Grumpy does not cut it

After another evening of being grumpy and tired we lay in bed and Zsolt asked me: so what is missing in your life? And there was no answer, there was a silence. I said, after a while, something stupid like- power, strenght; Zsolt sighed quietly and told me yet again that I am stronger than I can imagine I am. I cried, but I thought- I know. This is true.

What is missing in my life?

I have amazing son, great partner, healthy family, good friends( not many, but those who are there are 'taller than giants'), I have a big talent( that I'm stupid enough not to use), I love in a great place, I have things to eat and drink and read and learn.

Okay, I'm so so tired, I feel like I'm in a prison( it's a kind of mental prison where my head seems to have a life sentence), I wish I could go for a holiday somewhere nice and hot or at least go home for a while.

But it's important to remember-all this is just a phase. I bet that in 20 years when I will be able to visit every damn beach in the world, I will be upset and I will think about time when my son's life physically was in my hands( and tits). Even in 10 years I will miss those days.

So from now on I will try my best to enjoy the place I am now. It's a great place( on a floor that needs a good hoover, between king sized bed with my man and usual sized cot with my supervisor). I sit here for a reason. I should be grateful for what I have, be more with it all instead of constantly looking back or forward or from above or from too close.

Be grateful. And give this flat a good hoover( it's great to have electricity!).

LGT

As some of you know, my partner was born and raised in Hungary. One of the best, the most legendary Hungarian bands is LGT. They were told that they could be better than the Beatles if only they sang in English. They never did.

So there I was, on a sofa, waiting for Janek to burp after he ate and Zs called me to check something on the laptop. And there is this song in a background and he posted the lyrics and he tried to translate them. Obviously none of us is an English translator and there are sentences and words and metaphors in Hungarian that you can't find in English, but there you go. 

It made me cry so much, so much. Zs took Janek away to another room because I was shaking from emotions. I love how he knows me and how he knows what gets me. 

Check it out, it's beautiful.

Arra születtem, hogy kisgyerek legyek,                 
s anyám mellett lassan játsszam az életet,
arra születtem, hogy felnőtt is legyek,
s megértsem a szóból azt, amit lehet,
s végül arra jöttem én a világra,
hogy elhiggyem azt, hogy nem vagyok hiába,
ah, ah, ah, ah,
Arra születtem, hogy megszeressenek,
s megszeressem én is azt, akit lehet,
arra születtem, hogy boldog is legyek
s továbbadjam egyszer az életemet,
s végül arra jöttem én a világra,
hogy belehaljak abba, hogy éltem a világban,
ah, ah, ah, ah,

I was born to be a child,

to slowly play the life next to my mother,

I was born to be an adult too,

to understand everything what I can from one word,

And finally I became to this world,

to believe I am here with reason,

ah, ah, ah, ah,

I was born to be loved,

and to love who I can,

I was born to be happy too,

and to give my life over once,

and finally I became to this world,

 to die because I lived in this world,

ah, ah, ah, ah,

 

2mo

Dear Janek,

you're two months old today. We're laying in bed, you just ate, we're listening to Radiohead; it's your first time and you seem to enjoy it.

You're growing like a mushroom everyday. You're getting smarter, cheekier, more aware of things and people. You're beautiful. Strong. You still wake up in horror but the next thing I know is how wide you smile.

You're so happy to see me that I have to pinch myself from time to time. There's absolute, love and trust in your huge diamond eyes; it's scary, it makes me teary, it makes my days.

It was a hard month for the whole family, we've had bad days, some bad words, some tears hidden and open. But what we do here is grow, we're growing in speed up mode and we’re learning, so we can become the best possible family.

You're the bestest member, obviously, with your teeth-less smile and all. And you don't need to know that some words doesn't exist, because you are them anyway.

I'm trying to get myself sorted, too. I'm only 24, and I think to myself day by day- what am I doing here? With you?

I owe you everything and I want to give you the best days and memories and books and words and pictures and bicycles. I want to guide you through horror days and I want you to know I'm here always.

It's exciting and overwhelming, too. I'm so tired. I'm so scared I don't give you enough of things, feelings, attention. It's scary because quite frankly nobody loved me like you love me now and you are 61 days old. You're just about grown out of the ground. I have to learn how to deal with it all.

Happy 1/6th of the year. I hope we will be bigger friends everyday. Love you to bits( even if sometimes I am not understanding it all, at all).

Yours FOREVER,

Mama.

Lift

I'm sitting on the floor and waiting for Janek to wake up for his first night feed. It’s so damn hot, isn't it? I can feel my body sweating and I just took a shower; I don't think it ever happened before in this country( since I'm here obviously). It reminds me of hot hot nights back at home. When you sit long after midnight on the balcony with your grandma and you just breath this warm and sweet( grandma had lots of flowers) air.

Today I exercised once again. The workout I do is by a very famous now Polish girl who slowly changes the way Polish women look and feel about themselves. Trust me, you hate her while you're on a mat, but as soon as you're done- you're in heaven. And then she says the crucial words: I am proud of you. You did amazing job today.

At this point I cry. Every single time. I just burst into tears.

It makes me think- how sad is this world? Where is this world going? If the only time you feel good about yourself is when somebody else tells you you did a great job. And if thousands of people follow the person who tells them every day: I'm proud of you, you're awesome( people started to compare this fitness instructor girl and all her fans to a sect) it gets all negative again.

I thought about it and about myself. And about myself and others. And about how much I can forgive others and how little I can forgive myself. It's just fucked up.

Of I look only on today I've done SO MUCH; for my son, for my house, for my man, for myself.

