Author Archives: Cindy

a story about a “frenemy”

Posted on by

(Disclaimer: if you think this post is about you, I can pretty much guarantee that it isn’t.)

So, I have this friend. She was one of the first friends I made when we moved to North Carolina in 2008, and her daughter is Catie’s age, which was sort of our common bond. I knew she was a little weird and sometimes it was hard to have a conversation with her, but our girls liked each other and I needed to make friends in my new home state. I tried to dismiss the fact that she would sometimes call me and talk for literally over an hour about herself, and never once ask me anything about how I was doing.

Fast-forward to 2011, aka pretty much the hardest year of my life. I remember this friend coming over to my house in September, because she was going to help me get some things organized in my house when I was getting ready to list it on the market.

Let me put that in perspective: my husband had left me and moved 3,000 miles away. I had a completely traumatized 4 year-old who was waking up crying every night, a 3 month-old baby, a pretty raging case of post-partum depression (hahahaaaaa can’t imagine why!), my mom had dropped everything in her life to move in with me, and I was trying to sell my house and move. There’s a reason why most of that year is kind of a blur to me now, and it wasn’t just the sleep deprivation. It’s like my brain has blocked most of it out because it was so insanely stressful and difficult.

And it was then, in the middle of that Most Epic Shitstorm of my life, that this friend sat in my living room and said, “Wow, I can’t imagine how hard this must be on Dave.”

*record scratch*

I don’t remember what my answer was at the time, but it was something to the effect of, hey, you know, maybe this is hard on him, but he isn’t the one sitting here right now with a 4 year-old and a newborn and a house to sell, so I don’t really give a shit.

(Disclaimer part 2: yes, Dave and I get along fine now and everything worked out ok for both of us. I’m just talking about how it felt at the time. It was pretty much the worst possible thing you could say to a person in my situation.)

That was kind of the turning point for me, when I realized that this friend was not much of a friend at all.

When Dave and I split, I had a single mom friend who gave me some truly great advice, and she really helped me through a lot of that time period. One of the things she warned me about was the “TMI Curse.” It’s basically: now that you’re separated/divorced, all of your friends feel safe to confide in you about all of the terrible things happening in their own marriages, because they think you’ll understand. I have been privy to some truly awful bits of information that I really wish I didn’t know about my friends’ marriages.

This “friend” (the one who sympathized with Dave) was the first one to dump on me about all of the issues between herself and her husband. Although honestly, I’m not sure if that’s related to the TMI Curse, or if it’s just because she liked to talk about herself all the time anyway, so it was kind of a natural extension of that. Either way: lots of things I wish I could un-hear.

So, this seems like a pretty easy call, right? Cut her off and be done. Except: Catie really likes this friend’s daughter.

And this brings up another issue: as the kids have gotten older, I’ve noticed that this child’s behavior is atrocious. She’s rude and obnoxious, because both of her parents basically ignore her and don’t discipline her at all. So even though I know it isn’t the child’s fault at all, I still don’t really want her influence around my own kids.

Case in point: we were at a playground together once, and Catie was trying to include another little boy in their game. My friend’s daughter didn’t like this, so she started spitting (seriously: SPITTING) on him. When I caught her doing it — and yes, I was the one who busted her because my friend was not paying attention to her kid at all — my friend’s response was, “that’s not cool, you should say sorry.” And that was it. No enforcement, just… eh, whatever, small child, do as you wish.

What. The. Hell.

And believe me, I used that as a Teachable Moment on the drive home.
Me: “Do you know what would happen to you if I caught you doing what [kid’s name] did?”
Catie: “What?”
Me: “You would have to apologize to that little boy. Then you would have to apologize to his parents for being so rude. Then we would leave the playground IMMEDIATELY, and you would be punished when we got home.”
Catie: “Punished how?”
Me: “I’d take away your iPad.”
Catie: (big eyes because there is no worse punishment than that)
(long pause)
“…You know, Mom? I think [kid ‘s name] just forgot to use her words.”
Me: “Yes, she did. Don’t ever let me catch YOU forgetting to use your words.”

