Ok so I’ve realized I have not written a blog in well over a month…but I have an excuse! Last week, I typed my 50,000th word for NaNoWriMo 2014. For those of you who I haven’t badgered to death detailing NaNoWriMo, it is a writing community activity where the goal is to write 50,000 words of a novel in the month of November. So anyway, I finished it Thursday, three weeks into to the month. Now as I high fived myself and patted myself on the back for not only accomplishing this lofty goal, but doing it in 3 weeks instead of a month, I wanted to brag to the world how brilliant I was. I finished this amazing feat that not many people can do. It’s grueling and oddly satisfying at the same time. I also managed to go to work at my full time job, go to the gym, and feed my children (for the most part). So as I congratulated myself and prepped my social media sites for bragging rights, I glanced around. What I saw nearly made me throw up a little in my mouth.

My house is in absolutely disarray. Sure I’ve been loading the dishwasher and doing laundry and vacuuming now and again. But when I really looked at everything, I saw there were baskets of laundry and dishes piled up everywhere. There were handprints and nose prints and Lord knows what other prints all over the windows. I haven’t changed my daughter’s sheets in over a week. She’s been sleeping in a sleeping bag. There’s dust bunnies that she has actually named Frank and George camping out underneath her bed. Thank God she’s getting hot lunch at school or she just may have starved to death.

On the back deck, remains of summer are still in sight, a pair of googles, a deflated raft, a citronella candle. I’ve been too busy to pick that stuff up. I haven’t made a grocery list or gone to the store for a substantial grocery shopping in weeks. Our fridge looks like it belongs in a bachelor pad, one wilted tomato shoved all the way in the back of the crisper drawer, a half empty container of apple juice and some cheese. No, correction…lots of cheese. Cheese is a great meal on the go. We’ve been eating a lot of cheese.

I stepped on the scale, too. Wow, that was a shocker. I guess the pumpkin spice lattes that I used to keep me awake as I pounded out those 50,000 words settled right on my gut. And hips. And thighs.

And my social life lately consists of “liking” people’s statuses on Facebook. That’s right, I don’t even have time to comment, I’m so busy I don’t even have time to comment (I think I said that already…a symptom of being too busy…I repeat myself a lot). Sorry, all you get is a LIKE. Forget hanging out or going to dinner or talking on the phone. I have a voice activated text feature on my phone so you might get a text…whether it makes sense or not is another thing. I had a conversation with hubby last week and instead of telling him to “pick up a card at the store”, it wrote out “eczema in the back door.” Don’t even want to know what that would mean.

So instead of a pat on the back, I probably deserve a swift kick in the butt. *Sigh* It’s becoming increasingly more difficult to be the perfect mother, the Superwoman that is expected. Every time I do one thing really well and I’m proud of it, I look around and see everything that I’ve screwed up in the process, in my search for perfection. I’m starting to believe that perfection is unattainable. I’m not going to be able to be the perfect mother, wife, writer, employee, sister, daughter, friend, etc., etc., etc. at all times. Hell, I don’t even think I can accomplish any of those things ever, let alone all at once.

But wait a minute…why do I have to be perfect? Why do I even have to strive to be perfect? Why can’t we mothers just be happy doing the best we can do without feeling like an utter failure if we haven’t done everything perfectly? We are only one person, yet we expect ourselves (and so does everyone in our house, come to think of it), to be infallible, to never need help, to never screw up, and to never, ever drop the ball. And when we do, we seem to beat ourselves up more than anyone else does. We never seem to feel satisfied celebrating our accomplishments or congratulating ourselves, because our failures are always glaring at us, overshadowing the good. Let’s stop expecting perfection from ourselves to the point of never being satisfied with anything. We are our own harshest critics and we need to give ourselves a break every once in awhile before we end up having strokes and heart attacks from the constant stress we are under. You can only do so much, so why not do it well? If your kid needs you to snuggle with them, give yourself permission to skip the vacuuming. If your spouse has had a bad day, forget about the grocery shopping and go out to eat. And if you NEED to go to yoga before you have a nervous breakdown, it’s okay to take care of yourself.

So therefore, I’m ignoring that pile of uncut coupons that’s glaring at me right now. I’m gonna put my feet up and catch up on all the episodes of Big Bang theory that I’ve been neglecting. I’ll worry about all the rest in the morning. Maybe.