Tall Order

“MOM!” Can I have Grape juice?” “Can I have a snack?” “Nick won’t give me my coloring book!””Samuel tripped me!” “No, I wanted GRAPE juice, not apple juice!” “Where’s my snack?” “Nick still has my coloring book!” “Can you help me ride my bike?” “When are we having lunch?” “When can we go to the park?”

It really doesn’t end. It begins at between 5 and 6:00am with a 10 year old (Ben) content to pace outside my bedroom door with a very loud “radio” toy, while he hums loudly along to every verse, and a very chatting 5 year old who wants to make sure to share with me every single sound effect he’s discovered he can make while playing with his actions figures.

It doesn’t end until nearly 10pm when my oldest son has run all his “errands” around the house, from brushing his teeth to clipping his nails to trying to modify his recent hair cut on his own, and then asking for help to fix it.

This is life for a mom at home with her kids. Daily. Why do I say “mom” and not “parent?” Because I know how kids work – my kids especially. They can be sitting on their dads lap, or he can be walking through the room on one of his weekly visits and my two youngest will look straight through him – directly at me and ask me for a glass of water. I suppose it makes sense. After all, I am their primary care taker and they’re used to coming to me. For EVERYTHING.

What have I created here? Does anyone else deal with the challenge of being the preferred “short order cook” as it were? That’s often how I feel. I honestly don’t remember being quite so needy as a child. Have we cultivated a generation of spoiled children who are simply used to immediate gratification with high levels of dependency? OR IS IT JUST ME?

I like to think of myself as a very attentive person, my mothering is no exception. I don’t know of any woman that would admit to anything less. Maybe it feels compounded because it’s just me, and it has been for years and the kids are used to coming to me almost exclusively. But that doesn’t make it any less exasperating.

How do we deal with the overwhelming nature of having kids literally hanging off of us on a daily basis? I had a great idea. I thought I’d treat myself to a nice, relaxing nightly soak in the tub. I was going to make it my ritual. Almost as though it were planned – like some cruel joke, I’d slip into the tub, cover myself in bubbles and a new version of the chaos would begin. First, a voice at the door, “MOM?!” “Yup!” I’d respond. “Can I come in?” my little Savannah would innocently ask. “Nope” I’d calmly reply and close my eyes, just waiting to melt the day away with a new vision of what lie ahead and what I hoped to create tomorrow. About 10 seconds or so would pass and another arrival at the door would startle me back into reality. “MOM! I have to go to the bathroom!!” This from my 5 year old. “Sorry Nicky, you’ll have to go downstairs – mommy’s taking a bath.” That should do it. Now, if only I could get just 10 minutes alone with my thoughts…”Yea, but I can’t go downstairs – there’s a scary spido (spider) down dere (down there)!! “Alright Nick, just a minute.” I grab my towel, hastily rush to the door and fling it open, only to be greeted by 3 faces starring up at me. My 2 youngest burst into giggles while chiding, “mommy’s naked!!” followed by my sweet Ben who busts into the bathroom to make certain that (heaven forbid) I’m not trying to enjoy some relaxing music with my soak. He quickly pushes me aside to check the radio and without skipping a beat unplugs it if it’s plugged in (kids with autism are often very sensitive to sounds and music and Ben is one of them).

“Well, I tried” I’d say to console myself. In fact I tried several times night after night to establish and enjoy this little ritual only to be met with some variation of that same interruption episode. I finally decided that the short 10 minutes I would hope to enjoy in the tub was not worth the set up before hand to make certain that everyone was toileted, watered and secure in their own activities (lest a fight break out over a book, toy or piece of food). This just isn’t going to work. At least not right now.

Here’s the consolation. These amazing little children that God has so graciously blessed me with are growing faster than I could have ever imagined possible. While this time in my life lends to very little recreation or social time (then there’s that silly word “balance”) I know that in life there truly is very little “balance” to be had.

I recently finished a book that clarified things for me in this area and made me feel less abnormal for not striking this mysterious “balance” that I hear so much about. The author talked about the fact that truly in any area of life when you’re looking to achieve things, those areas require focus. So, for example if you’ve got a project at work and you’re on a strict deadline to complete it, your focused energy will be placed there, and you’ll let some of the other aspects of your job fall to the back burner. Not that you’ll neglect them completely, but you’ll give them less attention until you’ve got this time sensitive project completed.

Once that particular thing is done – you’ll move on and pick up again some of your other, less time sensitive details until the next “project” comes up. When there are particular goals in front of us or things we aspire to that will add to and enhance our lives in some way, we tend to get very focused in that area as well, at least for a short time until we’ve either accomplished our goal, or something comes along that distracts us and we shift gears. Either way, it’s more about striking chords of “harmony” in life rather than “balance.” When harmony occurs, there are small hints of lots of interesting components in our lives. When I think of the word “harmony” I think of a symphony playing a beautiful musical composition with gentle hints of tones that move in and out of concentration, barely detectible at one point, yet coming to a crescendo later in the melody. All of these fine details that move in and out of concentration weaving a landscape in your mind and evoking emotion throughout the piece – these notes are rarely balanced – but they have the ability to creating the most beautiful art.

When I think about this in terms of being a parent with young children I think of it as a “season” in life. As we move through various stages with our kids, some things come to a “crescendo” while other things take a backseat. But that’s how it’s supposed to work. We trade sleepless nights when their infants, for sleepless nights when they’re teenagers – for different reasons, but It’s all part of the process. We find ourselves so incensed with the endless barrage of questions and commentary by our young children to the point that we sigh and roll our eyes when for the fourth time we’ve been asked the same question in 30 seconds (OK, maybe that’s just me) but there will come a time when they won’t feel the need to ask because they’ll think they know it all, and our years of knowledge and life’s experience will become nothing more to them than an irritation.

So, is it possible to embrace this idea of creating “harmony” in our lives with our kids rather than chasing the elusive idea of “balance”? I’m not sure, but I’m willing to give it a try. I’m looking to master the concept of enjoying the present moment, rather than constantly catapulting myself into the future in my mind. If I can learn to take each day – exclusively as it is. With its God given blessings, along with its “opportunities for growth” (i.e. “problems”) than it might be easier to enjoy the beauty of the melody that’s currently playing, rather than trying to hurry to write a new song. Does that make sense?

I never want to look back on this time in my life and regret the fact that I was always looking “forward” to when things would get “easier” with the kids. The truth is that my kids are healthy, secure and seemingly pretty happy! That’s a huge accomplishment! As for me, I’m working on learning more and more each day to entrench myself in the blessings of all that is right and good in our lives. All the rich relationships, opportunities and experiences we have available every single day. And when those days come where it seems like the kids have purposefully plotted some evil plan to drive me to the outer fringes, I’ll reel myself back in with a quick (or sometimes not so quick) phone call to my sister, or to a friend with a sympathetic ear.

No one said raising children was easy. If they did, they paid someone else to do it for them. It’s our job to strike harmony and enjoy the beauty of the music, whether the melody takes a turn and moves us to tears, or it brings us to a place of lighthearted joy – either way it’s intended to leave us richer, more- well rounded, and ultimately inspired.