So a lot of people I know are having babies for the first time. And that got me thinking about the somewhat odd first conversation I often have with first-time moms…”Congratulations! Are you suicidal?”

Okay so I don’t exactly ask that directly. But I almost do.

And here’s why.

When I found out I was pregnant with my first child I was 22 years old, a senior in college, very, very wild, and very very not ready to be a mother. I had the kid because I loved the father  (and by golly I still do) and I didn’t realize how immature I was, because I was immature. All immature people think they’re mature. Bit of a vicious cycle really.

I mean I think that’s why I had her. I don’t really know why exactly. The alternatives just didn’t feel right.

So I began the journey and holy shit was I pissed.

And elated.

And pissed again.

You can read about all that fun here.

So when she finally came out things got a little bit funky. I loved her instantly – would have laid down my life for her the day she was born – could never imagine my life without her. But I was also R.A.G.I.N.G inside, at times. Or at the same time. Concurrently.

It’s really freaking weird. That postpartum depression thing is whack (to use the medical term).

I didn’t know what was happening and nobody mentioned it and I got sicker and sicker. I got so sick I thought if I told the doctor how I was feeling, the doctor would take my baby away. Those were some of the saddest days of my life. Terrifying.

Yep, people, that’s the way it rolled for me.

And then one day my toddler baby daughter cried and cried and wouldn’t sleep and I couldn’t take it one more moment and all those days of sorrow and insanity exploded inside me and I pinched her on the leg in anger. Then I fell to the ground with her in my arms, weeping and begging her to forgive me, realizing in that moment she would probably be better off somewhere else. I had intentionally hurt my baby and I didn’t care if the doctor took her away. (Incidentally, it didn’t even leave a mark on her. But it left a mark on me.)

So I went to the doctor and the doctor said “no more monkeys jumping on the bed.” No, she didn’t. She said “here’s some Zoloft. Take one a day and call me in a month. You have borderline postpartum psychosis but you’ll be fine.”

So I took the pills and I got much better and I survived. The end.

But…given this joyous history, I feel compelled when my friends or even semi-close acquaintances have a baby for the first time (because that first time motherhood is really somethin’) to talk about THEM, as individuals. How are YOU? I can see the baby is fabuloso. But you. Do you want to shoot yourself in the head? Are you wondering when your body is going to go back to normal? Are you searching for your identity?

Are you fucking flipping out?

Because in my case, I felt guilty and insane to have the feelings I had – everybody kept talking about how lucky I was and blessed and whatever – and what am I supposed to say? “Yeah, actually I’m drinking a 1/5 of vodka every night to cover up the fact that I’m really not digging this motherhood thing and if I had my way I’d be shooting pool shit-faced at the pub whilst smoking cigarettes and flirting with my man, as opposed to sitting here at this goddamned mother’s group talking about spit-up and nap schedules and tummy time with a bunch of overjoyed women I can’t relate to and who intimidate the hell outta me because they appear to have been blessed with the mothering gene that I am, obviously, lacking.”

No, I wouldn’t say that.

I’d smile and nod and act okay.

And get sicker and sicker and sicker, alone.

Because nobody talks much about how it sometimes effing BITES to have a kid for the first time. Nobody talks about the death that occurs with the entrance of this new life.

Death?

Yeah, I said it. Death.

And if you’re a mother, you know exactly who dies. The old you. The woman you’ve been your whole life. The identity you’ve nurtured and cradled. Your individuality (to an extent). Your freedom (to an extent).

You are a mother now. You live, all the time, just a little, for that baby. Even when you’re not with them, you’re with them. You may be at work. You may be at school. You may be 10,000 miles away.

But you are not alone. That baby is still with you. Your life is not your own anymore. Not entirely.

No matter where you go, you are tied. Forever. Forever.

Suddenly and completely and irrevocably.

And that, my friends, is fucking intense. No matter how “prepared” you are.

Don’t you think?

So we say goodbye to our old selves. The women we were. The little girl who became a teen who became a woman and then, a mother.  Never the same. It takes a little getting used to.

And it’s okay. It’s all exactly as it should be.

But some of us aren’t quite ready for that change.

I wasn’t.

I remember thinking I had ruined my life. Thrown it away. I wished I could just go back to my old body and my old life and my old existence. My old state of being. Selfish? Yes. Immature? Yes. But real. And serious. And true.

So I mention it to my friends. To give them an out, a window of opportunity – a chance to say “holy fuck what did I sign up for? I’m dying here.”

And I’ll understand.

And that time I spent in silence and pain and despair can be put to some good use.

Because in the end, I wouldn’t have it any other way. Not one single bit of it.

