When It’s All Too Much

It started with spilled milk.  While there may be no use crying over it, sometimes there is use in getting mad.

So Joshua rushed from the bedroom shirt half-buttoned with “it’s only seven in the morning” written all over his face to find out why his high-strung too-pregnant wife was ranting about milk.

It’s because we’ve lost all the valves that go in Amelia’s Playtex cups.  I don’t know what happened to them.  Maybe the dishwasher ate them.  But when I give her milk in a cup with no valve, you know what happens.

It’s hard to squat and bend and clean up spilled milk for the first of many times when your belly extends far out past your feet and every move is a stabbing pain.

Then after that, it was everything.  A Jonah Day, Anne Shirley would say.

When you’re contracting and cramping and carting around two toddlers to Story Hour and refereeing fights and folding laundry and washing dishes and paying bills, at some point, it all becomes too much.

Too many little toys all over the floor to be picked up again.

Too many times of trying to get one to sleep only to have the other one get back up.

Too many times of trying to just sit down only to be climbed upon and kicked in places that don’t need kicking.

Too many short moments.

Too many wonderings if this day will ever end.

My mom says I hold up unrealistic expectations for myself.  It’s true.  I think it’s because I feel surrounded by perfection.  Maybe I need to travel to a third-world country and really realize just how good I have it.  Because in the grand scheme of things, nothing happened.  It’s just nothing seemed right.  Everything seemed too hard.

Amelia left a trail of Cheez-its behind her at the OB office because I didn’t have anyone to keep her and sometimes I think I’ve irritated my mother-in-law by constantly asking.  So I didn’t.

Amelia took her shoes off and walked barefoot through the parking lot and I was too tired to care.

But it was at McDonald’s that I lost it.  So embarrassing.  Madelynne spilled her ketchup and when I tried to help her, I knocked over her drink and I was holding a tray and Amelia was escaping and sweet tea was everywhere.

Sometimes it’s just too much and sometimes the tears are just enough to make it better.

Some friends from church were there.  They settled my girls at a table, where Amelia spilled her milk again, and helped me carry out food and wiped up my mess and told me it would be okay.

They’ve been there, so I believe them.  They were exactly what I needed in that moment.  Just someone to show me some love, rather than some judgement.

Jeannett over at Life Rearranged published a great post today about showing mamas some love.  We’ve all been there, so let’s stop pretending we haven’t and get real with one another, in the grocery store, in the parking lot, in the library or the McDonald’s.  It doesn’t matter how many little fingers are squeezed into yours, if you’re a mama, your hands are full and it feels good for someone (even a stranger) to give you some encouragement.

Because yes, these days are short and they go by so fast and soon they’ll all be gone and you’ll be sorry.  But for those days when all this mess seems never-ending and you can’t imagine missing spilled milk, nothing shows God’s love like a smile and a helping hand.