Happy Mother's Day to me

It's Mother's Day today, and though I received my gifts already I got a little something extra by being able to get out this afternoon for a little "me" time. Well, it was 1.5 hours and Hafsa came with me, but whatever. I'll take it.

I was sitting in the Starbucks sipping my chai latte and reading the Sunday paper (while rocking Hafsa's stroller back and forth to prevent the wailing). How relaxing. Anyhoo. I read this great opinion piece in the Star Tribune by Lynnell Mickelsen that made me laugh out loud. The whole article is printed here on the Clothesline Blog but this is my favourite excerpt:

The first five years are the most insane. So give yourself credit and be kind. Young moms consistently underestimate what they're going through, starting out with pregnancy, the ultimate sci-fi experience in which women are literally invaded by an alien for 40 weeks. Followed by birth, which is like the worst possible canoe portage multiplied by 30. Followed by four or more years in which they're treated like a political prisoner in their own home---unable to sleep, eat, shower, exercise or read unless allowed by the guards, who are these short, raw and mercurial types who go from beaming to brutal in five seconds.

Three-year-olds are the absolute worst---it’s like living with Saddam Hussein with PMS. Four-year-olds are only slightly better. By age five, things start settling down, although if there’s another two or three-year-old in the house, it's easy to miss.

During this insanity, stay-at-home mothers are often asked by cheerful, casual friends, “So what are you doing besides just taking care of them?” (Just? Just?) Meanwhile, working moms are told, directly or indirectly, that Little Saddam is probably their fault, that if they just stayed home, he’d be an angel. (No, he’d still be three.) In the face of this pressure, I sometimes wonder why young mothers don’t kill their casual friends or in-laws more often. Mostly, I think, it's because they’re too tired.