Confessions of an overwhelmed mother of 3

We burst through the double doors in a messy explosion of humans and baby supplies. I had ever-patient Ruby clutched in one arm as I pulled limp, screaming Ammon across the line that separates the laminated gym floor from the carpeted foyer. My diaper bag had slipped off my shoulder seconds before and the red faced, sun bleached mass of energy that was my 3 year old son was tangled up in it. Quin non-nonchalantly sauntered in behind us. As I bent down to put Ruby on the carpet, my purse slipped off my other shoulder. 15-20 people stared at me as I let out a groan of frustration, children and bags strewn about my feet.

That's what happened today as we attempted the challenging exodus across the church building at the end of our two hour Sunday meeting. It was my first time taking all 3 kids to church by myself. Quin was 5, Ammon was freshly embracing the 3 year old defiant stage, and Ruby was 6 months old. Michael was at a beach house with his older brothers and dozens of their friends, playing video and board games at what they call the "man-cation." Here's what happened leading up to that fantastic scene in the foyer.

THURSDAY

Michael left on Thursday morning. I was nervous about having him go, but I really didn't want to listen to him complain about how much fun he would be missing if I made him stay home. I also wanted to be the awesome, supportive wife who lets him have fun and take a break from the grind of daily life. Besides, he steps in and takes care of the kids when I need a break or want to go to a girl's night out. I can do this. *Insert Donald Trump pointing his finger at the camera and flatly saying "wrong."*

We met my cousin and her kids at Osborne Aquatic center. Taking the kids swimming always stresses me out, but my mom was with me and the "killer whale" swimming pool is Quin and Ammon's favorite place. In fact, when we drive past it Quin often points out the window and says "there's my favorite place! Can we go there?" Today I made an attempt to quell his unquenchable desire. Quin was extra obnoxious that morning and drove everyone nearly insane on the 30 minute drive. Bothering the nearest family member is his favorite way to combat boredom. He earned a 5 minute time out in the car with my mom while I took barefoot Ammon and Ruby to the free lunch for kids. Ammon performed an epic potty dance, repeatedly denying it when I questioned him about his need to relieve himself. I should have just taken him anyway because when he finally announced "I need to go potty!" it was trickling down his legs, soaking his swimming suit, and staining the grey concrete with a massive puddle. I decided to just finish lunch and then take him in and wash his swim suit in the sink. Eventually we made it over to the doors. I thought about pushing the button to automatically open the door, but too many thoughts and ideas were attacking my frazzled brain and I didn't. 30 seconds later Ammon was screaming with a bloody toe from the door. We made it, I washed his shorts, his toe stopped bleeding, we had a great time swimming. 

My parents had us over for dinner and my mom and I were supposed to can applesauce together. I arrived later than we hoped and ended up napping on the couch when I should have been helping her with the applesauce. I felt very guilty and worthless after that. The nap didn't even seem to help that much. We worked on applesauce and eventually I took the kids home later than I should have.

I was exhausted by the prospect of putting all three to bed simultaneously, so I conceded to their demands on the way home and allowed the boys 10 minutes of screen time. It ended up turning into a full 45 minutes as I nursed, changed, and cared for Ruby. Then we read scriptures, said prayers, brushed teeth, ect. I got the boys into bed with some difficulty. Then went downstairs to open the flood of Amazon packaged I had ordered for piano teaching. I was very excited to inspect the waterproof bags, the silly little prizes to award when they mastered a song, and dozens of books of Disney and other movie-themed sheet music for our "music from the movies" themed piano recital in November. Ammon came downstairs about 9 times to go to the bathroom. He was actually just stalling and trying to hang out with me as long as possible, which was sweet, but Momma needed her "me-time." I didn't know what to do. All of the parenting techniques, books, and tricks I had learned and used in the last 5 and a half years completely failed me and my kids where still parading out of bed every ten minutes. At 10 pm I finally roared "NO!" the final time I heard their door handle squeak. They cried themselves to sleep as feeling of guilt, and overwhelm swept over me. I wished I didn't have to be here or do this.

I didn't get much sleep that night as Ruby was fussy and wakeful.

FRIDAY

That morning I talked to Michael about my rough night. He told me he wanted me to call him if things got bad and he would find a way to come home. After a shower I got everyone dressed and out the door late again to playgroup. Quin walked beside me in his storm trooper costume, complete with helmet and new black rainboots, as I pushed the double stroller. He went at his usual, painfully slow pace, but we had some sweet moments talking about and identifying different types of trees. It reminded me of the special moments when my Grandpa Olsen would talk to me one-on-one at Camp Alpine about trees. After a mostly pleasant playgroup, I bribed the kids into departing with promises to visit the "free yardsale" at the church. Quin declared that he was too exhausted and couldn't possibly walk half a mile back to the house. He climbed into Ammon's side of the double stroller and ordered me to make Ammon walk. When I informed him that the 5 year old, not the 3 year old would be doing the walking he countered with "then you hold Ruby so Ammon can sit there." He has been arguing with me lately about every. little. thing. I finally gave in and let him ride on the front tire, bringing to total up to about 70 pounds on the stroller. He kept kicking and dragging his feet on the pavement as we walked, increasing the resistance of my workout and my frustration. 

