Last week Gig Girl found herself wide awake at 4am. Ever the astute co-sleeper, I instantly recognized that, by the sound of Hubs’ virtually silent breathing, that he too was battling a bout of early morning insomnia. Our conversation went as follows:

Gig Girl: Hey, hon…are you awake?

Hubs: Yep. I  can’t sleep – I have all these thoughts racing through my head.

Gig Girl: Me too!

Hubs: What are you thinking about?

(Gig Girl can not emphasize enough that, what follows, is exactly what happened)

Gig Girl: Well, I was just lying here, thinking about the boys.  How much I love them and what great kids they are growing up to be. And then I started to think about them getting older and someday having their own families and how, I bet, we’ll have granddaughters since it’s such a boy circus here now. Then I was wondering about what kind of girls they’ll end up with – how it will be weird to actually have daughters-in-law, since I’m so used to being the only girl in this little crew…that I hope I’m able to make room for them someday and not overstep my boundaries as a mother-in-law. Why…what were you thinking about?

Hubs: The new irrigation system – for the life of me, I can’t figure out what kind of automated time rotation it’s on.

Nope – not a typo. Gig Girl found herself completely lost in a pre-dawn reverie about both existing and future familial generations while Hubs was contemplating the enigmatic abyss that is adequate lawn hydration. Granted, I take full accountability for the boatload of 4am crazy I had racing through my head (honestly, who thinks about future grandchildren before all her current children are actually potty-trained? In my VERY weak defense, I had just watched the “Married To Jonas” episode where Danni and her mother in law were at odds with each other earlier that night. As a mother of boys, it clearly it resonated with my future self),  but I simply can’t envision a circumstance where I would ever contemplate grass thirst, let alone lose sleep over it…ever.  Seriously – are Venus and Mars our only gender options?

It’s not often I rant. Okay, fine, I rant all the time. But usually my tirades hinge on what is literally transpiring in my own familial backyard. But today I’m compelled to blather and opine on external events. Recently, I came across a shared post on Facebook that showcased a French author who discussed her opinions on modern motherhood and how educated women who choose to stay home and raise their families have:

a) Willfully contributed to a dangerous counter-feminist mindset that can potentially set back womankind as a whole.

b) Essentially “lost their minds” as well as sight of the big picture where, after we raise our families, we’ll have to all be put out to pasture professionally because we will have virtually nothing worthy to offer our prospective corporate cultures.

She actually used the word “infantile” to describe the personal parenting choice of staying home…

Sigh.

Perhaps this is just my “intellectual dowry” at work here, but couldn’t one argue that recklessly stereotyping and demeaning an entire motherhood demographic actually delivers a more devastating impact on the fortitude of women’s rights than, say, Gig’s Girl’s innocuous decision to hang with the boy creatures here at the homestead?

Personally, I’ve been a working mom, a working single mom, a blended family working mom, a stay at home mom, and most recently, a work at home/stay at home mom. One might think that my diverse maternal experience may have rendered me exempt from the proverbial hairy eyeball of judgment. Right?

Not quite.

During every single phase of my mommyhood I’ve received some sort of external discrimination…some maliciously overt and some neatly packaged in passive-aggressive prose.  Either way, it’s hurtful. What’s even more interesting – 99% of the unsolicited opinions on my working/parenting status came from WOMEN. When I worked, clearly I was a  “removed mom who cared more about my career and personal corporate advancement than the welfare of my child,” when I decided to stay home I was “over-involved and indulgent with obviously no sense of my own value or self-worth” and then when I became a work at home I instantly morphed into an “inattentive and neglectful parent who surely allows TV to raise her children so she can surf the web all day seeking online employment. ”

Sigh.

And heck, it’s not even restricted to just whether or not I work – don’t even get me started on breastfeeding…or (gasp!!) the decision to circumcise or not circumcise. I actually had a female family member who, upon finding out O was a boy, sent me a large zip file of  photos entitled “circumcision mutilations” just in case I was considering “maiming” my “perfect son.”

Sigh.

