My Mother

So as you can imagine, it's been go go go these last few weeks. It's no surprise after all the running around I finally caught something. I had been feeling physically too good for too long. I've been coming down with something for over a week now and today seemed to be the worst of it. ( Let's not jinx it.) So today while I was sitting on the bathroom floor deciding if I could just live there, I had a mild freakout. I haven't bought groceries in over a week. The meal plan I made can't be done without the groceries, there isn't really anything in the house that Tony can make for his dinner and work lunch without waking up hours earlier, and I've been living on ramen because it seems to be the only thing I can keep down.

So I broke down and called my mother. 

I cannot describe how much I appreciate my mother and how she's always ready to help no matter what it is. So she was ready to go with some hamburger and beans dish for Tony for his lunch, some really good quality hot dogs, a pizza for later, and Sprite and crackers for me.
Clear sodas and crackers. are. magical. You forget how good they are when you aren't sick.
You can also forget how good your mother is when you don't need something. Thankfully, I've reached that point in my life I never thought I'd get to. I've finally reached that "your mother is your friend" point past the teen angst garbage.
As I've been going through this process of being a stay at home "wife", there are a few things I realized and came to respect about my mother. Today I'll be giving you 3 things I realized. We'll keep it short so I can go lie down again.

My Mother is NOT Lazy
As a nasty angsty teenager that really needed anti-anxiety medication, I thought my mother was the laziest mother on the planet. I would come home from school and she'd be napping. On the weekend she'd be napping by noon. What I didn't get? My mother wasn't napping because she's lazy. She was napping because she was EXHAUSTED. I never saw her getting up at 4 in the morning, cooking multiple meals because of multiple picky eaters in the house and for my father's lunch, the multiple loads of laundry washed AND put away, grocery shopping, running crap to me at school, vacuuming and washing dishes and ON AND ON.
I get it now. Dear God, do I get it now.

Just Because I Didn't See a Change in the House Doesn't Mean She Didn't Do Anything
The basic concept of "if she had done nothing at all, the house would be worse, not the same" never occurred to me until I was much much older than I ever should have been to be first realizing it. The work piles up visibly in a day. It is constant work. Constant. Improvement? Not if she had to take care of a schmuck like me. My immaturity and need to see flaws in the main authority in my life overshadowed basic sense.

The Reason She Eats in the Kitchen Isn't Because She Hates Socializing During Dinner

She wants to sit down, I promise you. She feels an overwhelming need to make sure everyone else has their food first. To produce enough hot food for everyone and make sure she herself gets some of the hot food, she eats on her feet while she continues to make food. Either eat it hot in the kitchen or chance not getting any of the food you made. I've struggled with this and it's just Tony and I. I can't imagine feeding 5 children and a husband and manage for all of them to get hot food let alone for me to get hot food. I've quietly been making food sacrifices without letting Tony know (now you know, honey... oops!) since we've been together to make sure he always has enough. He needs the fuel to keep going at work and I can snack on odds and ends here at home. I cannot imagine how many food sacrifices (let alone all other sorts of sacrifices) my mother has made over the years. My eldest brother is in his 40's. She's been making these sacrifices for over 4 decades and I never knew until I was in a similar place in my life. I never saw them, and when I did, I still didn't SEE it.

I see it now quite clearly even if I haven't gone through nearly so much. I haven't experienced it on any sort of level she has, but I've definitely gained invaluable insight.

So thank you mom. I wish I could say it more.

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