Thursday, October 3, 2013

17 ways to get a mom break when you need one


1. Insist on talking to your family only in pig Latin/like one of the Wonder Pets/in falsetto. If that doesn't make them leave you alone, start singing Broadway show tunes like a Wonder Pet.

2. Buy the cheapest perfume you can find. When kids get on your last nerve, spritz liberally. (On you, not them.)  

3. Whip out your child's IEP and announce that you are going to do a theatrical reading of it. When everyone flees, go take a bath.

4. Alternately, offer to do an interpretive dance inspired by the IEP.

5. Ask, in an entirely too chipper voice, "Anyone like to come with me to CVS? I need to research laxatives!"

6. Tell your child's physical/speech/occupational therapist that as much as you want to sit through the session with her, you need to excuse yourself to have a nervous breakdown BUT you will definitely be done by the time the 45 minutes are up, not to worry.

7. When the local cable channel airs your town hall meeting, settle down and start furiously taking notes, not looking up until your family has left the room. Then click over to HGTV.

8. Tell the kids you are playing scavenger hunt. Inform them that you have hidden, throughout the house, various dustballs for them to find. Go! Go! When they take off, have a nice cup of coffee alone in the kitchen.

9. This tactic require's a friend's help, a length of heavy rope and some KrazyGlue. Or, really, just the friend will do. Have one show up at your door and announce that her dog is having puppies and she desperately needs your help. No matter if she does not actually have a dog, or that she moved across country five years ago.

10. Tell everyone you are going to do 18 loads of laundry, and who would like to help? Proceed downstairs alone. Pull out book and read.

11. Find a supermarket or gym that offers child care. Deposit your child there, making a mad dash out before staffers realize he has special needs (but being sure to leave a note behind full of instructions, of course). Cower in the freezer section or behind a piece of exercise equipment.

12. Help your family understand just how much of a better mom you are when you have time for yourself by purchasing one of those airplane oxygen masks people regularly reference in that well-worn metaphor ("You have to put the oxygen mask on yourself first before you can help others!"). Whip it out during dinnertime, when you have everyone's attention, and demonstrate the proper inhale/exhale technique. Even if your family does not get the gist of the metaphor, you will have at least gotten a chance to take some nice, deep breaths.

13. Sign up for an upcoming conference—a blogger one, The International UFO Conference and Film Festival, a conference about conferences. Any will do!

14. Ask your husband if he'd lend you a hand with the bikini wax, or if he'd prefer if you just dashed out to get one.

15. Alternately, ask him if he'd like to come shoe-shopping with you... to find ones that will fit your child's foot braces.

16. Offer to play hide and seek with the kids. Then only play the "hide" part.

17. Actually inform everyone that you need a break, and that phone operators are standing by should anyone need assistance with something vital like, say, where the scented magic markers are or how much time to set "defrost" on the microwave. And then, woman, go take a break. 

Image: Flickr/M.Marcus

15 comments:

  1. Great ideas!! I'm soooo gonna try a few this weekend. Wish me luck!!!!!!!!!!

    ReplyDelete
  2. I'm sharing this with my husband. He's the stay at home parent in our household. I'm sure he can modify a few!

    ReplyDelete
  3. I really do the hide-and-seek one all the time! My kids think I'm playing with them, I think I'm getting five minutes alone in the bottom of a closet-- it's glorious! My only problem is that when my OCD starts "flaring" I feel compelled to clean said closet while I'm in there!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Here's a follow up for when it gets really bad!!! http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/10/01/mom-i-quit-parody_n_4023386.html

    ReplyDelete
  5. The shoes-over-braces one only works if you're not taking the child with you and not going to a shoe store the weekend after school starts (can you tell our last trip with new AFOs was a 4 hour ordeal?)

    ReplyDelete
  6. Once I left Aarshia at the therapist excusing myself for 45 minutes, went to a mall and tried all outrageous clothes which I can't wear otherwise. Had a hearty laugh and some crazy pics in the trial room..!! Came back all happy and rejunevated...

    ReplyDelete
  7. Well done! Pretty sure #9 wouldn't work though. Kids and puppies? You'd have tag- alongs for sure. Maybe your friend's sink is plugged full of hair?

    ReplyDelete
  8. Oh my goodness. Laughing until I had tear-filled eyes. I so needed that! Just the break I needed!!!!

    ReplyDelete
  9. Ha! Yes. I'll be trying some of these tonight...

    ReplyDelete
  10. I just have to say the words "jazz hands" and my kids (and husband!) know to scatter!

    ReplyDelete
  11. I tried #15 several months ago and HE ACTUALLY OFFERED TO TAKE HER HIMSELF!

    ReplyDelete
  12. These are fantastic thank you for sharing x

    Emma
    http://thegoodmotherproject.com/

    ReplyDelete
  13. That was hilarious! A very good list. I grew up as the healthy, normal kid in a house with a severely disabled child and I can see my mother pulling a few of these stunts along the way! Actually, I think she pulls them pretty often now that I'm disabled as an adult.... Hmmmm... Though the shoe shopping to find me shoes that work with a replaced femur thing mostly works to get rid of dad then we have a girls day at the fancy mall. ;)

    ReplyDelete
  14. I laughed so hard at that post. Maybe say that you are going to a meeting/to work out at the gym. That worked with my mom

    ReplyDelete

Thanks for sharing!