Tag: christmas

Ho Ho OH please leave me alone for one minute….

I don’t think I need to say this, but just in case it’s not clear. I love my children, I am devoted to the lads, they bring me joy and make me laugh…. Nobody needs to doubt that.

But…

We’ve just had two weeks of rather full on childcare. We took them out of nursery in the run up to Christmas to make sure we could get safely to my parents in Omicron times, and our nursery was shut until 3rd January which is totally fair enough.

We did a lot of fun things, we went to the zoo – we even got to see the pandas, a true rarity – we went to museums, parks and we saw family and friends, safely, after rigorous testing and following all guidelines of course. I’m not saying that sarcastically, I’m annoyingly rule following when it comes to these things. Was very boring at school.

Despite all this lovely memory forming, I was struggling mentally a bit and I didn’t know why because isn’t this meant to be that lovely time where we sing carols, gather round the tree, eat too many pigs in blankets and dream of, sing it with me, a ‘Whiiitteeee Christmassssss!’ (Thanks Bing – Crosby to be clear, not that bloody bunny). But I felt..not myself…and I couldn’t work out why.

Then, I was scrolling through Twitter in one of very few moments I had to myself, and I saw a post by Kat Storr (@thesocialstorr) which immediately resonated with me. I was ‘touched out’. She spoke about the same thing, never being left alone, feeling a bit suffocated, always being touched. And I understood why I felt that way, and, given the response to her tweet, we were not alone.

I realised I hadn’t been to the toilet alone for days, and I rarely didn’t have a child hanging on to me, wanting to be on my lap, wanting to be in my bed, just wanting me me me all the time.

With Lad 1, this is not so bad most of the time, he’s very cuddly and most the time I love that, I love his tight hugs, and his small hand holding mine, his nonsensical stories, the way that he smells even, but I’ve been his favourite for a while now and it’s A LOT, I have no space, I have no me time.

I do generally love the affection but the problem is when you add in Lad 2 – and that’s when the real over touching begins.

As mentioned before, Lad 2 is rough and tumble, he bites, he grabs, he hair pulls – and this is mostly aimed solely at me and Benji. Benji uses me to hide behind and then I’ll spend what feels like hours with the two of them all over me trying to get to or away from each other, while I try to avoid Jake’s teeth (he bit through my skin the other day, it’s painful!) and stop Benji pushing Jake away too hard and it’s just this huge wrestling match which is absolutely exhausting and they get hurt. And I get hurt. This ‘aggressive love’ ALWAYS ends in tears, sometimes mine if I’m honest.

Then, there is my favourite moment of the day. Both bathed, cosy jammies, with their milk, watching Night Garden probably, and Jake SITS STILL on my lap, leaning against me, just enjoying his milk. And he is still. Jake is never still. Even my mother-in-law was taken aback by how physical he is, and I’ve spoken about this on another blog. I cherish this brief moment, This is when I get to enjoy his baby smell. I love it.

I know this sounds like I want the touching to be on my terms, and maybe that makes me a bad mother, but is this so unreasonable? I gave them my body for 9 months each, longer if you count the breastfeeding (which I loved before anyone has a go at me!). But sometimes, I just want to have a cup of coffee – we all know I mean gin, but let’s pretend for second- and watch adult TV, not that kind, and maybe even, gasp, have a conversation with the lad dad without being interrupted.

Overall, I know I’ll remember the holidays as a lovely time, complicated again by covid, but by no means lessened in enjoyment. And I know when they’re older, and liking their mother isn’t cool, that I’ll miss their cuddles and squeezes. Maybe not those bites though…

But for now, with them both back at nursery, I can just enjoy my breathing space again.

Santa visiting lads…

This year we did a Santa visit for the first time. It’s really the first year that Benji has been aware of the whole Santa and stocking thing and as he’s obsessed with being a ‘good guy’ at the moment – they’ve been covering Police Officers at nursery – this has wrapped up (pun not intended but I’m not apologising) nicely with the whole nice and naughty list thang.

For me, this has brought back a child like excitement about Christmas, I wouldn’t have said I was jaded by Christmas, because I love seeing my family and friends, choosing presents, time off work etc, but after the utter fudging (see, I’m watching my swearing!) debacle that was Christmas 2020, it is so lovely to feel hope and joy and all those festive tingly feelings through the excitement of a child.

As I write, there is still a worry that plans could be affected AGAIN and the very thought of that fills me with dread, but, rest assured, if we end up stuck here alone again, Benji and Jake won’t know any different and we’ll have a lovely family time where me and Lad Dad day drink a bit too much, eat everything in sight (party food!!) and take a thousand pictures just to try to get one nice one.

Back to visiting Santa, as I’ve mentioned before, my boys are both pretty confident but Santa can be scary and I was expecting Benji to be the problem. But nope, this time it was Jake, JAKE who bites everyone (I’m still going to do a biting post one day), shoves little girls over at Gymboree and is absolutely and terrifyingly fearless. He absolutely screamed at Santa, wriggled and fought him and even shoved the present away. I’ve never seen him like that and I got the giggles to be honest, bad mummy.

I’d had visions of a lovely family shot of everyone smiling angelically at Santa that we could treasure for years to come, but no. We got what you see above…. although I actually love this picture of Jake for reasons I can’t understand! And Benji looks nice at least! He likes presents. And he had been promised lunch at the Dobbies cafe after. He’s easily pleased that one.

I think paying to visit Santa might be a relatively new thing, probably nicked from America and monetised, because I don’t remember visiting Santa in that way when I was little myself.

We definitely had one that came to our primary school – identified loudly as my friend’s grandpa or something when I was 9 and had made the logical, but sad decision that Santa couldn’t possibly be real. ‘Why?’ my mum asked me. My answer? Not how can anyone deliver presents that fast or any conclusion that I think other kids come to. For me it was simple. ‘Reindeer can’t fly’. I was sworn to secrecy for my little sister, then became filled with dread that when she did work it out, Santa wouldn’t come anymore. On reflection, I think she knew earlier than she let on but didn’t say for fear of no stocking. Luckily my parents like stockings too and we continued that tradition long into adulthood.

So, to be able to now continue the secret the whole world keeps about Santa for my own children, and share the excitement with Benji (Jake doesn’t really get it but he sure likes pulling things off the Christmas tree), I’m seeing Christmas with fresh eyes this year.

And that’s not just because the way Christmas and New Year fall this year, I get 2 weeks off to explore that day drinking. Promise 😉