I am a PSYCHO

**Cue the scary Hitchcock music - reee reee reee reee!!**

First of all, let me explain that 99% of the time, I am a nice, relatively sane person; I accept my role as homemaker, wife, mother, chef, maid, chauffeur, nurse, therapist, cheerleader with hardly any whining or complaining -- this is what I signed on for and I am fully aware that I have at least another 16 years of this. And most days, I am happy and content to take care of my family and see to their needs.

But sometimes, on those rare 1% days, it all gets to be a little too much, you know? I'm sure there's other women, other moms out there who know exactly what I mean. Days when you wake up and you just feel off; you walk into the kitchen and see the dirty dishes piled up, the overflowing garbage bin, feel the crumbs crunching under your feet; you walk into the bathroom and step on used wet towels, see the tub filled with bath toys that didn't get put away, you look at the sink and mirror all dirty and spotted with godknowswhat, the empty toilet paper roll that no one has replaced; you walk into the laundry room and see all the hampers of dirty clothes, the disgusting kitty litter box; you peek into the kids bedrooms and it looks like a hurricane of toys and dirty clothes has gone through; the livingroom needs to be vacuumed and dusted, there's DVDs and CDs on the floor everywhere, not to mention toys and dirty clothes on the floor.

And it all comes crashing down on you, the fact that this is your life, to be constantly picking up after others and cleaning their messes, that you are the one everyone assumes will take care of it, that no matter how many times you ask and beg and then have to downright yell at them to do this or that, they just don't GET IT. No one seems to understand the crushing responsibility you feel, the weight that constantly sits on your shoulders. It seems like you are the forgotten one, they are living their lives and having fun and you are the one stuck at home with the baby while they get to go out and do things, like ice-fishing and quadding.

In moments like that, I feel incredibly betrayed and taken for granted. Yes, this is my life and yes, I knew what I was taking on having four kids before I was 30, but some days I think, "I didn't know it would be like this!" And yet, how many other mothers throughout the generations have been in this exact same situation, they coped and handled it, they endured. I just wonder if they ever had their moments of 1% too.

So all this that I've explained to you is background information, so you will know where I was coming from when I had my 1% moment yesterday.

When I woke up at 8am, I was feeling great. Tyler had taken the boys out ice-fishing early early and because I had warned him the night before to try not to wake the baby, Ryder had slept in past his usual 7am wakeup time, and I'd gotten an extra hour of sleep. It was wonderful!

Until I walked into the war-zone that was my kitchen and livingroom. The carnage was a nightmare, everywhere I looked was a mess waiting for me to clean it up. To wake up in such a good mood and then have to see all that, well, all I can compare it to would be to receive a beautifully wrapped present, only to open it up and see that someone punk'd you and gave you a big steaming pile of dog crap. As I wandered from room to room, upstairs and down, each mess and disaster zone I saw just added to the chaos going on inside of me. (Not to mention, I had chosen the day before as my "quit smoking cold-turkey" day and I had no ciggies to calm me down and chill me out.)

Around 10:30, I put Ryder down for his nap and decided to take a nice long hot bath to try to calm myself down. I assumed Lena was watching the movie I'd put on for her. She asked me at one point, yelling through the bathroom door, if she could do crafts, to which I emphatically yelled, "NO! Wait till I'm out of the bath!" Thought nothing of it, she usually asks me stuff like that when I'm in the bath and my response is always the same. When my bath was over, and I was feeling slightly more human and less psycho, I got dressed and went out to the kitchen.

You guys, it was a nightmare! She had NOT listened to me. Craft supplies were everywhere, beads and puffballs and tiny pieces of construction paper that she'd cut, not to mention blobs of paint all over the table, chairs and floor. The entire table and floor was covered. I turned to her in absolute horror, only to see that she must've also decided to give herself another haircut and a huge chunk of hair was chin-length! I kinda lost it, marched that brat to her room as I yelled at her, then I went back to try to deal with the mess. Halfway through, I lost all desire to even attempt to wipe up all the paint and I just stood there, breath heaving, thoughts racing, just thinking, "I can't do this any more! I need to get away!" And OF COURSE, that's when Hubs and the boys came home from ice-fishing.

