Eating, Sleeping & Watching a Movie

These are the three things that I have finally accepted I will never do again without at least a couple of interruptions...Ever.

Why? Because once you have your first child (and then the second and so on), this is how it goes:

Eating
Step 1. - No matter how hungry you are, first nurse your infant so she's content or asleep while you cook/eat.

Step 2. - While doing step #1, explain to your five-year old for the up-teenth time that she is just as important as the baby, but babies don't know how to wait when they are hungry.

Step 3. - While doing step #2, start thinking what you'll have for dinner.

Step 4. - Put baby down and run to the kitchen. Begin cooking dinner. While doing this you have two options: (a) let your five-year old help you in the kitchen or (b) lose your sanity while she repeatedly asks "how long till dinner", "can I help?", "what are we having?", "I don't want that", "it smells funny"...

Step 5. - Ask husband if he would prefer lemonade or iced tea. The answer, of course, will be whatever is not ready.

Step 6. - Prepare lemonade.

Step 7. - Set table, if five-year-old hasn't already and begin this daily routine "turn off the TV, wash your hands and come to the table". Repeat until they actually do it.

Step 8. - Sit down, be reminded that yet again, you forgot the napkins. Get up, get napkins.

Step 9. - Sit down, relax and get your first bite ready to eat. Get up, go get baby who has begun crying.

Step 10.- Eat as well as anyone can with baby in lap, or

Step 11.- Put baby in high chair and feed her first.

Step 12.- Enjoy your cold dinner.

This is pretty much the routine for sleeping and watching movies (let's not talk about sex).

The funny thing is, you don't actually mind. Kids come first, they are small, they need you, they crave your attention and company, they have the energy that you envy, their minds are inquisitive and their laughter is never-ending. If you see it this way, then eating a warm dinner, sleeping for more than three hours straight and watching an entire movie does not seem so important. You could do without that, but they cannot do without you. Their entire life, personality and view of the world depends on how you respond to these needs.

The more I realize that their existence is my responsibility, the more guilt I feel for ever complaining. When my children get to the age where they don''t need me, when they will not crave my attention nor my company, I want regret to be the last feeling I get.

So...Eating? I could use the diet. Sleeping? I'll sleep when I'm dead. Watching a movie? Their life is the most interesting piece of art that I will ever come across. I wouldn't miss it for the world.