I've had writer's block for days...

             Instead of spending the afternoon crafting the plot of my fourth novel, I'm thinking about other times I've felt "blocked."  Like when I first became a Mom. 

This is what I come up with:

Sometimes, when you have kids, you have to implement rules like, “First one to the shower gets an M&M.”  And sometimes, when you’re a mom, you say things such as, “I would gladly give up sex with my husband forever for one more hour of sleep.”  It doesn’t mean you’re a bad mother or wife, it simply means that at this point in life, you know how to pick your battles in order to avoid a war.

The very first time I made one of these statements, I was sitting in the floor of my kitchen with my five-week-old son in a bouncy seat.  He was crying, so was I, and my husband was on a business trip.  I’d watched my mom drive away after two weeks of helping me survive new motherhood and then I’d taken my husband to the airport.  Heavy tears dropping on the hardwoods, I said out loud, "I will give up cupcakes forever if one or both of them come back tonight."  (Cupcakes are my kryptonite)  I’d never felt more alone.  Or stupid.  Or incompetent.  Or tired.  Or insane.  Or ridiculously fat.  Or totally unattractive.

But then I wrote my first book.  Got some rest.  And kind of recovered my body.

Now, that five-week-old is a five-and-a-half year-old and the kid who wasn’t even a thought in my mind is a twenty-six month old.  Technically, he’s two years and two months.  I know some people frown upon perpetuating the month thing after a year.  But as I tick away the moments in my life and add to those of my children, I cherish that I still know exactly how old my youngest is in months.  In another year, I will have a kindergartner and a preschooler and I won’t have time to count anything by such small increments.  So I enjoy every second of their lives that are also a part of mine.

And I shouldn't worry so much about having writer's block this week because my kid's always think my stories rule.  And it's entirely possible that motherhood is easier than giving up cupcakes...