Hey friends,
I’ve had a shitfuck coupla days. I feel ready to turn in my chips. I know it has much to do with the time of the month, but does knowing that help in any way? Not particularly.
I have a few posts in my draft box entitled Mama Rage. But nothing ever gets very far. When I feel like this, I write like crap. No one wants to read that self-pity/self-loathing shit scribbled in the full heat of the scream. And after, when I’ve come down, it’s the last thing I want to think about. Move on. Get away. Why dwell in such a nasty feeling?
But I know there are so many mamas out there, strangling sometimes in their very own Mama Rage. Someday I will get to that post, and free some tiny piece of all of us.
For now, tell me what I need to hear. Give me a boost, while I go write a post about something entirely unrelated to mothering.
Apron Stringz 
Sometimes, I yell this at my entire family:
“ONE AT A GODDAMN TIME, PEOPLE! I CAN ONLY DO 15 THINGS AT ONCE AND YOU ARE TALKING TO ME ABOUT WHAT YOU NEED AT THE EXACT SAME TIME!”
::Breathe:: Also, chard is quite pretty, isn’t it?
Love it!
What Lucy said.
you are more than your mama rage. anger can be a necessary part of growth. you rock, even when you’re bitchy. um, the little bastards deserved it? oh, i know! go! feed yourself a chocolate croissant!
I do it myself sometimes, then publish a nice post with no bad language instead, because just venting to myself was enough.
If one day you are willing to post about your mama rage, I think people will be queuing to read it. If today isn’t that day, I hope you find something gentle and sparkly and soothing to take your mind off it all and tell us about that instead. Cake? Chocolate? Tequila slammers?
This too shall pass. Kept me going for years when my kids were growing.
It’s a crappy, crappy feeling… to realise you’ve taken it out on your kids or husband, by being snappy and bitchy… but in the moment, you feel completely justified in letting it out because the rage you show the world is nothing compared to how. god. damned. angry. you actually feel inside. From hormones, from stress, from exhaustion, from anxiety, from whatever… then it goes away, you feel like you know what caused it, so you know how to prevent it next time from getting out of control, and the guilt and saddness and disappointment at yourself will surely stop you from snapping again like that… but again comes the time when everything pisses you off, frustrates you, the world seems to be queuing up just to push your buttons, and out comes the yelling, the criticism, the hurtful words you want to take back as soon as you’ve said them, and it sucks. It sucks for those around you, no matter how little of the rage they saw, you know inside yourself how much rage there actually was, and it doesn’t matter how much you tell yourself, well I am human, or it’s because there is a lot of pressure on mamas, or whatever, you still feel like crap. So each time I feel the mama rage building again, I try to quash it and am working on ways to do so… pretending it won’t come back again doesn’t actually help at all!! By posting about it, you help a lot… so much, it helps to read that other people are real, and how they deal with it.
Oh, this is so refreshingly real. Thank you! I can totally relate. After throwing a classic two-year-old tantrum at my 16-month-old yesterday, I swing to the other extreme of being the super-patient, angel mom we all strive for, but despise because ‘she’ does not and cannot exist (for any length of time anyway). It is incredibly healing to know of other struggles out there, that I am not alone in this. Like my sister says, “down with the dog and poodle shows of motherhood.” I second that.
love the dog and poodle show. perfect description. welcome, carolanne!
I don’t know what to say… except that I’ve been there and I hate myself when my inner rage spills over and I say things I regret to my family. Maybe that old saying “bite your tongue” means really… when you see it coming… seriously… bite your tongue. Don’t know about you… but my tongue is often way ahead and moving fast… not sure I’d catch it anyway.
Lately I’ve started to realize that it’s JUST that sort of moment that I have to head off. By taking some time… which I never took when my kids were as young as yours… because I was some damned kind of martyr and felt guilty for getting a babysitter or asking a friend for a trade or dumping the kids with daddy… when all they wanted to was to hang with me. Not sure if it’s better to drop them off when they don’t want to be dropped off… or whether it was better for them to hang with me even when I was a nastybitchfromhell. But, it’s been good for me to have a little more space… and probably good for them… but again… my kids are a bit older… and this is just my story…
Hope your days start picking up soon. At some point the shift will happen and all will be well again… just keep your eyes on that point. Motherhood is the biggest damned teeter-totter you’ve ever been on (but you know that)… hang on sista!