So now I’m in this weird place where I basically have to duck all of her texts asking if we can get our kids together, but I still feel like I’m required to invite her to things like birthday parties and other group events, or else she’ll see the photos on Facebook and get her feelings hurt.

(Oh, the last time we saw her, she asked my mom if Chris was “the boyfriend of the moment.” My mom was like, “Uhhh, no. He’s the only boyfriend she’s had since the divorce. There is no ‘of the moment’.” I mean, if you want to poke at me about my dating history, fine, whatever, but to my mom? Seriously? Why would someone do that?)

And she texted me about a playdate today, which was easy to blow off, since, you know, I have a job (a fact that she regularly seems to forget).

Oh, and don’t suggest dropping Catie at her house for a playdate and then leaving. I’ve tried it. It doesn’t work, I still get sucked into an hour-long overview of her life while standing on her front porch. It also means that Catie will be exposed to her child’s behavior without me there to say afterward, “Hey, you saw how she did that? Let’s talk about why that’s wrong and we don’t act like that.” Damage control, you know?

So this is what it comes down to: I don’t know what to do with her. Cut the friend off? I mean, I barely ever speak to her now unless we’re at some type of event where both of our kids are present. Do I tell Catie that she can’t see her friend anymore because she doesn’t behave well?

How do people navigate these kinds of situations? How do you “un-friend” someone in real life?

snow days

Posted on by

So, the snow day thing.

Ok, let me say this: I understand that there was an incident here in NC in 2005 that was similar to what’s going on in Atlanta now, where basically nobody was prepared for the snow and there was gridlock and people were stranded on freeways for hours and hours and it was a huge mess. (I asked Chris about it and he said, “yeah, that was the day my commute took over 8 hours.” Which: WHOA.) I get it. Better to err on the side of caution and all that, right?

They canceled school on Tuesday “in anticipation” of snow. Only it turned out that the snowstorm was moving much more slowly than anyone expected. So it didn’t actually start snowing until sometime after 6 p.m. Which means the kids could have gone to school and gotten safely home LONG before the snow started. But whatever, they made a judgment call.

Then school was closed on Wednesday and Thursday (today), due to legitimate, real snow and ice on the ground. And hey, that’s fine. It sucks for my work productivity because it’s really hard to focus when the kids are here, but I get it and I’m fortunate to have a job that allows me to have the flexibility to work from home when I need to be here with the girls.

And yesterday had its moments of being fun. The girls wanted to go play outside and they were both singing, “Do You Want to Build a Snowman?” from Frozen.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T1lDcPm-KRw
(That last verse always makes me cry, btw.)

It all sounded very fun and exciting… until we got outside. My kids are delicate Southern flowers, so they were game to play in the snow for about, oh, 20 minutes maybe. Then they wanted to head back inside and drink hot chocolate. Which is sort of how I feel too, so I understand that.

Oh well, it was fun while it lasted.

After we came back in, I turned on a movie for the girls (Beauty & the Beast), and Lucy promptly passed out on the couch in her long johns.

I cleared off the end of my desk for Catie, and I set her up to do some of her homework from school, so she wouldn’t get too far behind. I had this nice mental image of working away while she quietly did her math problems, which… hahaha. Yeah. No. There was whining, and “I don’t wanna do homework,” or “You have to help me with this part,” whatever. There was no concentrating on my work happening at all.

When she finished, she asked if she could do an art project, and this is why I’m grateful I stash away this stuff whenever I can. I got out some little plaster figurines that come with a set of paints to decorate them, gave her one of my old paint-stained t-shirts to keep her clothes safe, and let her go to town.

She had a blast. She’s way better at art-type stuff than I ever was.

