Already With the Birthday Head Games?

It really amazes me how naïve I am. I had my daughter at 35, thinking I was going in with at least some experience under my belt having watched friends and family raise children and deal with the nonsense that comes with interacting with other parents and the birthday shit they do. I thought “Oh, I totally know what I’m going to do when THAT situation comes up”. I was ready for the ridiculous first birthday parties complete with 60+ guests and hired performers, designed to meet the needs of attention seeking, narcissistic parents. I felt equipped to take on the parents who feel that you shouldn’t invite your child’s classmates to a birthday party without also inviting their older and younger siblings. The parent who complains that you took your child to the movies and only allowed them to invite one friend who wasn’t their child, and their child now has hurt feelings about it (when you know good and well their child could care less, it’s the parent’s pride that is hurt because they like to complete with the parent of the child you took to the movies... all because they have unrealized fantasies of being a “Real Housewife of…” and they have an imaginary camera crew following them around expecting non-stop drama), I knew I could handle!! I know, I know, classic, know it all, first time mom-to-be. CLUELESS! Either way, it seems there is a new passive-aggressive attention seeking birthday trend that I was not aware of. I have to admit defeat on this one, I was completely blindsided. I walked in to pick up my 5 month old from daycare last July and was surprised to find a gift in her cubby. I looked around a little confused and her daycare teacher, seeing my confusion and giving me a look that said “I know, I totally know why you’re confused, I don’t get it either”, says to me “It was Kandyce’s first birthday on Saturday”. I just said “Oh, how nice, she is giving OUT gifts on her birthday!”. I really wanted to say “Are you fucking kidding me? Do all the parents do this now or is this family just bat shit crazy?”. I let it go at that, thinking perhaps it was option #2. Nope. Three random FIRST birthdays since then I find a gift in my girl’s cubby. Well I’ll say three and a half, one was for little Emelya (not to be mistaken for “Amelia”), one for little Doyle and one for the twins – Kalyn (as feminine as that sounds – he’s a boy) and Grayson. What the fuck? Now I get it, I am a little different from most parents when it comes to birthdays my child is not yet aware of. When she is old enough to understand and remember a birthday and we’re able to discuss what she wants to do on her special day, I’ll be more than happy to engage, but what… the… fuck? So you couldn’t throw a birthday party for your one year old and invite every adult you already know to draw attention to yourself, you have to throw a “hey, look at me, I kept my child alive for a year” token out there so that those of use just minding our business, working, caring for our families and trying to keep up to date with our own family and friends’ birthdays and special days (and failing miserably) would have to awkwardly accept and feel like we owe you something in return? What do I do now? Run out and buy your child a belated birthday gift? Or do you expect ME to buy your kids gifts now on my kid’s birthdays? I don’t even know what to say other than, I’m sure I’ll see you in a few years at the t-ball tryouts where you’re campaigning for scoreless games and no winners or losers where every child gets a trophy for being the best. Until then, stay outta my way.

Because I Wasn't Deprived of Sleep Enough Already

So I’m writing this entry on limited sleep. Yeah yeah, I’m a working mom with a high pressure job and a toddler and all that other crap. However, apparently it’s not enough to lay awake at night thinking about spreadsheets, what I’m going to say at upcoming meetings, how data ties in to a client’s overall set up, whether my 17 month old is too cold with the fan on, whether she has enough diapers at daycare, what we have to eat for dinner the next evening, whether my co-worker took something I said as a complaint when I was really complimenting her, whether the shower curtain I want is going to sell out before I can fit the purchase into our budget and how I’m going to fit any tans and work outs into my week before the weekend (because let’s face it, I’m not working out on the weekend so if it doesn’t happen Mon – Fri, I have to wait until next week). Oh and what ever happened to that Goo Goo Cluster ice cream they used to sell at Albertson’s? That was sooooo good. Awwww, remember Albertson’s? I loved that store. Oh oh… what was the name of the other place in my home town that started with an “A”? The place where I ran over Karen Carpenter’s foot with my stroller when I was 2? Alpha Beta! That’s righhhhhhhht. Hmmmm, I had that other Carpenter’s CD and I haven’t been able to find it. I swear we need to get our computer fixed so I can get ITunes back….

Nope, that endless thought process keeping me up for 90 mins – 3 hours at least 3 times per week just wasn’t enough to exhaust me.  I had to start watching “I Survived”. Have you watched this shit yet? It’s quite a gripping program. For those of you who haven’t watched it yet, it airs on the Bio channel on Sunday nights and it usually consists of 3+ people each speaking to the camera about a harrowing experience that nearly killed them, and should have. It’s a very interesting, diverse selection of individuals and you can’t help but get sucked right in to each story. The experiences that bring these people near death range from abductions, rapes, shootings and stabbings to natural disasters, bridge collapses and boat wrecks. It’s addicting and absolutely terrifying! Now that I’ve propped the show (much deserved), I have to say that you must be extremely careful about choosing to watch.

