Day 363 The Perfect Mom Project

As both of my youngest daughters spoke to me at different points during the day yesterday, I began to feel trapped in teenitudes world. Each one for different reasons yesterday spoke to me like I was stupid. Aly requested that I help her sort out her closet and be part of the jury on whether or not she keep or release certain clothing items. I flatly refused the job causing Aly to become angry with me and tell me that she could not do it alone, (and my favorite line of all) "You do it for Avery, all the time!" When I rolled my eyes at this last comment, she had the nerve to say to me, "Don't roll your eyes at me!" to which I replied, "I will roll my eyes or anything else I want, you best watch your mouth" I then added "Your world is still under my control, remember, you use my car to get around these days". Not pretty, but what about parenting is? Eventually she settled down, since I had declared to myself that the day was a drama free day and I did not linger for any fall out.

 Next came my youngest daughters turn at bat. She was scheduled for a haircut and I asked her if she wanted me there or not. She replied "I don't know". "What do you mean you don't know Avery? Either you do or you don't!" I said. She then fell into this whiny explanation about how I stress her out before and after hair appointments, because I am either encouraging her to do something stylish with her hair on the way there, or complaining on the way home about how I just spent $40.00 for her hair to look exactly the same as it did when we entered the salon. Apparently she does not find these comments motivating and she is afraid to tell me not to come, because it might make me angry. We went back and forth about this until I decided that I felt bad enough about my parenting style. I decided that I was going along just to prove to her that I could be a "good Mom" and behave at the salon. Sadly, the salon was closed when we arrived due to a power outage from a big storm the night before, so I never got a chance to redeem myself. That will come later since the appointment was rescheduled for tomorrow morning.

 Here I was a little over 48 hours away from the end of my Perfect Mom Project and I was still nowhere near the finish line. After the two instances of teenitudes I busied myself with tasks around the house. Trying hard not to rile the teens any more then I already had. I was feeling like maybe I had dropped the ball with these two and I was raising a couple of ungrateful, mouthy ladies. As the afternoon moved forward we fell into a better rhythm and I found myself suggesting that the girls invite some friends over for a spur of the moment bonfire. Suddenly, Mom was not such a bad gal after all.

 There is one lesson I have learned over the last year, that a Mom is always just one step away from either success or failure. I wish that I had been able to tell the poor mother in North Carolina that, before she chose to take her two small sons lives. Her boys were one and two years old, and after being berated by her mother endlessly for her parenting skills she chose to kill her boys. She suffocated them and then put them in their car seats and let her car roll into the river. I do not know what type of mother she was, or why her own mother was so critical, but something in her snapped and she gave up. She lost faith in herself and she started to believe the negative. Sadly, instead of reaching out for help, she felt helpless and made the wrong choice.

http://www.cnn.com/2010/CRIME/08/18/south.carolina.children.deaths/index.html

Each day there is a chance to start over and get it right, so if I was not on my game yesterday, I know that I have another chance today. I plan to keep at this mothering thing until I get it right. Maybe I am not perfect, or even good at mothering, but my heart is in it and that to me is what is important. I only wish that someone had shared that with this worn out, frustrated and sad Momma before she made such a devastating choice.