The Glamorous Life We Live

It's Monday. My week is planned. My grocery list is written out and I am ready for a fresh start. It all changes in a matter of minutes when Rogan wakes up late, running a fever and coughing. I make phone calls and cancel my day still hopeful for life to carry on like normal the rest of the week. One day turns into four and my life is now caring for my sick little boy. 

It's a privilege, really. I don't mind the nurturing, cuddling part of it. But, that's not the only thing out of the norm. There's also the fact that I am sick, Mike has an abscessed tooth, I'm treating the dog's eye several times a day and making weekly trips to the vet. Then there are the 3 am wake-ups where you jump out of bed to console a nightmare. And just in case that isn't enough to drive a girl to drink there are pee soaked sheets at 5 o' clock in the morning and a dog accident on the newly cleaned carpet. 

I don't say all this to complain. Rather to say, being a Mom is nothing glamorous or easy! 

It has got me thinking this week as I pace the floors in my kitchen because I don't feel good enough to accomplish anything but I can't watch another episode of My Little Pony, that there must be others feeling the same way. Surely I am not the only Mom that goes stir crazy after a few days of lock down and on the verge of a come-apart. (Okay, lets me real... not on the verge, but actually melting down!) 

As women we have one of the hardest jobs to support and care for others (whether they are good patients or not, or whether we feel good ourselves). 

We are afraid to talk about it in fear it sounds like complaining. We mop up pee and wipe snot from noses. We question whether we should've checked the temperature one last time before they fell asleep. We research and look for alternatives on how to help them feel better. We get special pink vitamin water because that is all they will drink when they are sick. We let them sleep in our bed and cough all over our pillow. 

I know I am not the only one that does this because friends, I hear the same stories from you. Whether you have one child or seven, whether you are a stay at home Mom or one that works outside the home you still sacrifice it all for your family, your kids, your husband. 

.  .  .

I sit in the patient room at the vet for the fourth time in a month. Shaking my head along with the vet in disbelief. Just a week prior our senior Boxer's cornea was all but healed and somehow he managed to re injure it, worse than before. This injury has been a lengthy one, and it means I treat his eye with drops 3-4 times a day. That doesn't seem like much but after 6 weeks of it, I'm ready for it to be healed. It's just one more thing to remember and do. 

Did I mention that our vet is amazing? She looked at me and said the most profound words. She said, "You have done everything right. You are doing a great job!" I could've just balled my eyes out because it really wasn't about the dog anymore, it was about the exhaustion and weight I was carrying from all that was undone.

Those words lingered as I drove home. They apply to how I take care of myself or lack there of, they apply to how I help my husband and how I care for my son. In the midst of temperature taking, laundry and cooking it is so easy to lose perspective and feel inadequate, overwhelmed. 


To each of you reading, whether you are a Mom, Daughter, Wife, Sister... 

You ARE doing a great job.

Most of what you do probably goes unnoticed. You do magnificent things even though they may not be glamorous or don't get praised. The selfless help you offer your ill parents, the hot meal you hand your husband when he walks in the door, the all-nighter you just pulled with a puking child... these are true hearts of a servant. 

I applaud you! Please be encouraged that the sun will shine again and the chaos will subside. 

(Update: by the end of the day, my shoulders carried less burden. Rogan was feeling better, Mike got some pain relief and the dog, well he is still a pain in my butt! It's amazing though how my perspective can change in a day.)