I suppose nobody really said being a mother would be easy, but you kind of assume it would be easier than it really is. To be honest, it feels like rather a thankless task.
Looking back, the sleepless nights, the breastfeeding, the nappy changing (and washing as I used real nappies) was a walk in the park compared to what comes next: Being ignored.
You'd think it got easier because now they can understand you, they're able to walk, talk, and do things for themselves...
If only.
I mean, nobody tells you that you will get sick of your own voice, that you'll get fed up with repeating yourself over and over, day after day, with the same things, that they know they need to do each morning, or whenever, but you still need to remind them... Or have to repeatedly ask them to do something, till eventually they do do it (if you're lucky). And that you can not fathom how two children could sit at the breakfast table, first thing in the morning AND BICKER!
I've now decided it probably doesn't matter what I say in front of my children, because they're never listening anyway... WRONG! The minute I say an expletive, oh, yeah, course they hear that!
Or as soon as I pick up the phone or talking to someone. They're either really really noisy or nosy, or start fighting or trying to talk to me. "Who is it? Who is it?"
The little fuckers!
Now it's summer, my neighbours probably think I'm mad, as they hear me, outside in the garden, hanging the washing out and swearing under my breath how sick I am of being ignored.
Or think I'm a fishwife the way I holler at my kids...
So, this is why I love my writing. I can get lost in it. I forget I am a mother. It reminds me I am an intelligent woman and I'm putting that intelligence to some good use. It makes me forget the nagging, horrible person I don't enjoy becoming. I really don't like her! But however much I try not to become her, I fail. It doesn't work...
With my writing I become Teresa F Morgan, author of contemporary romance, commercial women's fiction. I am heard... well, read.
