Manic Mornings

For the first time since I became a mother of two nearly a year ago, we’ve recently found our morning groove, landing upon a routine that allows me to get to work on time.

But as any parent will tell you, life with kids is all about trade-offs. I’m getting to work on time, but I feel like I’m having to be rather mean sometimes to my two little kids to do it. There are usually a couple mornings each week when I leave the house feeling like the worst parent in the world because I had to cajole and scold my way to a timely departure.

I earn the shameful worst parent title in several ways, by being brusque with Lucy while herding her around as she transitions from PJs to potty to brushing her teeth to getting dressed for school and eating breakfast. I’m always urging her to speed up, or at least to get things done while also being a little chatterbox—it’s not an either-or proposition, after all.

I earn it by harping, “Isaac, stop that!” when he’s tipped over the bathroom garbage can again, just because he can. He’s not even 1 yet, but really, are you ever too young to learn that trash cans are best left untoppled?

So I’m embarrassed to say that I get fixated on the clock and let myself get too harried to be my best parenting self Monday through Friday mornings. My behavior often makes me feel like crud before the clock strikes 7:10. And soon enough, I’m out the door with 45 minutes to an hour alone in the car to rehash in exaggerated detail where everything went wrong that morning.

Achieving the balance between good worker and good mother is the trickiest for me during the daily morning rush. It’s when I feel like I’m stretched too thin to do everything right. So the next step in the morning balancing act will be to find a way to keep Isaac’s head from getting stuck between the banisters and keeping both kids from crying and wiping their boogers on my blouse while still leaving the house on time.