Spilled Milk

Life is clumsy. Sloppy. Bogged down in minutiae and an onslaught of tasks, you forget yourself, let alone your partner. Something will suffer, and parents usually choose their kids as a priority when it all becomes too much. When the mail piles up, you open the bills first. When you are overextended, you take care of the kids first.

Your spouse hopefully has a distant memory of the Before Times. They have context that explains away today. Sure, there’s pureed carrots on your shirt and your hair is mostly dry shampoo, but I remember how beautiful you looked on our wedding day. I remember how much fun we had. I remember when we decided to have this kid that just splattered his dinner on the wall. I was there when the doctor flopped him onto your chest, covered in slime and screaming. I saw your body transform into what it is now.

The memories may not save the marriage, but it’s something.

Introducing new people to your day to day operations is a different animal. After a prolonged period of doing your best to present you best self, however flawed, you pull back the curtain and have to see realization dawn in their alarmed expressions. Being a parent is hard in normal circumstances, but when the parents split, things get worse. Behavior gets wilder, but is often attributed to their broken home, so it’s difficult to police. Is he acting out because he’s a jerk or because his parents are divorced? How do I fairly punish a kid whose behavior we maybe caused?

Navigating life once it’s been flipped upside-down is full of missteps. To your spouse, you could say, “here is the mess we made. It didn’t come on all at once, and someday we’ll get back to each other.” To a new person, it must seem like Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. One day you’re gussied up for a date, then suddenly it’s “here are my kids. I’m a mom of middle schoolers and my house is a wreck. Oh, and wash your hands, because two of them have coughs and one just told me her BFF puked at lunch.” That whiplash is intense.

Constant struggle is painful to experience, but I’m sure it’s awkward to witness. I feel like someone is watching me parallel park all day every day, except the car and parking spot are different every time, and none of the vehicles have cameras or sensors, and I’m blind in one eye. And there’s a snake around one ankle. And I’m compulsively sneezing and choking and throwing up. In hurricane-force winds. While an entire NASCAR race flies by on the same road.

A spouse is your typical boiled frog, where things got more difficult slowly over time and the water heated you both, for better or for worse. Anyone new, friend or partner, is seeing the mess in full swing, like walking into a theater to find the movie is half over and you’re in the middle of a chase scene. Who is screaming? Are they a good guy or a bad guy? Why is everything on fire? And chances are, they would handle whatever chaos you’re enduring differently than you. You just have to hope they get comfortable in the boiling water next to you instead of leaping out to save themselves.

Unfortunately for me, a neat and presentable persona was not sustainable. I don’t have the energy or time to serve different meals for everyone on a regular basis, so rather than feeding my kids spaghetti and the adults a Lady and the Tramp style pasta all’Amatriciana and bottle of wine once the kids are in bed, it’s a sad amalgamation of leftovers on a good day, and a handful of frozen chicken nuggets on a bad day. Anything I was hoping to hide, anything motherly, is on full display. Not “motherly” in the way that I created life three whole times, but in the way that is sticky and exhausted.

Want to watch a movie?

Sorry, I have to fold three baskets of laundry and help a kid grow bacteria for the science fair.

True, it’s real life, but it feels like a death. Here we are again, seeing the filthy underbelly of life. No more pretending I’m just the woman who can meet you for a nice dinner or a drink somewhere fun. Now it’s all we can’t eat Thai takeout until the kids are in bed because one of them is highly allergic to every single ingredient and I’m too tired to go to the ER. It was nice trying to pretend I was two different people – one woman when I was with my kids, and another when I was out being a grown up for the first time in forever. I used arrive to meet other adults fully prepared to be in public, and now someone has walked in on me plucking my eyebrows. My worlds have collided and my dignity was the casualty.

I hate to have my struggles witnessed. I want to fail on my own and never speak of it again. The price for inviting someone in is having them watch me fuck up, and not just the simple stuff like dropping a glass. Someone will see me not know how to parent one of my kids, navigate rejoining the workforce, or learn how to maintain a lawn after eight years of xeriscaped yards. It can help to have an outside perspective (especially with the freaking yard), but it feels painful to me anyway.

In the thick of it, I can’t even remember the things I’m supposedly good at. I like to cook, but setting out the ingredients for sandwiches doesn’t really make that skill clear. I am a professional organizer, but my house is not a case study I’m proud of at the moment. I write, but I barely have the mental stamina for one post a month right now.

A new person’s context doesn’t have the depth of a long term partner, but I hope they can recall it nonetheless. Last year I was fun and seemingly carefree, do you remember? Close your eyes and think about that time while I clean vomit off the floor.

Here’s to a hearty frog that can stand the heat.