And the worst part? In my weakest, most insecure moments, I’ve had these thoughts myself. Mostly it’s been internal dialogue directed at myself because it’s the mentality I’ve been socially fed for years. But, there have also been some unfortunately self-righteous thoughts  aimed squarely at other women/moms simply because, in that moment, it helped justify my own parenting approach. But, the longer I parent, the more firmly aware I become of the fact that really not a one of us knows what the heck we’re doing. Ultimately, we love our kids, we do the very best we can and we pray nonstop that we will somehow deliver them wholly into adulthood with as little emotional scar tissue as possible…all the while fully knowing that in 20 years or so, our precious offspring will inevitably conclude that everything is all.our.fault.

The secret is out – we’re all winging it. Shouldn’t we at least try to support each other through it?

Ladies, we are far more powerful en masse. Let us forever stop being a gender divided simply because it is the ridiculous tradition that has long been handed down to us. Let us refrain from tearing each other down for personal gain or even just the brief high of a catty adrenaline rush.  Let us abstain from celebrating the mean, divisive behavior that all too often gets top honors in the media and reality television. LET US STOP CARING ABOUT THE KARDASHIANS! Well, except maybe Khloe…

The point is – Get married/don’t get married.  Have a baby/don’t have a baby. Breastfeed/bottle feed. Work/stay home. Have an early mid-life crisis and completely revamp your entire existence to find your own version of happiness. Whatever. Let us all embrace the power of our own personal life choices with grace and gratitude and vicariously appreciate the vastly varying decisions made by our surrounding sisters.

Eyes on our own papers, people.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to find a tree to hug…

Facebook Reality:

Actual Reality:

Legend has it that some children, ages 12-24 months, use their timeouts for moments of behavioral reflection – as an opportunity to think about their perceived misdeeds and mentally prepare to do better, to be better next time….

I gave Tobin such an opportunity today. I sat him down, quickly reminded him why he was in timeout (aka continuously attempting to free fall on top of your big brother and the dogs is NOT okay) and then walked away to leave him alone with his thoughts. Because he stayed seated after I left, I was hopeful that he would pensively replay the events   in his mind, realize his misdeed and be behaviorally reborn upon my return. Instead, I instantly heard some singing, giggling and then a few distinctively slurpy noises that prompted me to grab my camera.

This is what I found:

Sigh.

Of course, Gig Girl is no child-rearing expert. But, I’m fairly certain that this isn’t exactly his “meditative introspection” look. I’m pretty sure that, at 21 months, I’m already on the receiving end of a Tobin-sized song if disregard. Tra la la– Lord, please help me…

While the dismissive irreverence smarted a bit, I realized that the exercise was not a complete waste of time. After almost two years of searching, I finally have the irrefutable evidence I need that this little blonde, green-eyed baby boy does, in fact, have some of my (albeit feisty!) DNA in there.

Recently, I came across an online study that discovered women, on average, apologize more frequently than men do.  It went on to say that it’s not because men don’t apologize for misdeeds – they actually ranked just as highly as women when it came to doling out mea culpas for perceived transgressions. Rather, women apologize more often than men simply because we truly feel like we’ve erred more often than our male counterparts.  Hmmmm…

While I would love to chalk this little factoid up to us ladies being the more nurturing, intuitive gender (we’re not called the kinder, gentler sex for nothing), I did take a moment and take a little introspective inventory and realized:

Naturally, when warranted, I like to think that I’m capable of expressing regret and saying, “I’m sorry” (Hubs might disagree). But, when I think about it, I fall in line with that study and exist excessively apologetically.