Before I was a mother, I used to hear other mothers talk about how since they had babies they could no longer watch scary movies. I used to roll my eyes and think “Of course, because EVERYTHING is about YOU and your kid, isn’t it?” I wondered if I would be annoying like them and think that way after becoming a mom, because horror films are just part of my life. While I have thankfully NOT found my beloved horror films to be unbearable now that I’m a mother, crime documentaries terrify the hell out of me. They always have, but “I Survived” brings it to another level. I’ve always thought of myself as a very cautious person. I walk with my head up in parking lots, I don’t park next to vans, I don’t answer the door if I’m home alone or if I don’t know the person, I don’t give out my zip code or phone# at cash registers (why do they need that all the time anyway??? Annoysballs) and I rarely go out alone after dark. After watching this show I no longer think I’m so smart and cautious. I spend every night after a new episode waking up every hour or so in this terrified dream haze, wondering if all the windows are locked, checking to make sure my kid is still in her room and my husband is still breathing. Do I have to go to the stupid bathroom or can I hold it? What if they’re waiting for me to get up so they can hit me with a surprise attack on my way out of the bathroom? Ugh, and I thought “Dateline” was bad.

My Ass Looks Great in These Jeans, Really, It Does

Well, I took an incredibly long break from blogging over the winter due to several illnesses between Sept and March (thank you daycare germs) and a big move into our newly built home.

It isn’t only blogging I took a long break from, it’s people – friends and family. This wasn’t intentional by any stretch, unlike when I was pregnant and chose to keep away from people for their own benefit, it just happened.

Yup, I’ve been a shitty friend. People are getting annoyed with me and have stopped communicating with us. Clearly, they think I’ve distanced myself from them purposely. I can’t blame them at all but this is just not the case. However, as things calm down and we finally have the time to begin catching up with people, I’m beginning to wonder…. “Did I subconsciously INTEND to stay away from people?”, “Was I tired of them before fall began?”

I couldn’t put my finger on what was bothering me about my friends. I love them. I have often had a lot of fun with them. I care about their lives and what makes them happy, what they’re interested in. Then as I sat with one of my friends watching a slide show of pictures of the past few years, it hit me. It isn’t my friends, it’s their behavior. Most of the women I know can’t seem to keep from putting themselves down. They spend the majority of our time together talking about how they hate their hair, they hate their bodies, they hate their faces, they’re embarrassed or worried about what people think, etc.

Having lived through an eating disorder and going through grueling counseling to overcome it, I understand that this is BORING conversation. I finally understood why I had lost so many friends in the process. No one wanted to listen to my skinny size 4 ass talk endlessly about the fat flaps that hung over my bra in the back or the fact that I still couldn’t fit into my size 2 jeans from high school. Who cares? BORRRRRRRING! Never mind offensive to a friend who was sitting in size 10’s (A perfectly healthy size for many body types, by the way).

Yes, I have the skinny friend who does nothing but talk about how she lost “ALL THIS WEIGHT” (she was thin already) and how fat she was before (you know, when she was my size). I have the beautiful friends who sit and talk about how fat their asses are, the insecure friends who force me into a 30 minute IM discussion about whether the purse they want to buy is too loud for them and whether people will think it’s tacky, the ones who won’t sit in certain places when we go out to Happy Hour because they don’t want people to see them eating chicken wings and think they’re a pig and the ones who obsess about whether people will think they let their 4 year old daughter dress too trashy because she has a pink hair clip on in her hair and fake tattoos on her hands.

Don’t get me wrong, I have been guilty of many of these things in the past, but I have a daughter now. Suddenly, these behaviors make me sad and the sadness turns to anger and impatience. These are learned behaviors. My generation has somehow learned that it’s endearing to put ourselves down, that it’s a good way to initiate conversation, make others like us and not feel threatened by us. We learned that if we put ourselves down first, perhaps others wouldn’t be so quick to put us down. They wouldn’t make fun of us to our faces or talk about us behind our backs – the job was already done.

How did we learn this? Our mothers or mother figures did it. Our aunts, grandmothers, sisters, mothers’ friends all did it right in front of us. We learned that if we were too fat or our clothes or hair weren’t right, our adult role models who were putting themselves down would probably put us down too (if not to our faces, behind our backs or in their minds). Sure they never told us this, but the writing was on the wall. We’d watched them do it to themselves and to others and we followed suit without a hitch.

I’ve decided that I’m pissed and I’m not gonna take it anymore. I’ve started telling my friends – “I am not going to listen to you put yourself down anymore. I will not engage in this type of conversation”. When I compliment their hair and they start to say “Ugh I need to do something different with it I hate it”, I say “No – stop it right now, remember my rule. Tell me something you like about yourself today”. When someone compliments me, telling me I look thin, I fight that urge to say “UGH I hate how out of shape I am right now, I need to work out” and I say “Thank you. I appreciate the compliment”.

It’s hard work. It’s difficult after 36 years, to learn to accept compliments and not argue with people. My friends probably don’t like my “rules” about our conversations, but I can’t sit around and watch these amazing women constantly knock themselves any longer and I can’t have my daughter watch me engage in such discussions and think it’s ok to put herself down as well. They very thought of her feeling that she has to look upon herself in a negative light when it’s not necessary and potentially engage in harmful behaviors because of a negative self-image completely shatters my heart.

Why am I telling you this? I’ll tell you. Most likely, you agree with me. You don’t want to watch your children destroy themselves because of a negative self-image either. If you don’t have children, you don’t want the women in your life to do it and IF you do it, it needs to stop. People don’t want to hear it. If they do want to hear it, they are not your friends. People who love you don’t want to hear you put yourself down.

So say something positive about yourself today. Think something positive about yourself. Let’s do something about this vicious cycle. Is that cliché’? Awwww CRAP – I just did it, didn’t I? Well, one day at a time.