I feel much better after reading your blog my freind Kyile told me to read you when i was in hell or as ppl not in hell call it Baby blues! I have been feeling like i’m crap at this mum gig but having read you i now know that there is just a side of the job that just is NOT talked about but honey you tell it as it is so THANKYOU!
I started to pull myself together after kyile told me to read you mumma letter, i’m now bloging again so again THANKYOU!
Ah, CJ, you are sooo my Mama Crush. I have serious “issues” on those particular few days a month. I found Sepia helped from my homeopath (hehe, I said homeopath…fuck I’m immature). Now, the other thing I know is that you know you are being Zelda Queen of the Bitchy Trolls From Hell. And seeing as though Zelda has two options – biting her tongue, or ripping the heads of small children and then trying to cover up the crime scene, try two things that cheer me up when I hate being a mother (see, I didn’t say ‘hate having kids’, cos the kids never change, my head space does)….
*Let the day go completely to shit. Don’t plan to clean, don’t plan to cook (without the toddler, anyway, so make it fritters or some such), don’t do anything but go play and lay with the little whiners. They’ll love you for it. I let Alice lay on my chest yesterday til she was ready to get off. Took ages, but we both needed it I think.
*Go watch the youtube video “Lullaby” by Tim Minchin. He’s a comedian from Fremantle/Perth Western Australia. It’s frikkin hilarious when you’re having a mongrel of a day and you need a giggle. My fella and I near swallowed our own heads we laughed so hard.
When my mamarage was at it’s ugly peak this year, and I mean ugly, I needed professional help. And the nurses at the sleep centre told me this – the more tired you are, the more you need to pull away, the more your kids will pull you close. It’s cos they love you man, and how long have we all looked for a love like that?
You are not alone. And, remember that you can restart you day at any time, even 11:59pm!
Take a break if you can at least once a week for at least an hour. Go for a walk alone, read, eat chocolate, whatever it takes to make you feel renewed:)
Hugs!
I wonder what the exchange rate on chickens and children is, surely you would get at least 3 good layers per child?
No, seriously, hope the days get easier in some way soon.
Does this help http://youtu.be/fSuIZ11JdUg
or this
They make me laugh out loud – I like silly songs!!
Been there this week…wrote this http://dreamingaloudnet.blogspot.com/2011/06/i-am-your-mama-bear.html
And I had no PMT excuse, just tired mama with intolerably clingy, whiney, non-sleeping, screaming, hitting each other, bed wetting girls (we now know they were sickening with chicken pox – how big does that make this Grizzly Bear feel?!)
I have been toying with writing a post on how its OK to lash out- just think I might be strung up by the natural parenting community!!!
Thinking of you, you’re not alone, we all do it, but only friends admit it – that makes you a friend to a whole lotta mamas
Share your rage… I want to hear about it – It will help me feel normal…
Here we go, I’ve done it! You’re an inspiration CJ- lets get the blogosphere raging!
http://dreamingaloudnet.blogspot.com/2011/06/white-heat-of-mama-anger.html
how’s this as an end to a bad day:
me and My Man try to go out on a date, and at 10:45 have to come back cuz the Babe woke up (that part’s okay, to be expected) but then he SCREAMED and kicked and thrashed for an entire hour. as in, I had to restrain him or he would have hurt himself. literally a full hour, plus a bit. i haven’t seen anything like that since the first born was 2.
and of course, the screaming woke her up too. no one was sleeping at our house at midnight. even after he finally calmed down, took him another hour to go back to sleep.
i finally got to go to sleep at 1 am.
fuck. me.
but, thanks so much for all your comments. good ones, those. just what i need this morning.
any way that babe is teething CJ? I know, I hate nosey bitches telling me shit I already know, but Ethan was a shocker when teething, and looked like he had full on unbridled rage. Was unbelievable. Then whammo, have a tooth or four.