Whether it’s a “sorry” morphed into ardent justification, validation attempts, garden variety life choice defending, etc. I find myself in a weirdly consistent flux of feeling sorry about stuff that shouldn’t even register on the remorse radar.  So I’ve made a list of things that henceforth I will try, attempt to, not apologize (to the world at large or even to myself) for:

My Cardigan: My girlfriends often tease me that I never met a cardigan I didn’t like.  They are wrong. I’ve actually never met a cardigan that I didn’t LOVE.  At my core I recognize my intense affinity for jeans, v-necks, cardigans and flip flops.  But, sometimes I look around at some of the moms at O’s school and feel completely impressed (and simultaneously just a teense inadequate) with how uber-girlie and well put together they appear at all times while I’m doing a spot-on Fred Rogers impersonation. At times I have struggled with the feeling that, at any moment, my imaginary “Girl Card” may be rightfully revoked (Especially since, in the spirit of full disclosure, I should also confess that I really don’t like the color pink). Going forward I will strive to simply embrace my “practical-shoes-wearing-nature” instead of feeling like I need to make amends for it.

My Over-Worrying: Being raised by a quintessential worrier mom coupled with decades of Chris Hanson and Dateline has created the perfect storm that surrounds my extremely worrisome nature when it comes to my kiddos. In short – O sees a playground and I see an impalement hazard. And while I will continuously work on allowing my boys the freedom needed to feel self-confident as they grow up, I need to stop making amends when another parent’s safety gauge is different than mine and there are things that I just don’t feel comfortable with.  Never again will I apologize for my vigorous opposition to O cannonballing into the virtual cesspool of germs at Chuck E. Cheese!

My Extreme Aversion To All Things Housewives: Let the record reflect, I love pointless, pedestrian television. I once sat through a good chunk of a Silent Library marathon – and enjoyed every.single.minute. I know that all the Housewives installments reap huge viewer ratings and, I swear, I have tried to sit through episodes from several of the different cities. A lot of my friends LOVE the show so I have found myself nodding demurely when it’s the topic of our conversation and kind of feeling sorry that I don’t share their enjoyment of the show.

But, I stand here before you today to announce that the times I have tuned in all blur together in a blinding vision of really bad parenting, pouting over a $5,000 clutch that doesn’t close, vicious cat fights and a 45 year old woman resplendently ridiculous in full on ice dancing regalia at Rockefeller Center.  And these “friends” are so mean to each other!  I cringe every time I surf by.  My reaction is so visceral that I couldn’t even tolerate Dr. Phil’s version – and I love Dr. Phil.  So there, I said it – and I’m not sorry!

My Parenting: In this case, my apologies present as a wave of passive/aggressive (okay and sometimes just aggressive) debate and justification. Every parent knows that to have children is to be subjected to all sorts of unsolicited input, advice and suggestions. I’ve started to realize just how much time I’ve wasted systematically addressing each unwanted opinion. Why?  It’s essentially existing in a constant state of reactive sorry. As long as the Hubs and I are raising our boys according to our own standards and values, a simple shrug or pleasant nod in the inputter’s direction should suffice.

My Own Internal Barometer Of What True Happiness Is: The world is full of forces that will try to determine what should make someone feel satisfied, and at times, I’ve felt the need to defend that fact the Jones’ (or the Kardashians) just aren’t a factor on my fulfillment gauge.  My own definition of happiness is a personal, subjective entity that would probably read like a foreign language to the masses.  And that’s okay.

No, I will never claim an existence brimming with utopian perfection (as the flying egg sandwiches of days past can attest to). But, I do have the ferociously unwavering love and adoration of my most favorite boy creatures, the privilege of watching O get off his school bus every day (and, trust me, I watch him make every single step of the 10 yard journey to the safety of my front door to ward off any lurking, future Dateline wackos) and apparently I’ve struck some magical deal with the invisible Pamper fairy because I have never, not even once, had to empty my diaper champ when it’s full.  Honestly, what more can a Gig Girl ask for?  According to me, I am happy.  Unapologetically.

What are some of the silly things in life that you feel you need to defend or make amends for? Or, have you actually mastered simply embracing all your quirks and insecurities without a sorry in sight?  Send me an email at csf@thegiggirl.com or leave me a note in the comments below!

Proud as a peacock? Or mortified beyond words? I can't tell either...

Gig Girl would like to add one more descriptive to the ever increasing list of adjectives that are slowly defining her 2012:

Head Swiliating: adj  \ˈhed swil-lē-ā-tiŋ\

Definition: Used to describe an occurrence or event that is simultaneously head swelling and humiliating.