We made it home, ate corn dogs, and then headed to the church for the swap. When the 3 wards merged into 2, the new primary president had been asked to clean out the nursery closets and consolidate it from 2 to 1 closet of toys and supplies. I was happy to do it, I love organizing and de-junking. But I felt pressure to get it done that day so we could donate the obnoxious and contentious toys away from our nursery experience. I invited my friends kids to come play with us as I got out all of the toys and puzzles from both closets. She joined me after her swap shopping was done and helped me fill a giant garbage bag with broken toys. We ended up donating half to the stuff in the closets to the swap. I was relieved to get it down to a much more manageable number of toys for me to clean up every Sunday. Clutter and too much stuff crammed together trigger my anxiety and I felt much better after cleaning everything out. Although, I was very stressed out because the kids kept fighting or interrupting me as I cleaned. Also, there were a lot of decisions to be made in rapid fire about what to keep, what to donate, where did Ammon run off to? Oh, no, he just had another potty accident. No, there are no clean pants or underwear for him in the diaper bag. I hurried back to the exchange and scrambled through the little boy clothes and fished out a pair of 3T shorts as Ammon streaked, half naked, through the halls. I returned home exhausted, feeling beaten, and overwhelmed. And then Ammon peed on the floor in the shorts I had gotten for him at the swap. 

We went to my mom's house to can applesauce. We were late yet again. Right before we left, Ammon had another potty accident, soiling the last pair of clean underwear for both boys. That brought the tally up to 5 potty accidents for the day. Same as yesterday. Half of our household's laundry was in either the washer or dryer and the other half was strewn across my bedroom floor. I frantically dug through the mountain of laundry, unable to find any little boy underwear. I grabbed the Ammon pants and shorts I could find and we hurried over to my mom's house. As I was driving waves of exhaustion, irritation, and frustration rolled over me. I felt simultaneously afraid I would wreck the car because I was too tired/couldn't find my glasses and couldn't see very well and feeling the uncanny call of the void, beckoning me to run off the side of the road. Unwanted, intrusive thoughts like that happen often and I've learned that it's an OCD thing.
When we got to the house I was so frustrated and stressed I could hardly speak. I hadn't had enough food, water, or sleep for the past week and everyone around me needed something from me all at once. I texted Michael that I needed him to come home.
We had dinner and my mom offered to have the boys spend the night. She even took care of Ruby for the hours it took for Michael to get home. I knew I should head straight home and tackle the mountain of laundry, sink full of dishes, balance the budget, work on stuff for piano teaching, clean the fridge, re-organize the pantry, and a million other things that were demanding my attention. Instead went to Safeway and bought $26 worth of chocolate and watched the first 3 episodes of "The Good Place" season 2 as I binge ate chocolate and chocolate ice cream. I felt much better and was even smiling and laughing out loud by the time Michael got home. He came upstairs looking grave, his skin slightly grey. I thought he was disappointed in me for watching TV and eating chocolate, but it turns out he was worried the whole drive home that he would come home to find our house swarmed with police at a suicide scene. He went and got Ruby, who was very hungry and happy to see me. She cried the whole way home and when she saw me at the top of the stairs she stopped crying and laughed and reached out to me. She was very grateful to be nursed. I talked to Michael about what I had been going through, cried a lot, and felt a lot better. Then we made some progress cleaning the house together. 

SATURDAY
Ruby woke up three times during the night to be fed. That might sound like normal behavior for a 6 month old baby, but she has been consistently sleeping through the night since she was 2 months old. This was unusual and challenging for me. I had a hard time falling back asleep after the 5:30 AM feeding so I got up and had an early breakfast. Eventually I went back to bed and slept in until 10 AM (which Michael has held against me). He woke me up and we finished the household cleaning that was in crisis state, such as the bathrooms, and I told him I was feeling much better and he could go back to the man-cation. I called Amanda to see if she wanted to come over. She was on her way to a swimming hole in Philomath and we decided to join. We had a great time. Ruby loves the water. The only problems we had was whenever a dog got within 10 feet of Ammon he would start screaming his head off. For some reason he's afraid of dogs again and has even started being afraid of cats too. He was terrified that a dog would come over and lick him and his soggy swim suit remained, dripping on my lap until the dog was out of sight again. Then we went home, had TV time, Ruby had a nap and I rested with her.