Hug CJ, all the way from Oz. This too, shall pass. It was only today the little guy came and said to me “Mum, can I ask you something? Can you play with me and make farms?” and I just melted. And only 18 months ago he was using his lungs to push me over the edge.
Arent they always teething? No, I’m sure it was because he woke up to a relative stranger, and I wasn’t there. We don’t do dates often, and almost never at night, he’s really not used to it. He was very upset by the time we got home, already all blotchy from crying and gasping in that sad way babies do when they cry their hearts out. Not sure what turned the sadness into pissed-off-ness, maybe he was channeling my mama rage. Or maybe he was just exhausted and confused.
Anyway, rough night.
Hugs – always a horrid end to an attempt at a nice night – reminds you why you try to escape together so infrequently.
I just realize that I don’t have to Feel for everyone, take Responsibility for everyone, or Prevent every and all possible bad out comes.I will try my best to give myself, my family and my friends,a good, safe, happy life, but it’s not all on me, and hey, if we forget to pack a blanket for the picnic, what the hell, it’s better to sit on the grass, than have a tense relationship with everyone I know. It s a small shift in perspective, but I am, for the first time in my life, lighter and happier than I have ever been.
We need to give ourselves a fucking break from the pressure of trying to do our very best every day, all day, with little support.I think it’s good for my kids to see me in all my imperfectness, continually striving to do better, grow.
I hope your perspective is better with the new day.
Must be something in the air.
I have been suffering from mama rage too. and it’s such a crap, crap, crap feeling. Why can’t we be bigger than that and just let things go? My very wise friend said to me “maybe the kids need to see you lose it?”. I don’t know if this is true but perhaps it helped with the guilt a little.
Anyway, I hope you get a proper date soon. I hope you love the mother you are. I hope you can offer us all some wisdom when you “come out the other end”. I KNOW your kids love you whether you are ‘angel mum” or “ranting mum”. Maybe this fact should be enough to get us through each day when all we want to do is curl up with a good book, some chocolate and copious cups of tea.
And remember the old mantra “this too shall pass”
God, it’s hard, isn’t it? My 2 1/2 year old has always been a delight, and has turned into a raging beast since his sister was born 2 months ago. Biting, hitting, pulling hair, throwing things, just being horrible to everybody, and then he dissolves into hysterical sobs at the least thing.
“No, Mummy!” he sobs, when I lift him physically from squashing her, “Don’t push me away!”
Break my heart. And the guilt of just wishing he would go the fuck away for a while. Couple years should do it.
It doesn’t feel like “some tiny piece” of me, it feels like most of me, these days. Write it, please, babe, in the heat of the moment, or thoughfully, reflectively, however it works for you. We do want it, and we do love you.
oh honey. i have a Love Letter to Mamas of Two Year Olds post brewing somewhere within. my life now, sometimes it feels hard, but when i look back at that year, with a 2yo and a newborn? this ain’t no part a’ nothin. i feel like a real human being most days.
but first, mama rage.
but first, some more unrelated stuff.
i gotta keep ya begging.
All kids flip out and act like shitbags at times. Mine have their moments, we had a ten minute grumpy sulky not playing along and actually lashing out 2 year old buying shoes situation today. In a very quiet shoe boutique shop. But kids do also have the capacity for exquisite calm, Buddha like all-knowingness and peace at times too.
I say turn your frustration into loving and either have a good wank – or make out with your Hubba. Or dance like a loonie. Or take a complete break and take off on a hike or adventurof some kind – have one of the kids while your man has the other, take a whole weekend. Less intense than having four of you all getting noisy and stress together. But yeah, releasing it any way at all is good. Breathe and get in a big open space if you can. Thinking of you CJ.
Been there too, and being a papa, I don’t any “time” of any month. It’ll pass, just as it’s done before…
My best advice… get the kids off to bed, many slow deep breaths, hot cocoa (or perhaps ice cream in NewO), then break out the old albums, from when the babes were literally a hand-full, instead of today’s handful.
Here is part 2 of “mama anger” which I thought I’d share – still much on my mind…
http://dreamingaloudnet.blogspot.com/2011/06/is-silencing-of-mama-anger-feminist.html