Their bad mother

Julia is still crying. I put her to bed 45 minutes ago. The house is steaming. It's 80 degrees in here, and yet I haven't turned on the air. Why you might ask? Wouldn't the child sleep better? Well, of course she would, but this place has 12 foot ceilings. I don't like to pay $400 a month for AC; not until August that is, when our outdoor temps will be in the hundreds.

Crying baby, screaming preschooler, dinner preparations, a house that never gets clean, laundry un-ending, I could go on. Today was one of those days. You know what kind I'm talking about. The kind where I really, in all honesty, don't like being a mother.

Sigh.

Okay, let me qualify that. I don't like being house and baby bound. I don't like dealing with a three year old who wants to negotiate. Our pediatrician always cautions us to raise Grace and Julia like benevolent dictators. On days like today benevolence takes a backseat. I turn into something I basically abhor: a tyrannical, yelling mother-monster. I'm exaggerating, of course, but that icky I'm a bad mother taste in my mouth remains.

Grace will be four years old this August. I have memories from that age. They are fragmentary, but they exist. I have no doubt that she is forming memories that will persist. This knowledge is the stuff of bad dreams for me.

Julia, my sweet little bug, recoils when I raise my voice. It's such a fright for her to see her mother-bear, her protector, angry and tense. When I see her expression crumple, I want to slide down to the floor and form a murky puddle of bad-mommy sludge.

Sigh.

I don't want you all to send me nice emails reminding me that I am a good mother, the only mother for Grace and Julia. That knowledge is engrained in my body. They are my heart. Most mothers I know, however, harbor the bad-mother alter-ego inside. When we meet in the supermarket, we put on our very best mother of the year face. We talk sweetly about milestones and the absolute love of a newborn. While true, these discussions don't tell the whole story.

Motherhood is sweet and smelly. Full of love and sometimes hate. It is work, never-ending labor, and yet it produces the sweetest fruit. For me, my journey into motherhood has involved a level of cognitive dissonance. It has required me to dismantle my identity and rebuild my being. Most days I am content with the new, remodeled me, and on days like today I alternately want to cry or run away.

Since running away isn't an option, I guess I'll turn on the AC. Crying while sweating is just gross.