The problem is, I kind of used up all of my “creative ways to keep the kids entertained at home” ideas. I admit, I’m more of a “let’s go out and do stuff” mom. We go to the playground, we go to one of the museums, we go walk around the mall, whatever. But when the roads are icy and it isn’t safe to drive, all of my normal “let’s go out” options are gone.

Today, thankfully, even though the schools are closed, the girls’ daycare is open, so I was able to drop them both off there, and they were so happy to get a chance to play with other kids. And I’ve been able to catch up on some work, which has been great.

My main complaint about the snow days? Apparently I didn’t read the fine print when I opted to put Catie in a year-round school. Because I just learned that year-round school doesn’t have “emergency days” built into its calendar, so when the kids have a snow day? It means they make it up on a Saturday. And after this week, it means they’ll have 3 different Saturday make-up days.

The first make-up day is supposed to be this Saturday (as in the day after tomorrow), when my sister is flying in from Texas for the weekend. And you know what? No. I’m sorry, but I am not sending my kid to school on a Saturday. Not this Saturday, not any Saturday.

I understand that scheduling is difficult, and it’s hard to manage the calendar for a year-round curriculum, but no. Nope, no way, not gonna happen, nuh-uh. And I’m not even going to make up an excuse and say that she’s sick. If I have to send in a note, I’ll write, “It’s Saturday. We have plans.” That’s it.

Because, when it comes down to it? I work full-time all week, and that weekend time that I get with my girls is precious. And it’s FIRST GRADE, so I’m pretty sure that if she misses a few days here and there, it’s not going to prevent her from getting into a good college later.

SorryNotSorry

 

 

 

 

 

 

Fortunately, it looks like most of the ice has melted today, so we should be back to normal tomorrow. Fingers crossed, anyway.

(For the record, I still mostly love the year-round calendar and I really like Catie’s school in particular. This is just one beef that I have with the county school system’s administration.)

seven

Posted on by

Catie turned 7 years old yesterday. It kind of blows my mind that this kid:

…is now this kid:

And I don’t really know how to write a post to sum her up, because she is just lovely and charming and hilarious, and also challenging and stubborn, the way I imagine most 7 year-old girls are. She’s not a girly-girl type in that she loves science and dinosaurs and video games, but she also asked me to download the Frozen soundtrack for her iPad, and I’ve caught her belting out “Let It Go” more than once, so there’s still definitely a little girl in there. She’s a bundle of contradictions and I love them all.

This year, Catie wanted to have her birthday party at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences in downtown Raleigh, which is one of her favorite places. It was a dinosaur-themed party (for the girl who says she wants to be a paleontologist when she grows up), and she loved it.

I wasn’t sure what to expect, but it was a great party. The instructor was fantastic at keeping the kids involved in all kinds of activities, and they brought out live animals for the kids to touch: Madagascar hissing cockroaches (I was on the other side of the room, shuddering and gagging during that part of the presentation), some kind of lizard, a snake, and an alligator.

I don’t know how much they pay that lady to handle those critters AND deal with a lot of little kids clamoring to touch them, but I’m sure it’s not enough.

Overall, it was a really fun party and she had a blast.

The kids spent Saturday night and Sunday with their dad, so they had a separate birthday celebration with him.

Since yesterday (Monday) was her actual birthday, we had dinner at my parents’ house and had cupcakes – sort of a mini-party just for us.

Today, the kids are home because it’s a snow day (for the record, it hasn’t snowed yet, but they closed the schools “in anticipation” of snow, so… ok, whatever). Catie seems to think that this is like God’s birthday present, giving her a day off school.


Every time the girls snuggle up on Chris like this, I tease him that it’s really too bad that my kids don’t seem to like him at all.

So, overall I’d say she’s had a pretty spectacular birthday, by 7 year-old standards.

wedding_reception_tracy_catie_dancing
My sister posted this on Facebook for Catie’s birthday yesterday. I love this picture of the two of them.