Examples of Head Swiliating
Gig Girl found it a surreally head swiliating experience when she received ample, unsolicited praise from not one, but two teachers about her oldest child’s commendable behavior at the very same instant her youngest child burst into an unprovoked and inexplicable shrieking tantrum tirade that instantly cleared the school halls.

Sigh.

When I find a word that describes the act of simultaneously beaming with parental pride while bursting into a panic sweat brimming with maternal mortification I will be sure to add that to my 2012 list as well…

Gig Girl has done it again

Gig Girl admits – this past January 1st, like many others before it, held not only the promise of a new year, but new opportunities for personal transformation, progression and evolution. While I refrain from making resolutions other than my continued attempt at living fearlessly, I always embrace each new year as a prospect for a clean slate and rekindled hope that I can somehow exude a truer version of my best self. That I will somehow seize the occasion to soften some of my least desirable descriptives and add a litany of new adjectives to all that is Girl Girl for a refreshed definition of me (ambitious, I know, but a Gig Girl can dream..).

Sadly, it seems that, so far 2012 is bearing a striking resemblance to 2011 when it comes to the descriptive pool I’m submerged in.

A few examples of my current, very personal list of adjectives:

stu·pid:  adj \ˈstü-pəd, ˈstyü-\
Definition: slow of mind : obtuse b : given to unintelligent decisions or acts : acting in an unintelligent or careless manner c : lacking intelligence or reason : brutish

Example Of Stupid:
After already losing one computer to a vicious pop-up virus, it was stupid of Gig Girl to incessantly click on that pop up that plagued her Words With Friends app last week (curse you, you silly addictive scrabble rip off!!).

It was also extremely stupid of Gig Girl to be shocked that clicking on said pop up caused the mother load of system crashes on her brand new computer. What C drive?

And finally….
Gig Girl felt really, really, really stupid when she realized that, even after one fatal system crash, she had failed to renew her virus protection software until her computer was literally wiped out at her fingertips.

Then, of course, there’s:

Ironic: adj \ˌī-ˈrä-nik also i-ˈrä-\
Definition: incongruity between the actual result of a sequence of events and the normal or expected result (2) : an event or result marked by such incongruity.

Examples of Ironic
It is quite ironic (and more than just a teense painful) that Gig Girl downloaded this death wielding virus 10 minutes after completing an article entitled “Important Ways To Avoid Downloading Harmful Computer Viruses.”  Sigh.

And let us not forget:

un·com·fort·able: adj \ˌən-ˈkəm(p)(f)-tə(r)-bəl, -ˈkəm(p)-fə(r)-tə-bəl, -ˈkəm-fə(r)-bəl\
Definition: causing discomfort or annoyance

Examples Of Uncomfortable:
Gig Girl felt mighty uncomfortable when she had to explain to the Hubs that, once again, technology had whooped her proverbial butt and she needed him to don his IT Help Desk Cape to swoop in for the rescue. (Which he did…for over 3 hours and somehow managed to completely salvage my hard drive…and he didn’t roll his eyes once that I could see).

While this ordeal  has made me wonder if I’m just too darn, ahem, “mature” for change, it has given rise to at least one new self-coined adjective to the list of all that I am:

Idioclownerratic:  \i-dē-ə-ˈklau̇n- i-ˈra-tik\
Definition:  See Gig Girl

I guess there’s always 2013…

Gig Girl had a Yuletide epiphany recently. I’ve realized that life is like…a Christmas card photo shoot….

If you spend too much time scrutinizing and analyzing every single snapshot you’ll waste precious time obsessing over

The Good:

The Bad:

Yes, he's giving Charlie a Noel Noogie...

And,well, The Ugly:

But, if you simply take a step back and breathe it all in at once, you may just find that it’s actually all the many flawed moments that truly make life picture perfect.

Happy Holidays And A Blessed 2012!

Gig Girl

Gig Girl feels compelled to advise – this post is not for the faint of heart (or stomach for that matter):

I’ve long esteemed Thanksgiving as my favorite celebratory holiday. Of course, I love Easter and Christmas and do my best to honor the religious beliefs behind each. However, Thanksgiving delivers little to none of the “retail requisites” that abound in other holidays. With a complete focus on food, family and festivities, Thanksgiving gets me every time.

