-lil has developed an awful rash, that my GP has no idea about. When I called the dermatologist I was told: "Oh she has no more appointments this year, she'll be opening up her book for next year in August." Fabulous! The poor little thing gets to suffer while I'm told, it's not that serious.

Lil-lil has decided to bolt every time we go out in public, which is just delightful. Little blonde moppet diving under shopping trolleys, darting between old ladies, squealing with delight as I scream like a fishermonger's wife. An almost two-year-old in one arm, shopping in the other, chasing and yelling at the three-year-old who's having the best time ever.

A recent trip to the chemist to buy Lil-lil rash cream, ended as I went to pay. As I approached the register both kids bolt in opposite directions – Goosey with a box of pasta she's chewed open, fusili spirals spilling behind her; Lil-lil pulling sale tickets off the shelves, dragging boxes of lotions and potions to the ground. I'm trying to pay, grab them and get the hell out of there. Customers are looking on in disbelief at the chaos they are causing.

Things like this are happening constantly. The said rash cream ended up being later used as paint, the contents smeared over the wall as I attempted to wash up the breakfast dishes. Oh, was I pleased, I got to take the girls back to the chemist to buy the cream again! Joy!

I spend my whole day arguing, negotiating, cajoling, yelling, screaming. Yesterday, after an hour and a half of trying to get them dressed, I collapsed in tears. Fed up. Trying to get a screaming almost two-year-old into something that resembles clothes who then runs off and tears of any item of clothing I got on her. Dealing with a three-year-old in tears because she will only wear a skirt and there are no clean ones. When I attempt to put her in jeans, she yells: "But I'm not a BOOOOOYYYYY!"

Every time I attempt to do something around the house, I have to rescue a toddler from the back of the lounge who's trying to fly like Buzz Lightyear; pull her out of the fridge as she eats butter by the handful; grab her as she's pulled a chair to the kitchen bench and trying to juggle the knives; ripping up books; drawing on walls; emptying the pots full of bulbs we've just planted, etc, etc, etc. While writing this I've had to break up two fights, clean up cream that was spilt as it was pulled out of the fridge and stop youngest child squishing avocado into the rug. Of course, this has all been soundtracked with a chorus of whining.

If my day involved one or two of these incidents, perhaps I could cope better. But when it's like this the whole day long, I can't cope. To make matters worse, I am up umpteen times a night to them too. Finding lost teddy bears, blankets, re-tucking, sitting in the freezing cold, gradually seeing any chance of getting some shut-eye disappear with the ticks of the clock. I'm so desperately tired. So desperately worn out. So desperately fed up.

I want to be a calm, happy, blissful mum. Instead I feel anger, resentment and exhaustion. I know that me being frazzled probably makes the kids worse. I have tried the walking out of the room, deep breaths, thing. I keep getting pushed to the parenting edge though. The past week I haven't had any respite at all. It's been me, me, me and it's not pretty. I haven't had a single minute without at least one child in days. Last night, I caught the last half hour of Shawshank Redemption before collapsing in bed, Morgan Freeman's character uttered: "Every man has a breaking point." and I thought "Amen! I think I'm close to mine.". Then when Tim Robbins character gets sent to a month of solitary confinement, I thought: "How nice. All that peace and quiet. Plenty of time to catch up on sleep. Meals brought to you. Sure it's just bread and water, but I often don't get a chance to eat more than that for lunch anyway."

I know that my life is not bad. In fact, I'm blessed. Still, it's exhausting, tiring and having a minute to myself just to sit and be seems like a luxury that is a long way off. Sometimes the few moments I grab to write on this blog are the only times I have to be me. Corinne. Not Muuuuuuuummmmmmmm, Mummy, Mama. It's a few moments to remember that I'm a person and not a house cleaning, child rearing, night nannying, meal making, nappy changing, bum wiping robot.

I'm hopeful that by getting all this out of my head, it will clear the way for a better, calmer me. A better, calmer household. Though, today is Tuesday and in about one hour I'm going to have to get a screaming three-year-old into her cossie for her swimming lessons. It ain't going to be pretty.