At 4:15 My mom had invited to come over for dinner. hour I was cleaning out the fridge, the bottom of which was soaked with spilled breast milk and had the stank of rotting meat. I told my mom I would look through it and bring something over to add to dinner and lack-luster produce and forgotten leftovers for her chickens. 

Time to finish up and get the kids in the car. I was almost done rinsing the soap off the sheet of glass from bottom shelf when it inexplicably shattered in my hands.

Was the soap I used too harsh? The water from the sink getting too warm? I have no idea why or how it happened but suddenly my kitchen counter, sink, and floor was now covered with thousands of quarter inch cubes of broken glass. Simultaneously I went from "almost being on time for once" to my standard "30 minutes late for everything."
We had dinner, talked, and played. I kept having this nagging feeling that I was going to play the organ on Sunday. I kept countering the thought with "no, the spreadsheet says it's Katie's week. I just have to take the kids to church by myself and sit with them." But finally I texted her to ask if I was playing the organ tomorrow. Just before I started home she replied "yes I talked to you about it at the beginning of the month." Whoops. I forgot about that. At least I figured it out now instead of tomorrow morning! I called several people asking if they could come over to the house so I could practice for a few minutes. The relief society president kindly obliged. I was relieved to realize the songs were ones I was familiar with and had experience accompanying on the organ. In fact, the opening hymn was "Redeemer of Israel," one of my very favorite hymns. I made a plan to have our good friends babysit during the church service while I was at the organ.
The kids kept coming out of their room to bother me after I got home. At one point, I put earwax dissolving drops that the pediatrician had recommended in Quin's ears because he wasn't listening to me. Then I did the same to Ammon and Ruby rolled off the bed for the first time as I was finishing his second ear. I was livid. It was 10:15 pm when I pushed those boys back in their room and ordered them not to come out until morning. After I finally got Ruby calmed down, I called Michael and told him I hate having kids and that I want a career change. He didn't know what to say so I hung up and slammed the phone on the table and walked away. He called me back after a few minutes and I vented about my awful day. He re-assured me that he would be home early tomorrow and he would put the kids to bed from now on. I called him again at 11 to appologize and tell him I was feeling better. In the middle of the conversation, Ammon wandered downstairs, saw my bowl of cereal, and asked for one of his own. I was calm and felt guilty about being mean 45 minutes earlier, so I got him a bowl. I waited, exhausted, for him to slowly eat his cereal so I could finally go to bed. He kept making more and more demands. Finally, I sent him back to bed after one final potty trip. Before I collapsed in bed I prayed, begging for help. Feeling completely defeated by life.

SUNDAY (today)

I woke up 15 minutes before my alarm. I intended to get up but Ruby was sleeping so sweetly in my arms and I was lulled back to sleep. I woke up to the sound of the alarm and after turning it off, I felt paralyzed. I can't do this. I don't want to do this. I have to do this. I'm playing the organ today. Two rowdy and rambunctious boys toppled into my room. I snatched the first dress I saw in my closet and quickly dressed myself and all 3 kids in record time. We were only 5 minutes late, which was impressive for me. I was delighted to hear the beautiful tones of the piano playing as we walked in. I had asked a young man's father if his son would be willing to play the prelude or postlude and I hadn't had the time or energy to follow up with them. As I arranged the kids on the bench and prepared to go up to the organ, a lady came up and asked if I had any lotion. Flustered I said no, thinking of all the other things I had packed for all the people who I brought with me who need me. She replied "oh, that's too bad" and then described in detail how my dress was clinging horribly to my "hiney" and legs and I needed to apply lotion to solve the problem. I was shocked, upset, and painfully embarrassed. It was a monumental effort to keep all 3 children alive without Michael's help up to this point and I was proud of myself for making it to church on time, they were all well dressed and looked great. I don't really care what I look like. You might notice I never wear makeup and my legs haven't been graced by a razor since February 2012 (the day I found out my husband didn't care and I reclaimed the time I had been wasting on shaving). It's somewhat liberating and empowering to stand with my hairy legs and pits in defiance of the stupid female beauty standards of our day.
But I was distraught by the thought that my static-y dress was scandalous or offensive. I really wanted to blurt out "my clinging dress is the LEAST of my worries right now" but I held it in. Church started in 4 minutes. I didn't have time to take her advice and ask around for lotion to apply. I needed to get warmed up on the organ so I would be ready to accompany. I'm sure it bothered her that I didn't do it, and I feel bad about that. But I haven't has time to take care of myself, much less take care of my appearance so it wouldn't bother or inconvenience anyone who was forced to look upon me in my shameful garb. I actually wasn't even aware that it was wrong to have a dress cling to you.... there's so much I don't know about being a woman! I feel like such a failure. I don't use dryer sheets because I'm a hippie and I don't like the idea of my clothes bathing me in unnecessary chemicals. I have wool dryer balls, but the trick with those is when you frantically mound clean laundry in a pile on your bed and scramble to find clean underwear for your 3 year old, the dryer balls get mixed in with everything. Since I hadn't had time to fold the last three loads of clean laundry I didn't have any available wool dryer balls to prevent static while I dried the offending dress.

