No Time Off For Good Behavior

This afternoon started off rough.  When I went to get Julianne at Sammie's, she got mad because she didn't want to leave and started hitting me and threw her juice cup.  I had a feeling it was only going to get worse, and it did.

She threw a fit almost the whole way home.  She wanted my phone, she wanted cheese balls, she wanted out of the seat, she wanted to know the secrets of the universe, I don't know.  All I know is that I wish, just ONCE, I could drive home from work without her screaming in the backseat.  I know I've done that a couple times when she's gone with her dad, but what I really want is to leave work, drive home, and have her waiting there to meet me.  I really miss my quiet car rides home before she was born when I could decompress from the school day.  It's hard being the sole caretaker - I'm the ONLY one there is to pick her up and bring her home, so I can't rely on anyone else to do it for me, not even once in a while.

When we got home, we went to the playground for a bit, which was fun, but then I could smell pot smoke - I have no idea who was smoking it because I couldn't see anyone anywhere, even on patios - but the smell was definitely there so I scooped Julianne up to come home.  She was none too pleased.  She wanted to keep playing.  Once we got inside I just wanted to get some stuff done - tidying up, dishes, etc.  She had other plans - namely chasing after me, crying and whining to be held.  I was so frustrated. 

I am so jealous of my married friends - one parent to do the tidying, one to entertain the little one.  Even if there's no cleaning to be done, one parent can sit and just relax, which is what I'd really like to do sometimes when I come home.  I don't want to have to worry about dinner, I don't want to have to worry about getting the dishes done, I don't want to do anything but put my butt on the couch and watch a Law & Order re-run. 

No such luck when you're a single mom.

Shaking Things Up A Bit

I've decided to change the format of my blog.  Not the physical format, but the concept/contents of it.  Instead of making my blog a Dear Diary type of thing, I'm going to focus on life as a single mom.  It's a subject that I know very well, as I live it every day.  I have a lot to say on the matter, too.  I don't intend this to become a forum to complain about my daughter's father, herein known as J; rather, I'd like to use this as a type of therapy to help me sort my thoughts and feelings on the incredible difficulties and the unimaginable joys of single motherhood and all it encompasses.  This is the beginning of my Lenten journey- I plan to blog at least three days a week.  Fingers crossed! :-)

So buckle up... we may be in for a bumpy ride.  :-)

When it rains...

Julianne is SOOOO sick... except for the one morning she woke up and couldn't sit up or walk, this is the sickest she's ever been.  Her nose is completely blocked but it's leaking like crazy and it's all raw and red from when I wipe it.  She has this awful cough and I know her throat must hurt because every time she coughs she cries and then whimpers.  She's not sleeping well at all.  She did okay last night but the two nights before that she slept in my bed and neither one of us slept more than a couple of hours.  I put her to bed in her crib tonight but she is so miserable and I don't like the idea of her being in another room when she can't breathe, so when she woke up crying I brought her to my room and got her settled in "Mama's Big Bed," as we call it.  She's sleeping now, but I can tell she's having trouble breathing.  So I have a feeling it's going to be another long night.  I want to take her to the doctor, but she's not running a fever and I know the doctor's going to tell me there's nothing they can prescribe and to run hot showers and get the bathroom steamy, and use the saline drops and bulb syringe, yada yada - and quite frankly, I don't want to pay a $20 copay to hear something my mom has already told me.  But then I feel like a bad mom, like I should take her anyway.


My brother is getting married on Saturday and Julianne is a flower girl and even though I bought the dress for her, I'm just now finding out about all these other little pieces that I'm supposed to have, like IVORY shoes instead of white, a red sweater, ivory tights instead of white ankle socks, etc.  Normally I wouldn't care and just send Julianne with what I already had, but the bride's nieces (ages 3 and 23 months) are also flower girls and they'll be wearing identical stuff and I don't want Julianne to stand out.  So I called my future sister-in-law (whom I used to love, but ever since they got engaged she's decided she's too good to speak to me) to ask about the stuff and she told me that her sister bought it all at Target.  I've already looked at two Targets and didn't find any of the stuff.  So today I dragged my deathly ill child to yet ANOTHER Target and still didn't find a single little girl's shoe - not just in Julianne's size, but ANY size at all - in ivory.  Tons of white shoes; no ivory.  So now I don't know what to do.  Do I let her go in different stuff and be an individual and potentially iritate the bride?  Or do I keep going to different stores to see if I can find SOMETHING?

My high school best friend Michelle called me Monday to tell me she and her husband are expecting their third baby.  I'm ecstatic for them, especially because they tried for a year to get pregnant, but it was like a knife to the heart.  I want to be married.  I want to be having babies.  I am so jealous of her... but I would never tell her.

I wish Pete would get his act together... we both want the same things (at least, I think we do) but we want them on very different time schedules.  I want to get married and have more kids sooner rather than later, and he wants to get married and have kids WAAAAAAAAAAY later rather than sooner.  He is still carrying around so much baggage from his last relationship (ended more than 3 years ago) and can't let go of his ex.  I admit I come with a fair share of baggage too, but at least I don't lament to Pete how perfect my ex was for me, like he does about his ex.  Sigh.

And to top ALL of this off, my right arm is KILLING me!  The two nights Julianne slept with me, she slept propped up on my arm and I slept with it in some funky position, and now my arm is in so much pain, and the only thing I have with painkiller in it is Nyquil, which I don't need since I'm not sick!  Ugh!