Unfortunately, Thanksgiving got me in a whole different way this year…

The day began and almost closed as every Thanksgiving has since Hubs and I got married. Ardent in our recognition of gratitude, we visit with both sides of the family and travel from NH to MA and then up to ME every fourth Thursday in November. Of course, this means we spend the entire fourth Wednesday in November packing up enough gear for ourselves and our upright and four legged boy creatures for an extended lake stay. But the effort is worth it – we arrived in my hometown mid-morning to visit my grandmother with the boys. Then we headed off to my parents and the house I grew up in for a traditional Thanksgiving feast. Satiated and contented we headed up to the lake for further merriment with Hubs family. Exhausted from our state trifecta escapades, Hubs and I retired to our lake bedroom early.

And then, disaster struck….

Gig Girl, despite her feisty, often unyielding and at times, crusty countenance, still fancies herself somewhat of a lady. Thus, I turned to Hubs as composed as humanly possible giving the circumstances and announced;

“Uhmmm, just so you know, I’m fairly certain I’m about to throw up…and it isn’t going to be pretty.”

And then I did.

And it sooooooo wasn’t.

I violently vomited for so long and at such a deafening decibel that, not only did I watch my entire Thanksgiving meal come up, course by course, but I actually became embarrassed over what I could only imagine Hubs could hear through the wall our bedroom shares with the upstairs bathroom. My mortification almost superseded the unimaginable relief I felt once it was over. Almost. In my post-hurl delirium, a crazy turkey vision danced before me, looking something like this:

Only it was a much different feathered finger the creature was waving before me…I noted the irony of the the bird, giving me, well…the bird…

I would like to say that this was the only cloying episode in what should have been our Rockwellian holiday weekend.

It.so.was.NOT!

After keeping Hubs awake all night with my nauseated tossing, turning and hurling I shamefully dragged myself into another bedroom to give the man a moment’s peace. Hubs finally awoke fully to the sound of Sir Reginald dry heaving on his bed. He raced him to the shower, only to hear Tobin fussing angrily in his crib. Getting Reggie back on solid ground, he went to check on Tobers…

Again, Gig Girl does fancy herself a lady on some levels, so I will spare you most of the details. Sufficed to say, the richness of the food from the day before apparently did not sit well in T’s fledgling digestive track…my poor monkey was wearing the meal’s remnants from his chest down. It circumferenced his tiny abdomen like an ill-fitting pair of beige and olive liquid mommy jeans.

Hubs found himself getting yet another boy creature in the shower on this fateful morning.

It actually gets worse…

After crawling back in our bed to get some rest, I saw a little brunette head standing over me. “O…don’t get too close, I don’t feel good,” I whispered. Then, “Do you feel okay?” He assured me he was fine and then bounded downstairs to eat some breakfast and prepare for the annual “Friday after Thanksgiving ice skating” with his cousins. Of course, I never anticipated that he was merely putting on a brave front, masking his stomach bug disquietude to ensure he could participate in the aforementioned rink activities.

And neither did Hubs…

So you can imagine his complete and utter shock when, after putting Reggie out, Hubs turned around to find O viciously hurling in his parents’ kitchen sink. Racing to his assistance, Hubs let his eyes follow the long, slushy trail of spittle and Coco Crispies that wound down the cabinets and merged into a gigantic mushy puddle midway across the room. That’s where he watched in helpless horror as our newly bathed Tobin toddled over and began gleefully splashing about in the bile-riddled drivel as if it were his own personal wading pool.

The man had officially, and understandably, reached his breaking point.

After bathing some more boy creatures, we quickly repacked up the gear we spent all day Wednesday getting together and headed home by 9 am on Friday morning (yes, it was really only 9am on the longest morning EVER). I would love to say we enjoyed a brief reprieve from illness on the truck ride home, but alas we did not. But, as I fear I’ve already shared too much, I will spare you those gruesome details. Finally arriving home, O and I spent the entirety of the day sequestered upstairs, vacillating through all the horrors the 24 hour stomach bug beholds and giving an entirely new meaning to the phrase “Black Friday.”

