Sometimes, I think back to friends who had children before me, and I realize looking back on all our interactions that oh, they must have been so much more exhausted than I was then.  Because now? Hello, now I’m a person who will literally fall asleep anywhere if given a chance.

What IS it about parenting that is so exhausting?  Sure, yes, the night wake-ups are certainly a culprit.  But there’s plenty about parenting that’s also the exact opposite of exhausting — so much of it is so boring!  But here’s the catch with that: I firmly believe that the utter banal boring-ness of some parenting experiences are equally as tiring as the 2AM and 3AM and 4AM wake-ups.  

Sometimes, I feel like I’m sleepwalking through my time with my kids.

Take hopscotch.  You throw a stone, you can’t jump on that square, rinse (well, not literally if it’s a chalked outline) and repeat.  Over and over and over. How many times can a person be fully present and engaged with hopscotch? Often I find my mine wandering, slowly turning to melted butter as I play.  I want to think about things the engage my mind, but it’s HARD to do that when you’re actively doing another task. At least, that’s how it is for me. So while I’m not literally sleepwalking, I’m there paying attention and chatting with them, I am only ever using a little bit of my brain to do it, and I feel the other sections just liquifying.  I’m like a bowl of jello left out too long at a picnic.

I wish I could tell you that it gets easier with time.  I believe it will, but kids are still little — there’s a lot of hopscotch time left, still.  So for now, I’m trying to figure out a way to be present with my kids, but also not bored out of my ding-dang mind.

The first thing I’ve decided is that I get to listen to adult music in the car.  If there’s one thing that turns my mind to mush fast, it’s listening to children’s singsong music forever.  I just literally cannot. The first few times I put on “mama music” my daughter protested, but now, she’s acclimated to it being a fact of life.  Sometimes we listen to kid music, sometimes we adamantly do not. My mind needs to be engaged with rhythm and complexity and feeling, and listening to Raffi just does not do that for me (sorry Raffi my man).

Another thing I’m trying is not reading picture books more than once in a row.  If we just read a book, I am not going to repeat the same book. In an effort to save my sanity, once we read a book, it now goes back in the library box or the bookshelf, and something else needs to get picked.  

Finally, sometimes I just say no.  No, I’m just going to watch you play that, or no, I’m just going to watch while you climb on the jungle gym rather than come up there with you.  Maybe one day I’ll look back and long for the requests (which is why I do heed them sometimes) but other times, I hope that if I look back and remember those days, I’ll remember that I took care of myself by allowing myself a moment to watch and also not engage to the detriment of my mind working on other things, like book projects and such.  

But for now, this is what I’ve got.  

Of course, the 2AM, 3AM, and 4AM wakeups are still exhausting, but the only solution I have to that problem is waiting for the baby to be not-a-baby.  

Until then, I’ll be here, mind like jello, but working hard to keep it from liquifying entirely one adult song and one not-repeated picture book and one sit-in-the-grass-and-just-watch moment at a time.

zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz….