Mondays Are Hangover Days

I don't think I've ever talked about the struggles of being a Stay-At-Home-Mom.

Well, maybe I have. But definitely not this one.

Bimmer Man leaves for work between 6:45 and 7:15 in the morning. He gets home between 6:30 and 8:00 at night.

It's a really long day. For both of us. This happens 5 days a week. Most other stay-at-home-parents that I know don't have partners that work this much. Most partners of parents that I know leave at 8:30 and are home by 5:30. That sounds like a dream to me.

Am I complaining that Bimmer Man works too much? No. I'm definitely not - when he decided he wanted to be a lawyer, this is what I signed up for. I knew it. I agreed to it. When we had The Monkey, I knew I was going to be the "primary" parent because he would be working a lot, which is partially why I stay at home - if I worked, The Monkey would be in daycare and neither of us would get to see her much during the day during the work week. What we have now is what works for us and this is what makes us the best parents that we can be.

So when the weekend comes after a really long week, it's a real whirlwind of activity - The Monkey gets her "dad" time since they don't have as much time together during the week. They play, hang out, do a ton of stuff together, work on cars, play Legos, go shopping. We get to hang out as a family together, we see friends, we go to other play places, we are pretty much on the go all weekend long.

Sometimes I go to bed on Sunday night completely forgetting what we did on Friday or Saturday.

Then Monday comes.

The Monkey is pretty much worn out from all the "dad" time she got over the weekend. She's crabby because he's not here. She's irritated because it's "not as fun" without dad. She acts out because she knew she could get away with certain behaviors over the weekend when I wasn't around. She wants the tv on all the time because playing isn't as fun and she's not as creative because dad has been playing with her. It's a seriously irritating day for me.

Mondays really make me question my parenting skills.

Which is why I call Mondays "Hangover Days." Serious hangover from the weekend. Sluggish, irritating, lazy, and headaches abound.

As a stay-at-home-parent sometimes I feel really bad talking about the struggles of staying home because of all the "mommy wars" that you read about on Buzzfeed or blogs or Facebook groups. There's going to be that one person that says "you ungrateful mommy! you get to STAY AT HOME! while I AM WORKING AND AWAY FROM MY CHILD!!" So I'm putting this struggle out there. BECAUSE MONDAYS FUCKING SUCK. It doesn't matter if you have kids or don't. Stay at home or work. Mondays are terrible "Hangover" days for everyone.

Now that it's Tuesday, we're going to have a great day. HAPPY TUESDAY!!!