I came here to write a post about how I’m a shitty mother and should therefore not be breeding again (whoops! Too late!) because my temper is simply Not Normal.

But you know what? Fuck that. I am, at the core, a human woman with a baby growing inside me. Yes, my hormones are nutty. Yes, the daily pain has clouded my sense of enjoyment in general. Yes, yes yes. There will always be some reason (thank you mental illness) why my reactions are not appropriate and my family are victims of my inconsistent temper and nitpicky complaints. There will always be an out, for all of them. The bathrooms haven’t been cleaned in 2 weeks? What’s the big deal? This is only a big deal because they live with me. Laundry in the dryer for 4 days? What’s the problem? It’s only a problem because Mom made it a problem this week.

But when do other people become accountable for being fuckups? When does my mental illness or my pregnancy or my PMS or my controlling nature take a backseat to someone just being an all-out asshole?

And so our mother-daughter weekend at the fancy resort in town is cancelled and I’m a Big Bitch. But Internet, I have to say that if the child will not wear one of the six jackets in her closet to school tomorrow and instead insists that the world will end if she does not make a phone call and retrieve her loaned out jacket (at 10:10 p.m., people) because tonight at 9:30 was when she decided that every acceptable jacket in her wardrobe was far too dirty to wear and 9:30 is a fantastic time to start doing laundry…. well that doesn’t bode well for us in a hotel room together for two days.

Actually, it was the screaming that came after the “I don’t care, FINE!” (cue slamming door and tears) that convinced me that this is not the weekend for mother/daughter bonding. I don’t know, man- something about that finality, like how fucking dare I question her right to make phone calls at 10 p.m. to get her clothes back, how dare I expect that she would deign to wear one of the (I’m not kidding) SIX other jackets in her closet, or fuck it, suck it up and wear one of the dirty jackets? How dare I challenge her, remind her that this is happening because in the SEVEN hours that she’s been home from school she couldn’t be bothered to do laundry, pack her bag for the weekend (reminded 3 times, folks. THREE times), or take inventory of her jackets? How dare I, why can’t I just let her make the phone call what’s the big deal, FINE, ***door slam*** whatever, I don’t care anymore!

I wish I could let it go right there. A good mother would, right? A cool mother would make the phone call, or promise to get the jacket clean by tomorrow?

I guess I’m not that mother. I’m that other mother, the one who expects that if you have something you want me to do you’ll ask me ahead of time, not “can I go to the movies tonight and by the way can we pick up xxx on the way” at 6 p.m. I’m the mother who yes, looks like an asshole when I say no, not tonight, figure out a way to make plans ahead of time, dude. And I’m OK with looking like an asshole because no one remembers, and the Internet wasn’t around me when there had to be a checklist with items like “get out of bed” and “turn off bedroom light” and “put dish in sink” just to get the kid through the day. These are tools people need, tools for Life, tools like if you want your friends to hang out with you, it’s a good idea to ask them sometime before the movie starts, and if you want clean clothes to wear to school, either put them in the hamper on laundry day or wash them before the day you need them, and if you want your ears pierced make an appointment and ask for a ride, and not the day of, instead of walking up to someone and saying “we really need to get my ears pierced why haven’t we done that yet?”

And so my mother-demon comes out and the door is slammed open and the closet flung open, and the jackets that are there, even the beautiful and much gushed over leopard print coat I gave her for Christmas won’t pass muster for Friday at the middle school, none of them will do, and I just lost it.

Maybe there’s another way to teach these lessons. Maybe it isn’t my job to teach them at all. Maybe what I’m teaching her isn’t Life Tools anyway. Maybe all I’m teaching her is that once someone crosses your threshold, it’s OK to come out with guns blazing and throat burning.

It’s all so silly and so stupid and I know, I KNOW! That if I would just walk away, just disengage, just turn a deaf ear to the undercurrent of blame and how dare you-ness of the whole thing, it would go away quietly and without sore throats and cancelled trip reservations.

I know.