Plus, I had two more, so it can’t be that bad. In fact, it can be downright lovely. And that’s the real message.

Ha.

There’s really no appropriate introduction for this, except to say that, for funsies, I decided to create a few bumper stickers. You know, things I would put on my car, were I not afraid of getting mowed down by some irate stranger.

By the way, if you are easily offended or sensitive or believe some things are sacred and should just not be made fun of openly on the internet, I suggest you skip this post. No really. I warned you…I’ll give you a chance to think about it…

Still here?

Good. I knew you’d stay.

That’s why we’re friends.

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Okay seriously. Should we print one of these?

Dear Rocket,

You came into this world the way you’ve remained, perfectly.

You came two days before you were due (always the gentleman), in a birth that felt like the sunrise. “Turn around,” she said, “pick up your son” and you swam and I lifted and kissed you and we locked eyes and you took air and took me. Pink ball of perfection. They asked me how I felt. I said “elated.”

You were so beautiful you took my breath away. How could it be?

This boy.

My son?

My son.

Your sister named you “Rocketship” before you were born. Rocketship “Rock on” MacDonald, to be exact.

It stuck.

I dressed you in blue. Your hair was red and blond with ringlets, eventually. You didn’t talk much or cry very often. You smiled and rolled around and climbed and grew. You slept on daddy’s chest.

And grew.

Until you had Chuck Taylor’s and a newsboy cap and words and freckles across the bridge of your nose (which destroy me, by the way).

Once, I walked in from work and you were two and you ran to me in elation, threw your arms around my neck as I knelt to you. You whispered “Mama, home.”

Let me always be home for you.

Let me get on my knees and feel your words across my cheek.

You turn 6 tomorrow.

My awe has not diminished. Your sacredness rests undisturbed. You won’t ever understand, little one. And that’s okay. You shouldn’t. You may get a glimpse when you have a daughter, but you’ll never quite know –what a boy means to his mama.

Tomorrow you turn 6.

The birthdays hurt a little.

Because I remember when you were 18 months old I got sick and was lost and I left you. For two years I left you. For two years I couldn’t see and I ran searching for something, stopping by as mama, holding you in the night sometimes, when the whiskey hadn’t taken me completely, crying softly in the folds of your neck as you slept, begging for a change and dying.

How did I go so long?

How did I not see?

That all I needed and all I sought and all I was dying for rested in the freckles across the bridge of your nose. In the little feet that ran to me. In the blue eyes that forgave me as I walked away again.

Without a word you explained — if I could only see you clearly for one single moment,

I would know freedom.

And finally, I saw.

But that time still sits like a boulder on my chest. Like a thousand pounds of granite grief. Of the time I missed. Of the boy who missed me.

But this isn’t a sad story.

This story ends in joy.

In you and me and a homeschool room (screw reading, let’s make messes) and stories in the “big bed” and breakdancing and Modest Mouse and mohawks, and baking cookies and sand and dirt and Transformer pajamas and stuffed seals and farting noises and you and me.

A boy.

And his mama.

Who’s home.

Happy birthday, little man.

Here’s to the rest of the story.

I wish I could do deep meaningful shit with my kids all the time. I do. I wish that.

But I can’t.

I wish when we spent special time together it was to knit and garden, sew pants out of upcycled wool, build things out of repurposed tires, visit abstract art museums. Paint, dance, frolic.

But I can’t.

I mean I CAN. Physically, I can.

But I can’t. Mentally. Ya feel me here?

Sometimes, I just need to pay money and do something easy with the kid – a guaranteed win. An outing that’s an “in the bag” kid pleaser with very little work on my part.

You know, like going to the movie theater to watch Transformers with your 5-year-old son, after purchasing on his behalf a large, buttered popcorn, one Sprite, one package of regular M&Ms and one package of Sour Patch Kids.

So it’s a PG-13 movie.

So it cost $40.00 we really didn’t have.

So he ate enough preservatives, sugar, additives and chemicals of unknown origin to destroy a few million brain cells.

So we didn’t really talk. Or learn anything of any use AT ALL (except, perhaps, that hot women can run full speed through a burning Chicago, dodging falling buildings and Decepticons, while wearing 3-inch spiked heels! Okay, seriously people, I gotta write a blog post about the way women are depicted in those damn action films. I’m vomiting a little just thinking about it.).

So it wasn’t deep or profound or particularly meaningful.

And I felt a little guilty that our special date together – our just he & I time – was a few hours sitting in a theater, watching large metal machines beat the shit out of each other and long-haired women with big lips dodge bullets and squeal.