Happy birthday, Catie-bug. We love you to the moon and back.

back to school day

Posted on by

As I’ve mentioned before, Catie goes to a year-round school. It’s generally a 9-weeks-on, 3-weeks-off system, but the breaks at both Christmas and in the summer are a little bit longer. She had a 2-week Christmas break, followed immediately by her 3-week school break.

Long story short: she started back to school today. I don’t know why they’re starting back on a Thursday, calendars and county school systems are weird like that. But after 5 weeks off – and a whole lot of changes to Catie’s life in the past five weeks (like, oh, her dad moving across the street after living 3,000 miles away for the past 2.5 years) – I kind of guessed that she was going to have a hard time with the transition back to school. Catie isn’t an easygoing, go-with-the-flow kind of kid, so I was anticipating a few curve balls.

I was not, however, anticipating that the rest of us would have curve balls too.

Last night, I got the kids to bed, and Chris and I hung out, talked, and watched TV for a while. When I was getting ready for bed, I went to take my pills (I have a few that I take in the morning and at night for various and sundry reasons, mostly vitamins). And this is where, I am guessing, based on the next few hours, that I forgot to take the pill that helps me go to sleep.

We went to bed, and I could. not. sleep. Which normally isn’t a problem for me (because, again: I take a medication for insomnia). So, midnight rolls around, then 1:00… sometime around 1:45, Lucy came in and wanted to get in bed between me and Chris, and I let her climb up, because it was easier than fighting with her about it. And then I still couldn’t sleep. I think I finally dozed off sometime after 2:30 a.m. (That’s the last time I remember looking at the clock.)

So, the alarm went off and I (obviously) felt like hell. Catie woke up and said she had a tummy ache. I know from past experience that this had very little probability of being an actual physical ailment, and was more likely due to being nervous about going back to school. I cuddled with her a little bit, we talked, and then I got her to eat some toast to settle her stomach.

After that, it was like a normal morning: got myself dressed, got the kids dressed, got Catie’s lunch packed, the whole thing.

Then, it was time to brush Lucy’s hair. Which she hates. Because her hair tangles like crazy and I always end up yanking it too hard and hurting her. (Oddly enough, she will sit patiently and let Chris brush her hair, but if I try it? No way, no how.)

She started throwing a tantrum because of the hair-brushing, and Lucy is the type of kid that when she cries too hard, she pukes. And that’s what she did. Everywhere. At the exact moment that I needed to be taking the kids to school.

And this right here is when it comes in really handy to have a second adult in the house, because Chris basically saved my butt. I left my puke-covered toddler (and puke-covered bathroom) with him, while I took Catie to school. I got her there 5 minutes before the bell rang.

Then, I rushed back home (thinking how thankful I am that the kids’ school and daycare are both less than three miles from my house), picked up Lucy – who was calmed down and cleaned up, because apparently Chris is a wizard, I don’t even KNOW – and took her to daycare.

And now I’m at work trying to catch my breath and wake the hell up because I got a really lousy night’s sleep.

So yeah. First day back to school didn’t go quite like I’d planned. Here’s hoping it goes a little more smoothly from now on.

thirty-eight

Posted on by

Thursday was my 38th birthday. I tend to think that past, say, age 21, any birthday that doesn’t end in a zero feels pretty unremarkable. And really, I spent way more time planning Catie’s birthday party than even thinking about my own. I guess that’s what happens when your child’s birthday is 11 days after yours.

But my birthday was good. The kids were with Dave, but Chris brought me flowers, and we went out for dinner.


He remembered tulips are my favorite. Points for that.

It was really nice just to have a little grown-up night off, where I got to dress up a little and not worry about whether or not the restaurant would have crayons or if I should bring our own from home.

After work on Friday, I picked the kids up and went to my parents’ house for dinner. My mom had gotten some fancy cupcakes from a little bakery here, and the girls blew out my candles with me. It was nice.

(And yeah, I’ll admit that I gave up on the detox diet long before the 3 week point, because I totally ate the hell out of those cupcakes. I’m still working on more “mindful eating” and I’m back to running at least 2 miles a day, and I guess I’ll just take it from there.)

