So after a week of being a Matiz driving soccer mom....

I have decided that I kind of like it. Not enough to get married just yet or start joint bank accounts but enough to allow him to use my shampoo and let him get a chance at packing lunch.

I have to take my hat off to working mom's though (although I have before). Before moving in with The Boyfriend, my nights consisted of getting Zander fed, bathed loved and to sleep, which lasted from about 17:00 to 21:00 tops. After that my time was my own and I spent it reading, eating, watching movies, practising my origami skills, surfing the net and whatever I felt like. My new routine has the added chores of washing clothes, palnning what needs to be washed tomorrow so we don't run out of any type of garment (I did this before but now more often) and bedding, cooking, planning my day for tomorrow, planning tomorrow's meals, packing away the toys, planning the weekend, and making to-do-lists. Yes, I know, I love planning. I thrive on planning and it makes my world go round. Once I am done with all my little things and it's time for myself we are close to 22:30 and I am just about ready to pass out.

I do have to say that The Boyfriend is a jewel here. We have a very nice routine going where one cooks and the other bathes Zander, while the one washes the dishes and the other puts him to bed. He helps where he can, without me having to ask and he has adapted beautifully to suddenly having us two permanently in the house. He even buys the right groceries I ask for, and every so often has a red square cider as a suprise waiting for me when I get time to put my feet up. And may I add all this without us having to discuss what needs to be done. It's a well oiled machine. I think it helps that both of us rely on routine and order to get things done and we anticipate.

I am not complaining though. I can't begin to describe how awesome it is for me to finally have my own household again. To decide what is for supper, when the washing needs to be done, what groceries we are running out of, did I or didn't I fix the seam in his pants? It's awesome being able to decide what my son will have for supper, whether he is naughty or really in need of something, to enforce my own ideas of discipline. No one will understand the value of these things unless you have lost them once. I feel in control of my life again so this enables me to take control of things I have let go because emotionally I had too much on my plate.

One low dow though is the fact that I am slowly losing patience with Zander's bad sleeping. I have tried everything: mosquito thingy for the mozzies, teething mixture for the teeth, extra balankets for the cold, a t-shirt for the heat, a dummy chain so he can find the dummy, a humidifier for his chest when he was sick, panado, stopayne, calpol, co-sleeping, different nappies, a different room. I have tried this all at once and various combinations. He still wakes up 6 to 9 times at night. Mostly it's handable, but I do get times, like this week, when it gets too much and last night it came to a head point when I lost my cool and gave him three HARD smacks on his bum. He didn't even really cry but shit does not describe how I felt, and still feel about it. This is motherhood and it comes with the territory so the last thing I should be doing is losing patience with him and ESPECIALLY not smacking him. We are at a very difficult stage where he can't verbally express himself so if I am not quick on the uptake he starts bawling, and I start thinking I'm going to go nuts if he does that one more time. The other night I gave him to The Boyfriend and said to him that I just couldn't deal with it at that moment, and he managed to sort the situation out before I lost my cool. I will never hurt my son, he is my life, but my adult logic doesn't understand his child logic that in his world you can cry for everything. I would like to think being tired, changing residence, being sick and settling into suburbia allows the both of us to go a little bit nuts. It's just that you should never take this out on your child. It;s just frustrating when you are feeling like a zombie from the moment you open your eyes, promising yourself you would go to bed early, and then come bed time you can't sleep. And no, sleep training via a professional is not an option. It is just too costly. Sleep training in general is not an option because I can't really afford to get less sleep than I am already getting.

So there you have it. I smack my child and dope him too.

And in the same breath I would like to congratulate my friend Cezzane, a social worker with DOSD, on her pregnancy.