But there was no preparation. No thought. No arguments. No cajoling. No disappointment when the child in question gets distracted after 10 minutes – more interested in gluing his finger to the table than furthering the objective of the well-thought-out, Waldorf-life craft project.

So it was perfect.

And halfway through the movie he crawled on my lap. And he sat on my lap the whole time. And I smelled his head and kissed his cheek and rubbed his bony little arms. And I watched him laugh when they laughed and get nervous during the fight scenes because you never know – this could be the first time the good guy loses…

And in the car we talked about who’s better: Optimus Prime or Bumblebee, and he reenacted the fight scenes and I realized I finally know the Transformers’ names like his daddy does, and he finally got an hour of uninterrupted mom-lap time.

And I gotta say, the whole thing blew wool-felting right outta the fucking water.

Well, yes. It was a really crap movie. Like bad.

So yesterday I went out with the three kids. Mac was working (shocker), and I was feeling ambitious and altruistic, figuring “I can handle this. I’m a good mom.” Plus, if I’m OUT of my house I don’t have to deal with the mess IN my house.

I know. I’m a thinker.

So we went to breakfast. Then we went to a craft store to pick out fabric for curtains I’ll never actually sew, and we walked around the 2^nd-hand baby store (where I bitched about the prices, realizing I can buy the same shit for cheaper at Old Navy and it’s NEW)…then we went to a couple other stores, then Costco.

And really the little hoodlums were pretty good. I mean they’re kids, so they can’t be THAT good, but for kids, they were alright.

But by the end of our outing I realized something: My kids never stop talking. They never, ever, ever fucking EVER stop talking.

“Mama, do you think it’s weird when girls talk about boys they like?”

“Mama, why are we going this way? Can’t we walk to the next store? Why can’t we walk? I wanna walk. We never walk ANYWHERE. Why do we never walk anywhere?”

“Mama, can we buy this wooden chest of drawers for my doll clothes?”

“Mama, I love it when I fart in my underwear.”

“Mama, Georgia has a booger.”

“Mama, you never buy us anything.”

“Mama, how do the police tell the bad guys from the good guys?”

“Mama, how did the Russian Revolution start?” (Yes, Ava actually asked that.)

“Mama, how come Hitler used gas on the Jews when  all the countries signed that agreement after World War I promising never to use gas again during war?” (and that too.)

“Mama, will I ever grow up as tall as daddy? How tall is daddy? Is he taller than an elephant? I want to be taller than an elephant. A crane is taller than an elephant. But what about a giraffe? Is daddy taller than a giraffe? A crane is taller than a giraffe for sure. Pretty much everything isn’t as tall as a crane. Right, mama? Is a crane taller than everything?”

And ON and ON and ON and ON.

And on.

And on.

And on.

Please give me a break. One break. Two minutes of silence.

Holy fuck do they EVER stop talking?

No. They don’t. They are relentless. I don’t think they breathe. They only talk.

When I’m with all three of them, there is always one of them making noise in my direction, needing me. Always.

Whether it’s whining or crying or wailing or squealing or talking…there’s always noise coming at me from the little people.

My husband can sit there and, by all appearances, not hear a single smidgen of it.

I on the other hand hear every single speck of chatter and feel compelled to answer each and every question they pose. [Unless it has to do with farts or poop or underwear. Most of those questions I let go unanswered, realizing the purpose is usually just to say the word “fart” or “poop” or “underwear” – any response being almost wholly irrelevant.]

I do okay at the beginning. But after a few hours…my Lord I’m tired of people talking at me. I’m an extrovert and all, but shit. Everybody’s got a limit.

And then I start giving one word answers and my daughter starts picking up on my impatience and I start feeling guilty so I try again but my heart’s not in it but they don’t stop because they actually physically cannot (by the way, is that some sort of ailment?)…so we just go on like that…forever….it’s all really quite a lovely little picture.

So I turn on music. Loud.

But they talk anyway. OVER THE MUSIC.

Sometimes I pretend I can’t hear them.

But they only TALK LOUDER.

Deep breaths. Mantras. “I am a rock in a stream.”

Yeah right. That shit never works.

I tried telling them once about the Dalia Lama stating that “senseless chatter” was a bad thing, clouding the mind and separating us from our Buddha nature. While it appeared promising at first, that particular strategy backfired miserably when they started accusing me of “doing senseless chatter” almost every time I brought up a subject they didn’t feel like hearing.

Oh well.

I know I’ll miss this in 20 years.

OR WILL I?

The only time I get any peace from the NOISE. Except wait a minute. Ava is not in this picture, which means she was probably with me. Talking. Talking to me. Talking to me endlessly. Shiiiiit.