If I Wanted to be a Single Mom...

I’m having a hard time thinking of how I would complete that sentence.
I have been finding myself playing the role of “married, single Mom” now more and more.

I adore my son...I would give up my life for him. I truly put my own needs aside to meet his. But when my husband and I discussed having a child, we knew that there might be some complications both during pregnancy and afterwards. I have a chronic pain condition that rears it’s ugly head every so often. I felt confident that I would have a partner who would be able to chip in when I wasn’t feeling my best. And through the years I accumulated more medical conditions. But still, I felt that I had someone to help “carry the load,” especially with the addition of two dogs.

But now I feel completely drained. It could be my hypothyroidism, but I don’t think it is. I am drained of being the resource for a very needy child. My son needs his “emotional tank” filled to the brim every day. I am drained of his continuous high energy, and schlepping him from place to place to burn off that energy.

I am drained of two wonderful dogs that are a real part of our family. But their needs are rising as they are getting on in age. And two fish that are relatively maintenance free, but do need to be fed and have their tanks cleaned regularly.

I no longer have that partner who made a promise to me that he would be there for me if raising a child were too much for me to handle on certain days. I feel cheated. And at the same time I admire all of the amazing single Moms who willingly chose to become single Moms. My best friend is a single Mom. She always sounds frazzled. She also schleps her son from one activity to another. And she also has an aging dog. I continually wonder how she does it. She DOES have her parents to chip in when she needs a break. And a slew of close friends who are more than willing to watch her son when she needs time for herself. I have none of that. Which makes me even more resentful that my husband is bailing out of his promise to me.

So I have to ask myself: If I wanted to voluntarily be a Single Mom, under my same medical circumstances and lack of resources to help out when I need a break, would I still want to be a one? I honestly don’t know. I can’t imagine life without my son. But I feel as if I am getting older exponentially at the same time.

My son is getting more mature and is taking on more responsibility. In a few years, he won’t want to even acknowledge that I even exist! And I desperately want to see him mature into an adult. But right now he is so sensitive that he needs to know my every move, my every step. I guess instead of wondering, “what if,” I should slow down and try to capture each small moment with him.

He lost his third baby tooth a few days ago. And since my husband was on a business trip, I thought that the excitement of losing his tooth (at the Bronx Zoo of all places!) would be diminished without his father here. It wasn’t. At all. He squealed with excitement at what the Tooth Fairy brought him. His Tooth Fairy is named Nute and is a Surfer Dude. We sent an e-mail to Nute, apprising him of the situation! And that whole night was filled with excitement, even as drained as I was from the day!

I guess I can now assuredly place an ending onto my opening sentence. If I wanted to be a Single Mom, I would definitely want to be one! Gladly! Otherwise, I would go through life with regrets. And that’s the last thing I want. And this childhood phase is passing so quickly! I better hold on with two hands, because I am going to be going on the ride of my life! Together, with my beautiful son! Being the best Single Mom I can be!

The Conundrum Over Wine Glasses

I am currently in the midst of a heated debate regarding a set of wine glasses I gave to a close friend recently. I first saw them on a Facebook group site called,

“OMG, I so need a glass of wine, or I’m gonna sell my kids!!”

This group has a following of 109,646 fans. So I am obviously not the only one who can relate to this group! I bought a pair of these glasses with the full group tag imprinted on the wine glasses for myself, as well as a pair that just said, “OMG, I so need a glass of wine!” A friend saw these and LOVED them, so I bought her a set, with the complete logo as a gift, and she frequently calls or texts me that she is pulling out those glasses after the kids are asleep!

Enter one of my other close friends. She typically has bottles of wine and wine coolers lined up on top of her refrigerator. And she frequently mentions that as soon as her son goes to bed, she is having a tall glass of wine. Well, I thought that these “OMG” wine glasses would be great for her to have too! I even bought her the ones that just said,”OMG, I so need a glass of wine,” just in case she didn’t want to use the ones with the reference towards selling your kids with certain company. Well, as it turned out, she was appalled. And she needed to mention that not only was SHE appalled, she showed the glasses to her family and fiends and they were appalled as well! I apologized for offending her and offered to take the glasses back or suggest that she give them away or even throw them out if they offended her so much. She said that she wanted to keep them (?).

