The State of the Momhood

Momhood has been....hmmm....exhausting, enlightening, entertaining, scary....just another regular week. My daughter is changing before my very eyes. It's like she turned into a teenager overnight. I have to remind myself that she's only 12. She has the body of a 15-year old and the mind of....well, she thinks she has the mind of a 17-year old, but often it just seems like a typical 12-year old mind. I'm really starting to like her again. OK, I admit it, I haven't really liked her a lot since she was about 5 when she seemed to regress into the TERRIBLE twos all over again. She's always been a verbal, challenging child. Suddenly, it seems like she's learning to harness that verbosity to her advantage. She's probably one of the, if not THE, most outgoing kid in her class. She hangs out with lots of girls and boys and is incredibly social and often quite witty. She's the pre-teen that we never got with our son. Like many things, this is both good and bad. Right now, it's kind of fun to watch. Stay tuned for interruptions.

Meanwhile, my almost 17-year old son seems very subdued. I think he's really stressed out about college, school and cross-country (which I'm quite sure he hates). I worry more about him because he doesn't express himself very much. Just like his father, I have to read between the lines. That's stressful for me! Can't we all just say how we're feeling without being obnoxious, rude, mean or whiny? But no, that would be too easy.

So, I'm learning to become a mind-reader. I'm not very good, but I do my best. And, like the true Libra that I am, I'm always trying to keep the peace and make everyone happy. Often, this makes me unhappy and crabby. Especially a couple of days during the month, if you know what I mean.

So that's update. Fortunately, nothing catostrophic today.