We awoke Saturday refreshed and reinvigorated to find…Hubs was the bug’s next victim.

Despite being the worst Thanksgiving weekend EVER, Gig Girl has learned some invaluable lessons over the past 48 hours.

1) NEVER make your kids’ annual doctor’s appt. the week of Thanksgiving. I’m pretty sure that’s where those miserable germs first accosted us (thus proving my fear of doctor’s office germs is NOT unfounded).

2) We all aspire for material comforts on some level. However, having your health and those who love you unconditionally through vile wretchedness are truly life’s most precious commodities.

3) Holiday perfection is truly an oxymoron. Whether you accidentally burn the bird (or buns, ye who shall remain nameless!) to a crisp, are forced to awkwardly convene with relatives you only see once a year, or spend the evening in a nausea-induced swirlie, it’s never a flawless event. And that’s okay – you can always try again next year.

4) Someday we will look back on this weekend and laugh hysterically about how we naively believed that our completely untrained puppy would be our primary unpredictable body function concern.

And perhaps most importantly:

5) In this crazy world of unexpected twists and turns, one can never tell when a Thanksgiving Day meal is going to have absolutely no caloric consequences. Always go for that second helping of pumpkin pie.

Gig Girl, for many years and in a previous life, lived like a big feral ‘fraidy cat. Neurotic, on edge and ready to randomly bolt from the room at the slightest stir of trouble. I stressed over…well, everything. Finances, my job, the economy, terrorism, SARS, Y2K (remember that ridiculousness??) and any other personal or social issue du jour automatically skyrocketed to the top of my angst list. I’d spend needless, endless hours strategically brainstorming my actions and responses to situations and/or dialogues that NEVER HAPPENED. At my rock bottom, I realized that the excessive worry and trepidation that I perpetually carried with me was actually something I sought comfort in (yes, yet another lunacy Snuggie).  Constant fret had actually become so much my norm that I didn’t know how to operate without its incessant, raw gnawing in my stomach.

And then, I went through a divorce. Believe you me, there’s nothing like first person navigation through an actual life-altering crisis to help a neurotic 30-year-old realize that fretting over the bird flu is a freakin’ colossal waste of time (although I do maintain that everyday doctor office and ATM vestibule germs embody perfectly reasonable phobias.  But alas, I digress…).

The point is, despite being inherently wired for worry, I do recognize that unfounded fright over EVERYTHING is futile. I know a Gig Girl can’t change overnight (a.k.a when it comes to mothering my boys, I will always be a completely insane and unapologetic worry wort). But I still do my best to work every single day towards living fearlessly and faithfully to the best of my abilities. It’s literally the only New Year’s resolution I ever make each year. Whenever I find fear creeping in and influencing my life, I take a deep breath, prayerfully ask for guidance and move forward. Whether it’s quitting my job, navigating through the unknown abyss of infertility, starting my own business or even something as innocuous as painting my kitchen red (which I did…and I love!), I’ve learned that ignoring that petrified flight risk inner voice in my head has yielded some of my life’s most amazing blessings.

Well…Gig Girl got a little cocky in her complete disregard (tra la la la) of fear…

And then something happened to my former feral ‘fraidy cat self. If I were to break the “something” down mathematically, it would look a bit like this:

Hubs + Me + Pinot + Giddiness Over an Evening of Uninterrupted Adult Conversation + Perhaps A Smidge More Pinot + 24/7 Internet Access To Our Former Breeder =

In case you’re wondering about Sir Reginald, I can assure you he’s still with us:

We brought home our newest family member last week. Official name: Charles Brown Barkley Farmer. “Charlie” for short. One girl and five rowdy boy creatures all under one roof. My daily existence is a blur or diapers, piddle, chew toys and toddler gear.

Gig Girl must confess: I.am.TERRIFIED (or, maybe it’s more like, “Terrier-fied?”)