I was then forwarded an article by one of our other Motherhood Later bloggers regarding the issue of Mom’s needing a drink at the end of the day to take the edge off,

“All Joy and No Fun...Why Parents Hate Parenting,”

from New York Magazine. This article quotes a Mom who states, “The Children’s Museum of Manhattan - a nice place, but what it really needs is a bar.” This is just not a select group of Moms who fall into this category. There are Parenting Podcasts where the hosts readily admit to needing a drink of wine at the end of the day. There are Parenting Forums where literally hundreds of Moms admit that parenting is far from easy and that a drink at the end of the day helps them to unwind.

I need to add that I am not at all pro-drinking. In fact, I rarely drink at all due to the plethora of medications I take. And I am definitely not advocating drinking to such excess that it begins to impair your life or you need it to get through each day. But a glass of wine now and then, or socially, I believe is perfectly acceptable. Especially when you come home at the end of the day and find a myriad of toys strewn around, crayon marks on the walls, a bathroom that is drenched from you child wanting to give their stuffed animals a bath (and end up wrapped in your child’s sheets to “dry off,” i.e. remake bed). I can see wanting to grab something to relax you before you try to calmly deal with each of these issues.

So back to my wine glasses. What do you think? I gave them to one friend who adores them and one friend who is horrified by them. I guess having glasses that indicate that you would want to sell your kids is a bit much. And I don’t think I will be giving them as gifts to any other friends, unless upon specific request. But considering the circumstances, was I reading into my appalled friend a little too much, and subtly indicating that she has a drinking problem (which I certainly was not), or was she over reacting to what I considered a humorous, harmless gift?

Please give me your feedback. I am interested to know what you think.

After the Wrath

All totaled, we were without power for five days. No refrigerated food. No air conditioning. And the constant buzzing of tree grinding that I am listening to as I write. Which has been ongoing now for over a week. Which also, incidentally, is getting on my nerves. At least they stop cutting trees at around 8pm now and resume at 9am. They had been cutting around the clock, 24/7.

I restocked my refrigerator. I found it coincidental that almost all condiments were on sale at my local grocery store. Yes, I’m sure it was in preparation for the 4th of July weekend. But I found it interesting because those were also items our community needed to stock up on. Our local newspaper, The Great Neck News, was quoted saying that, “Some 1,000 trees were downed, causing $10 - 15 million worth of damage. Some 25,000 customers in Nassau County, the majority in Great Neck, were without power.” As if we were not already aware of that. But that’s beside the point.

During those five days, in order to cool down and recharge my cell phone, cell phone battery charger, and computer, I would pack up my things (along with a multiplug adapter), and trek off to spend a couple hours at one of our local Starbucks. I would set myself up for the afternoon. The store was packed with locals who were doing the same thing. In fact, when I pulled out my multiplug, and offered those who were waiting for outlets to free up, to use the multiplug outlets I wasn't in need of, I made quite a few friends!

I came to anticipate those five days at Starbucks. I heard horror stories of damages to people’s homes. One family was desperately trying to find one room at ANY hotel on Long Island to go to, without any success. There was a gathering of the “lost souls” at Starbucks who had nowhere to go. We chatted. Got to know each other. And in a community that is known for it’s haughtiness, we were suddenly all equals. It didn’t matter who had a bigger home or a fancier car. We all were in the same boat...no power, no food, and no means of communication other than our cell phones, which we were all charging. And together we “let our hair down.” No one came “dressed to impress.” We just wanted a cool place to charge our cell phones and other technology. And get a cool drink!

Which brought me to my next observation. Americans are attached to our technology. I’ve gone on trips where I wasn’t able to use my cell phone or laptop. And I was well aware that I would come home to 100+ e-mails and 250+ junk e-mails. But when your only means of communication is your cell phone, for an undetermined amount of time, cell phones come close to brushing your teeth! And when going on the Internet for a couple hours to connect with the world in other ways, your laptop really, truly becomes your luxury. That is what my comrades in Starbucks all felt like. We were stripped of everything except our technology. And with that we were all on equal ground.

The last day that I spent at Starbucks, their Internet system was down. We were able to charge our items, but no one was able to log on to the Internet. Many of us had Apple laptops, as did I. As soon as all of our peripherals were fully charged, the Apple consumers came up with a great idea! Let’s go to the Apple Store a mile down the road and use their Internet service! We all scrambled to pack up and drove down the road. The store was so inundated with customers, there was not enough staff to assist the people who wanted to purchase things. I found a nice Mac Book Pro in a remote area of the store, sat down, and surfed the web. It was not as nice as being among the “lost souls” at Starbucks. But hey, a woman’s got to do what a woman’s got to do!