Can we just pretend is hasn't been almost three months YEARS since my last post?  I'm just sitting here going over every experience and thought I've had in that time, and I can assure you- you haven't really missed anything.

 

Tonight, I want to complain.  You may have seen this precious little picture on Facebook:

 

 

This little girl is so many things.  She is beautiful, smart, HILARIOUS, determined, entertaining, talented, sensitive and just super cool.

 But I swear she will be the death of me. 

I can remember crying when I found out I was having a girl, and again when I had her.  I turned to Nathan and said through sobs, "She's going to hate me."  Granted, there's just a little bit of emotion flying around when you're giving birth, but I've had that same thought many times over the past 8 years.

I feel (on a pretty regular basis) like I am failing at being Hazel's mom.  I just haven't figured myself out enough yet to figure out how to raise a little mini-me successfully.  Does that make sense?  I could go on forever about all the issues we struggle through together, but suffice it to say it's just hard being her mom sometimes.  She's one tough little cookie. 

She (and therefore all of us) deals with pretty extreme anxiety, and that's what I want to focus on in this post.  She fixates on certain things for long periods of time.  "What if I'm too small to hold my baby when I have one?"  "Do I have to move away from my family to go to college?"  "Do we have to drive on the highway to get there?"  "How old am I going to be when you die, Mom?"  I don't mean that she has these thoughts and over-analyzes them in the moment.  I mean she will think about, dream about and talk non-stop about one of these thoughts for months until it becomes almost crippling.  I feel like it prevents her from being as carefree as she should at her age.

Most times, this anxiety translates into an upset stomach.  That's where the crippling comes into play.  I feel like this little girl's stomach controls our every move sometimes.  It becomes very frustrating.  This past couple of weeks has been no exception, but I just haven't been able to pinpoint something that is stressing her out.  She complained for 8 straight days about her stomach, but never threw up or had a fever (or any other symptoms). 

"Can you turn down that music?  My stomach hurts."

"I don't want to eat at a restaurant tonight.  My stomach hurts."

"I just turned cartwheels across the living room, then did a back flip off the couch, but I can't help straighten up 'cause my stomach hurts."

Needless to say, we lost our patience.

So when she woke up in the middle of the night last night saying she was going to throw up, I sent Nathan to deal with it (by yelling at her that she wasn't sick and better go back to bed).  When she got up a second time, I sent Nathan to deal with it again (in the same manner). 

When she got up a third time and I had had enough of his yelling, I finally stomped into the bathroom to take over, and she proceeded to throw up....6 times throughout the night.  After the first time, she looked up at me with the saddest little face and said "NOW will you just believe me?"

See?  Failing.