Right okay so today it’s all about my little Budda and how he’s now at that age where he HAS to “help” with everything…..and he’s been doing this since he was basically walking! Now realistically Budda has only been “helping” incessantly (bordering on stalking) for the past few months….it has just been a very long few months. Just simple things can now so easily turn into a battle for middle earth and all because someone gets frustrated……usually me.

Now I realise you’re probably all thinking – “oh how cute!”, “she just needs to realise how lucky she is to have such a joyful little helper”……..well all you people obviously have no children! You see the “helping” starts off as very cute to the point where you literally have warm fuzzy feelings bursting from every inch of your skin – remember the old cartoons when you were a kid where the animal/person is surrounded by sweet little birds and floating love hearts everywhere? Well it’s a similar feeling….

And then slowly the frustration begins to sneak into your being, as you’ve just realised that a 3 minute job has now taken at least 25 (and it’s only half done)……but as you look down on that excited smiling little face and it all just melts away. Again that frustration starts to sneak back in clawing its way up your leg and into your belly….and finally you just think “surely a little help can’t hurt, I’ll just demonstrate how it’s done” – well holy hell you may as well have just ignited all the fires of hell simultaneously!! BEWARE the wrath of a toddler who thinks you are trying to keep all the “fun” things to yourself! Best man the walls, pull up the draw bridge and batten down the hatches – the battle of wills has begun!

And now comes the fun part – oh yes, the fun part! Now comes the muffled and somewhat suppressed sigh of every embattled mother across the planet and then the “talk down” begins. The “talk down” is what I like to call that period in time where you must call upon your magical and all-knowing inner super mum to deal with the small demon like spawn from hell that is currently turning purple with hulk like rage, usually screaming and sprawling out to cover as much floor space as humanly possible….and all while being (of course) in the most public place possible…..During this wonderful time many emotions are felt – embarrassment, rage, self-pity and let’s face it most of us are either resisting the urge to yank that small human off the floor by the arm and flee at top speed with every fibre of our being or want the ground to open up and swallow us. Scarily most of this is not due to the fact that we feel we’ve somehow failed in our small human raising abilities/duties but in fact due to the pressure we put on ourselves for the approval of other people……and (dum dum dum *sinister sounding drum beats*) other parents! Crazy isn’t it??

So after many reasonably quietly and carefully chosen words through semi gritted teeth in front of what feels like 50,000 eyes comes the next stage…..”negotiation”. So by now you’ve gone through several transformations – normal mum, frustrated mum, super mum/inner child wrangling goddess to something that closely resembles a hostage negotiator. The negotiation stage is not always a last resort – as in a bribe but sometimes it’s an ultimatum fluffily disguised as a choice….as in “we can stay here, finish what we’re doing (i.e. shopping etc) and have fun or we can go home” (usually followed by and you can go to bed). The beauty of this ‘choice’ is that you haven’t actually specified what the fun is = you can make it whatever you want! You are not locked into any form of verbal contract which they WILL undoubtedly recite to you word for word at any given point on time “but you said we’d….” Thankfully my Budda’s not old enough to do that….yet

In my case, it’s usually a bribe as I’m either grasping to the end of my frayed rope by one fingernail and the threat of small human death or severe maiming is an imminent possibility or cringing internally dying of embarrassment. Now I’m sure goody too shoes old UK Super Nanny wouldn’t approve of my methods…..but in my all new honest 2.0 version blog I don’t give an aunts fanny! I’ll shamelessly admit that, I’m NOT above bribing children. In saying that, not all my bribes are actually carried out – as I tell my Budda “mummy is old and she gets forgetful every now and then”. It’s much easier than admitting 1: I don’t have whatever I promised, 2: I never intended to give him whatever it was, 3: I had a BP moment (shocking I know!)

I know all you fellow mothers out there know exactly what I’m talking about……and how secretly (very secretly) we’re all wondering how we have managed to keep it all together and not just accidently snapped and killed someone.…and all for the sake of our little humans. And for all those of you currently incubating little bundles of joy away or those of you still deliriously happily thinking about bringing a small human into your world – ENJOY THE WILD RIDE! I’m not saying it’s always like this – most of the time I love my little helper and basically just the enthusiasm he brings to simple every day jobs. My little Buddas eagerness, zest and excitement to complete any job, is honestly motivating and just plain fun…most of the time that is.

Without sounding incredibly biased, I do love my little Budda and more than just – “he’s my son and it’s in the contract”. His lust for life is infectious – absolutely exhausting but undeniably irresistible.  Totally revitalising, like a quick splash of water right to the face while you’re having your midday nanna nap. He can really lift my mood – chase those BP moments away if you will, other times well let’s just not go there shall we? Any parent can fill in those blanks….I’m sure. This entry may just seem like one big rant by a bitter mum that finds parenthood excruciating and all that it entails – not true! I love being a mum – I do…..but frankly it’s the hardest job I ever done. I’m sure everyone has once heard the expression – “anything worth doing is hard work” – well that’s what it is really, hard work.

I wouldn’t change it for the world but anyone who thinks ‘stay at home mums’ don’t work or have a job – BOO to you! Shame on you! Now I could be all philosophical and go on about how we are growing and shaping the future of our nation, our world even but that would be sickening and cliché – causing many of you to click on the big red X. Whereas the reality of it is, that we’re all just doing our doing our best – being the best parents we can be, all the while keeping our sanity, fending off ‘helping hands’ and being stalked by little feet and never-ending cries of “mmuuuuummmmeeee”.

I mean c’mon whether we like to admit it out loud or not, we’ve either all got a “helper” or we know one….and they’re not all toddlers are they?