Today, Catie and I dropped Lucy with my folks and went to see “Frozen.” After trying to take Lucy to the movies twice now (for “Despicable Me 2” and “Walking with Dinosaurs”), I’ve come to the conclusion that she’s really just not old enough to sit through a movie in the theater, because both times she got antsy and I ended up walking her around in the hall for a good 15-20 minutes to keep her from having a meltdown. So I think I’m going to add “movies” to the list of thing to reserve until she’s a little bit older and has a longer attention span.

Plus it was nice to have some alone time with my big girl, because that doesn’t happen often. And Frozen was a really, really good movie, so I”m glad we went.

So really? Yeah, ok, I’m one step closer to 40 and yadda yadda, aging, crows feet, whatever. But so far, 38 is off to a pretty good start. No complaints here.

detoxing

Posted on by

I have a lot of issues when it comes to food. That sentence probably applies to a significant percentage of women, I realize, and I don’t think my issues are particularly special or unique. Food is comfort, food is a reward, food is stress relief.

From basically Thanksgiving until New Year’s, I ate pretty much everything in sight. I didn’t track my calories, I eased up on my workouts, and I was completely self-indulgent about eating whatever the hell I wanted, whenever I wanted. Cookies at midnight? SURE! Why not? Miraculously, I didn’t gain any weight during the holidays, although don’t ask me how because I honestly don’t know.

I worked really hard in 2013 and lost a lot of weight, and I have a pretty big fear of regaining it and undoing all that work. So my plan had been to allow myself that time of indulgence, with the knowledge that after New Year’s, I was going to start a detox diet and get back on track. It’s not even that I’m trying to lose more weight, because I’m actually pretty happy with where my weight is right now – sure, I wouldn’t complain if a few more pounds magically disappeared, but my size 10 jeans fit comfortably and I’m pretty ok with that. The detox plan was more about hitting a mental reset button, so I don’t continue these bad habits of eating junk food all the time.

I started the detox on Monday. This basically means all I’m eating is meat, vegetables, and fruit. No sweets, no carbs, no processed foods, no dairy. It’s really hard.

And because a few people have asked, this is sort of what a typical day looks like:
* Breakfast – a few slices of turkey bacon and a piece of fruit (today was grapefruit with a little Sweet & Low).
* Lunch – a big salad with some kind of meat (usually grilled chicken on it). I don’t use dressing. Oil & vinegar would be allowed, but I hate that, so I just put a little salt on it and I’m fine.
* Dinner – some kind of meat/veggie. Piece of salmon and roasted asparagus. Steak and steamed broccoli. That kind of thing.

If I want to snack between meals, it’s basically some kind of vegetable (like a handful of raw baby carrots) or an extra piece of fruit.

So, yeah, that’s a little intense, right? And it isn’t sustainable in the long-term, believe me, I know that. The idea is to do this for 3 weeks (although if I last 2 weeks, I’ll be happy), and it sort of changes how I think about my daily meals and makes me more mindful about the foods that I’m shoving in my mouth. Like, no more polishing off the kids’ leftovers. And no more grabbing some quick sugary treat because I just happened to walk past the kitchen.

So yeah, I started it on Monday, and by Tuesday afternoon, it dawned on me that all of that eating I did over the holidays was not, in fact, just a fun little self-indulgence, but was actually how I was coping with some pretty major stress issues in my life. Most of which falls under the category of “stuff I can’t blog about,” but mostly involves my kids and all of the changes we’ve been dealing with lately. I’m not the most adaptable person in the world, I lack the “go with the flow” gene, and those kinds of major life events tend to really stress me out.

The thing is, though, take away my comfort food? And there is no comfort. Which is how I ended up sobbing my eyes out all over Chris’s chest on Tuesday night. (To be clear, he didn’t do anything to make me cry. He just happened to walk in the door and ask me how my day was. Poor guy had no idea what a loaded question that was.)

