I promise I didn't write that last post with the intention of not posting again for almost two weeks.

The day after that post, I woke Nicholas up from his nap (the mere fact that he did nap instead of singing show tunes in his crib for an hour should have been my first clue that something was up) to discover the poor baby covered in massive amounts of vomit. 20 minutes after I woke him, I was due to pick up Isabella from preschool. I quickly changed his clothes, picked chunks of puke out of his hair, woke up Luci, got them into their winter gear, loaded them into their carseats and drove with the window down in 20-degree weather because the smell, OMGTheSmell, was so awful, to preschool.

Nicholas bounced back pretty quickly. The rest of us were not as lucky. Late Friday night, I came down with the stomach flu. The next day, Isabella and Luci were down too. And on Monday of last week, the hubs got it too. My flu lasted the longest. I was out of commission, and basically too weak to even walk across the room until Tuesday. The hubs had to take two days off of work, because I literally could not even stand up without feeling as if I was going to pass out.

The hubs and I spent Valentine's Day taking turns sleeping in our bed, while the other laid on the couch playing kid shows off our DVR for the Triple Threat and praying not to die. For once, I was glad that 80% of the space is taken up by the likes of Sesame Street, Olivia, and Little Bear.

Relatives, terrified to catch the flu, dropped off food on our porch, and then ran like the wind back to their cars, lest some disease-ridden air particles from the inside of our house seep under the door and into their nostrils. I can't say I blamed them. Our entire house was a festering mess of vomit-stained clothes, dirty dishes, and toys that had not been cleaned up in days.

Mamacita started her visit early, and thankfully came into town last Wednesday (instead of Sunday) to help me once the hubs went back to work. I was better, but still really weak, and there was no way I could have handled the kids in my condition.

We are all better now, thankfully, but I never, ever, want to repeat those five days again.

Anyway...

I thought the comments on my last post were really interesting, and I glad so many of you decided to take the time to leave one, especially you long-time lurkers (hi, Kendra! I have always wondered about those visits from Vanuatu!). And I am always glad when I hear about someone finding my blog and completely identifying with what I write here. It makes me feel like this blog might actually help someone, instead of just serving as my misery-laden sounding board, so I'm glad you found your way here, Suzanne.

The bottom line is this: All mothers are just trying to do the best job they possibly can. Some of us are better at it than others and some of us find it comes much more naturally to them than it does to others. I've said it here before and I'll say it again, a lot of times, motherhood for me is akin to being a customer service rep at a high-volume call center where the people on the other line have a continual stream of demands and complaints that never, ever stop no matter what you do, say, or promise them.

Motherhood is Hard (with a capital H) for me. Juggling a career, a social life that barely exists, a marriage, and a house that's perpetually filthy along with motherhood and attempting to keep my sanity is always going to be a challenge. And when I know through reading your blogs or talking to you on the phone or emailing you that it's hard for you too, (maybe not as difficult as it is for me, but hard all the same), then I know that this is a struggle we all (well, apparently not all of us) share, it makes the burden not as heavy.

Please don't be afraid to share these feelings if you have them, and I know most of you do to varying degrees. It doesn't make you a bad mother.

It makes you a human one.