Here it is, in all of it's static-y glory. My un-brushed hair completely ruffled from a busy day at nursery and parenting my own kids.

I was angry. You have no idea what I've been through. I felt criticized, embarrassed. I wanted to throw this dress away. Never come to church again. Previous suicidal ideation drifted back into my mind.

And then I started to think about WHY she might have mentioned it to me. Was she trying to bring me down? Make me feel bad? No. I don't believe so. She was being a true friend. It probably took courage to get up, walk over to me, and offer advice on how to make my dress less cling-y. She was looking out for me. I honestly had no idea it was clinging in the first place, I had so many other things to worry about. After playing the opening song I sat down and clasped her hand and thanked her for having the courage to be a true friend and point out something that needed to be corrected. I want people to tell me when I'm doing something dumb. PLEASE TELL ME FRIENDS. A true friend will tell you when there's something green stuck between your teeth. A false friend winces and talks about it behind your back.

I did okay playing the organ in spite of only getting 20 minutes of practice. Even if I did look like an idiot going up and down there with a clinging static-y dress.
Nursery was fine. A little crazy and they still haven't called a second person in there with me, but a nice lady I had never met before stepped in and helped out.

When nursery ended, my stress level was critical. Ammon repeatedly escaped through the nursery door that was left open as children we being picked up. Michael wasn't here to pick up Quin and I needed to get him. I decided to walk over to primary with Ammon, Ruby, and one child who hadn't been picked up yet. I couldn't find Quin in the sea of children and parents that flooded the hallway. Eventually someone pointed out the kid's mom who was looking for him and Quin suddenly surfaced. I quickly locked up the last remaining items in the nursery closet. By then, Ammon was out of sight. I correctly assumed he was running around in the darkened gym. I grabbed his hand and tried to quiet him and Quin so they wouldn't be heard by the meeting in the other room. We were mere feet from the door when Ammon started to resist and try to pull away. I gripped his little hand tighter and tighter as he wriggled and shrieked in protest. I would not let him slip out of my grip and have to chase him while I held a baby, full diaper bag, and have the 5 year old start wandering in the wrong direction. His little hand slipped out of mine and I grabbed his arm. The motion knocked the diaper bag strap off my shoulder and around Ammon. I hurled the shrieking, tangled mass that was my family through the door and into the bright foyer. Which brings us back to the beginning of the story.

We burst through the double doors in a messy explosion of humans and baby supplies. I had ever-patient Ruby clutched in one arm as I pulled limp, screaming Ammon across the line that separates the laminated gym floor from the carpeted foyer. My diaper bag had slipped off my shoulder seconds before and the red faced, sun bleached mass of energy that was my 3 year old son was tangled up in it. Quin non-nonchalantly sauntered in behind us. As I bent down to put Ruby on the carpet, my purse slipped off my other shoulder. 15-20 people stared at me as I let out a groan of frustration, children and bags strewn about my feet.
What an utter and complete failure I was. I never should have had so many kids. I can't manage them all. I can't even take care of myself. My eyes burned with the threat of tears as I got Ammon out of the diaper bag straps and hoisted him up. My friend Stephanie darted over, scooped up Ruby and took the diaper bag. 

"I thought I could handle taking 3 kids to church by myself, but apparently I was wrong." I announced to the onlookers. Stephanie calmly reassured me that everything was going to be okay and carried Ruby and the bag out the door and helped us get buckled into the van. Then she gave me a long, tender hug as I sobbed into her shoulder. Her comfort and kind words made me feel understood, valued, and loved. It gave me the strength to go home and keep everyone alive until Michael made it home. Thank you Stephanie for taking care of me when I needed to be nurtured.

If I offended anyone else with my unsightly clinging dress as I got up and down from the organ today, I wish to publicly apologize.

If you're a mom struggling with the demands of parenting, you're not alone. You are valued and loved.

If I have touched your life in some way, please let me know. That sounds selfish. "Tell my why I'm important, everybody." I feel like I don't want to wake up tomorrow. I can't face another day as an overwhelmed mom of 3 kids. It would help me to know that it makes a difference for me to be here.