By that time, I was a time-bomb waiting to go off. I held it in quite admirable, I thought. I didn't want to just blast into them for no particular reason. I was giving them the benefit of the doubt, hoping that at any moment they would say something like, "Wow, look at the front entry! Don't worry Mom, we'll take care of it" or even, "Here Mom, we'll take care of these dirty dishes and clothes that we left all over the livingroom". But no. The kids immediately started playing video games, Tyler went to lay down in our room. No one even noticed that I was standing there, fighting for sanity, they didn't even take notice of the huge mess on the table. I bent down to pick up a pair of scissors on the floor, Pablo happened to be sitting on them, and as I pulled them out from under him, he reached out and dug his claw into my thumb.

That was it. That was my breaking point. I shakily put the scissors back in the junk drawer, then I walked to my bathroom, grabbing a towel along the way from the linen closet, and I locked the door. Turned on the fan, sat down on the toilet, shoved the towel to my face, and I lost it.

I could hear Tyler yelling at me from the bedroom, "What's wrong? Are you okay? What happened?" I couldn't even respond, not that I wanted to. I wanted him to sit there, stewing, frantic with worry for me. I was in there for at least half an hour, crying so hard it felt like my head would explode. When I finally got myself under some semblance of control, I left the bedroom, ignored Tyler's "What the hell happened?!", went back into the kitchen and tried to tackle the mess again. But then I thought, "Screw this!" and I let them all have it.

I can't even remember what all I said, but I know that all the feelings and thoughts I'd had running through my mind as I sat in the bathroom and bawled, came out. When my storm of emotion finally ran its course and I collapsed in a chair, there was absolute silence. The kids silently tiptoed past me and started picking up their messes, occasionally looking at me with worry and fear in their eyes. As most people do when they feel they're being attacked, Tyler chose to get defensive and so I sat there and listened to him, "You SAID it was okay last night that I could go ice-fishing!" (That was a major cause of my psychotic episode, the fact that he went out ice-fishing every day, sometimes twice a day, for the last five days, instead of staying home and helping me out around the house.)

And so, I lost it again. "You know what? You think its so easy to take care of the kids and the house? You have no idea why I'm so upset? Well, fine! I'm going to bed, that's it, I'm done. YOU can deal with everything! Have fun with that!" And I crawled into bed, pulled the covers over my head, and started crying again. Eventually I fell asleep, although I could hear every so often Tyler yelling at the kids or his screams of frustration. I think I slept for almost three hours, waking up only when Tyler came in to tersely tell me he had to leave to take Ardan to hockey practice.

When I came out to the kitchen, the kids were only too happy to tell me all that had went on while I slept unaware. Ardan had accidentally broke a picture frame, there had been glass everywhere, and Dad had to clean it all up and get out the vacuum. Ryder had had a huge poopy diaper and Dad had to change him. Lena spilled her juice on the floor and Dad had to wipe it all up. Dad had to make them lunch, then clean up afterwards. Ryder spilled his juice all over himself and Dad had to change his clothes. There was no cutlery for them to use at lunchtime, so Dad had to empty and reload the dishwasher.

This, of course, was HEAVEN to my ears. Yessss!! Finally, he had to experience a fraction of what a day in my life is like. And it was pretty obvious that he hadn't been able to handle it. Okay, yes, to give him his due, he DID handle it, but not in a calm, sane manner. The kids said he yelled at them the entire time and his face was red and they thought he was going to have a heart attack.

When he came back from hockey practice, I was there waiting. Didn't say a word, just looked at him. And he said in a quiet voice, "I get it now." It didn't totally appease the psycho beast, but it was okay. And so I was back in 99% mode.

Its not the first time that 1% has come out, and it certainly won't be the last, but at least I'm being shown more consideration and thoughtfulness. AND my hubby went out and bought me a pack of smokes last night without me even asking. Haha. His attempt at pacifying the beast, I guess. And it worked!