And I'm still beating myself up, I think it's not enough and I actually want people to say to me that I do everything great. And if its not great is good enough.

But the only person that should acknowledge this and say this is writing this damn post. Obviously it's nice to be appreciated but I remember we could cherish every thing my mum was doing every day and she was still unhappy. If you don't respect and believe in your job, who the fuck will?

Of course, it may all be so obvious it can become painful. But it's not on every day basis.

I would like to vow here to make Janek feel proud and awesome about things he does. And don't contradict this with a following sentence. (’Very nice drawing.
I wish your mother had an abortion.’)

You're awesome, I'm awesome. Today I feel proud.

at the end of which I eat a piece of chocolate

Last couple of weeks are hard. So hard. Very bad days change to strange days to better days and to very bad again. I'm not even sure how to write about it because I have problems vocalizing my feelings.

Since I became a mother all those things about me are just showing up every day- bang, pop, pow- things I didn't knew or didn't want to know about myself. 

I'm going from totally hating myself to feeling well about all of it in the matter of hours. Sometimes minutes.

It all looks so good and happy on the outside, inside of me there is a constant battle, I'm constantly telling myself I do things wrong or not good enough- and then, automatically, this is just what's happening. I start to make mistakes I could easily avoid.

And oh, god- everything is affected. My relationship, my friendships, my self-esteem more than ever and my kid. I feel awful but at the same time I need to know I have right to all this feelings. But at the same time I want to stop feeling them.

It's so hard it's even hard to say what ACTUALLY is happening. Because maybe it is all inside me?

I cannot wake up. I wake up and I cry because I'm so tired( no matter how long I sleep- and Janek is an extremaly good sleeper! He just wakes every 3ish hours to eat and falls back to sleep; ALWAYS). Takes me couple of nice minutes to get awake enough to realise that Janek is not hungry anymore( I try to catch more sleep and shovel my tit in his poor mouth)- he has gas and needs to be burped. It takes so much effort to actually come up and burp him- crazy. 

Day reveals itself, it's getting better until I feel I should be dressed already, I remind myself that the best days are days when we're out and about early. But no- I will drink a tea, feel crap about myself, spend another hour on my iPod instead of for example taking a shower or reading a book( Janek is napping at this point).

Somewhere then I panic- start to clean the house furiously, think what to cook for tea( by the way it took me 3 years in this country to realise what 'tea' means; haha! I was always like- what do you mean what I cooked for tea- biscuit?), get dressed, feed Janek, put the make up on, turn the washing machine, wash dishes, change Janek, write shopping list, feed Janek, put him into pram and we're out to the shops. 

This feels good, to be out- until Janek starts to cry- which he does rarely and I feel ASHAMED ( why the fuck do I feel ashamed that my child is uncomfortable!?) that I AM FAILING because my baby is crying BECAUSE I AM NOT GOOD ENOUGH. And I don't know what's wrong. 

But he doesn't cry much( trust me, this boy is an angel and I should be grateful forever, I would probably die with all those feelings if I had a cry baby) so we do the shopping, I spend much more money than I should because there is always a magazine or a nail polish or whatever that needs to go in as well ( WHY!?).

We get back, I feed J, I cook a bit, he hangs around on his chair, if he sleeps he sleeps if he is awake I feel guilty the same second I notice that I don't spend enough time with him.

Guilty guilty guilty. Fuck. My brain is fucked.

There are days when I just run around him and I'm not happy at all and I don't feel any joy from any of it.

There are days when every time he smiles at me I cry from happiness because he obviously loves me so much and is happy here and I make myself ask questions: why do you love me, baby? Why are you happy? I don't do anything for you. I definetely don't do enough. What do you do with 2 months old? What do you do with baby that's one year old? How will I know? ( See, now I know all those questions are so stupid, but once I feel them it's a different story.)

There are moments, short moments, when I feel so proud he is my son and I feel so good about myself, too- very short ones- in Starbucks when he talks to me and smiles and I look nice in pink dress and I feed him and kiss him and people are passing and they smiling to us; in a lift when he cries his heart out and the lift is full but I still make everyone laugh a good laugh and J stops to cry and then we're home.

Everyday I keep thinking that I'm not good enough and that I should sort myself out first before actually having a baby. Everyday.

It's all so chaotic, I'm sorry( to whom? I write it for myself, I put it out there because maybe someone will have some advice). I cry every day.

I googled too much of postnatal  depression and 'adult child of alcoholic' syndrome and all this and I should stop because in the same way I probably have a cancer already. I refuse to take any kind of drugs anyway. Because it's all inside me, see? I know it. Every day I see it and I'm scared it will go to my son- and I want the good things to transfer, not all this. Why do I need people's permission all the time? Why do I want people to feel sorry for me?Why do I care what they think? Why I AM SAYING SORRY EVERY DAY MINIMUM 265421 TIMES( sorry I'm passing here with my pram, sorry I'm on your way, sorry I wanted to get out of the lift first before you got inside, sorry my kid is crying, I'm sorry I look for money longer than 3 seconds, sorry I couldn't pronounce this word properly, sorry I'm here)? Why do I need their advice about my every step? Why I forgive them so much and I treat myself so harsh?

I kind of knew all of it about me before but it's since I became a mother it all goes out to the surface. Ok, it has something to do with hormones but I refuse to throw the blame on them because I really know they're not everything. It's easy, too easy to say: yah yabadi yabada it's my hormones, whatev.

There's so much work to do on myself, but where to start? ( Oh, there's chocolate.)