(Oh, it probably goes without saying, but there’s no alcohol allowed on the detox diet either, which is fine because I hardly ever drink anyway, but man, if there haven’t been a few times this week that drinking my feelings sounded like an excellent plan, since I couldn’t eat them. Damn.)

And I’m sure this is healthy, forcing me to talk about my worries and fears and confront them, rather than bury them down with another handful of potato chips. It’s just weird that dealing with the emotional side of it parallels the food that I’m eating: it’s good for me, and I know it, I just don’t like it very much.

life with Lucy

Posted on by

On Friday evening, I went to daycare to pick up the girls. Lucy was happy to see me as always, but Catie burst into tears.

She said, “I thought Daddy was picking us up, I want to spend the night with him!”

We’ve been working on a custody schedule – basically, Dave gets the kids 2 weeknights and alternating weekends. It gives them a lot of quality time with their dad, it gives me a break, but it still gives them enough time at home to reinforce the idea that my house is their home base. And in theory, it’s a really good schedule.

But I also understand that in Catie’s mind, her dad has been here for about two weeks, and this is normally when he’d be leaving again, so she’s wanting to spend as much time as possible with him. I get that.

And while normally I’m the type who would say, “Sorry, kiddo, these are the rules and this is how it’s going to go,” I also know that I need to let her have time to adjust and feel secure with having her dad back in her life.

So, I texted Dave to see if he had plans, and he said he was fine with taking the kids. I asked Lucy if she wanted to go with Catie over to Daddy’s, or if she wanted to stay with me. She said, “I stay Mommy’s house!” Ok then, fine with me. Sometimes it’s nice to only have one kid at a time, even when that kid is a particularly energetic two year-old.

Dave came over and picked up Catie, and I honestly thought Lucy would change her mind when she saw Catie leaving without her, but she stood in the door and yelled goodbye to them, blew them kisses, then closed the door and asked me to play with her.

We spent the evening playing with all of Catie’s toys that Lucy is never allowed to touch. Every single Skylander action figure, Lucy would pick it up, say “What his name? Who he?” and then put them down. She wasn’t destructive at all, and she didn’t even really care about playing with them, it was just that she was able to touch them without Catie there to shriek at her to get away. Forbidden fruit and all that.

On Saturday morning, we goofed off for a while. At some point, she climbed up in my lap, handed me my camera, and said, “I say cheese!”

If the two year-old demands a selfie, you take a selfie.

Later, we picked up Catie from Dave’s place and headed over to my cousin’s house. The kids exchanged their Christmas gifts (we always seem to do our gift exchanges after New Year’s), and the kids played for over three hours while I hung out and visited with the grown-ups.

When we left, I really thought Lucy would be so exhausted that she’d be asleep in the car before we got out of my cousin’s neighborhood. I mean, she normally goes down for a nap around 2:00 (and she usually sleeps at least an hour & a half or so), and it was well after 4:00 p.m. But she didn’t, she stayed awake all the way to my parents’ house. I figured by that point, we’d just power through without a nap and I’d put her to bed early. We had dinner with my folks, and the kids played for a while before we finally came back home.

I’m not sure exactly when she got her second wind, but it was like WHOA. She was basically like a tiny drunk who wouldn’t sleep it off. She was staggering in circles around the house, eating Pirate’s Booty cheese puffs straight out of the bag.

Sometime around 9 p.m. when she was still hyper, I decided to film a video of her.

We did four of those, they’re all pretty similar. She loved watching herself on the replay and then she’d want to film it again.

She finally fell asleep at 9:50 p.m. Long after her older sister had already called it a night, and WAY past her normal bedtime (typically between 8:30 and 9 p.m.), and on no nap to boot. I don’t know how on earth that happened.

Oh, and she was still awake and trying to climb in my bed a few hours later. I don’t even know.

She’s lucky she’s cute, that’s all I can say.