after Jane O’Connor  

I hate being weary. 

My favorite thing to do is hide in bed. That’s a weary way of saying I’m exhausted. 

I like to drink two pots of coffee in the morning. That’s a weary way of saying I haven’t slept through the night in a long time. 

I can’t wait until all three of the kids are in school because then I might be less weary.  

Nobody in my family is weary at all. Not even my husband.  

There’s a lot they don’t understand… 

Comforting at least one nightmare each night does disrupt my sleep. 

Being a stay-at-home mom is a job with no days off or vacations. 

A mom is supposed to keep everything together all the time: the house, the kids, the schedules, the meals. 

“What’s a weary woman to do?” I ask my morning dose of Prozac. Its full name is fluoxetine, and it’s a selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor.  

Then I create a plan that is crucial. That’s a weary word for I’m at the end of my tether. 

Maybe I can teach my family how to be helpful. I create a to-do list. It tasks my husband with laundry, the four-year-old with making his own bed, the three-year-old with picking up toys, and the one-year-old with not throwing food across the room. I stick the list to the fridge and return to bed. 

Soon there’s a knock on my door. My family saw the to-do list. My husband wants to begin helping right away. 

The trouble is my husband doesn’t know how to do laundry. That’s okay. I drag my ass out of bed and show him how to separate lights from darks and how to change the settings on the washer. I explain that my bras need to go in a lingerie bag and that they should never go in the dryer. I demonstrate how to spot-treat the kids’ clothes. 

I show the four-year-old how to smooth his sheets, pull the blanket to the top of the bed, and how to place his pillow on top. He screams when I move his stuffies to the floor. 

I help my three-year-old pick up Matchbox cars and drop them in the toy box, but for every one he puts in, he takes two back out. 

The one-year-old throws cheese puffs across the room, but at least those aren’t as hard to pick up as the pureed peas she flung yesterday.  

My husband is trying to be sympathetic. That’s a fancy word for knowing your wife is losing her mind. 

When I return to bed, my husband says, “Why don’t I cook dinner tonight?” 

And I know he really does want to be helpful. 

“The kids and I will make pasta with red sauce,” he says. 

My husband is not a chef. He’s not even a decent cook, but I’m too weary to argue.  

When he calls me to dinner, I try to dry the tears that won’t stop falling. When I step into the kitchen, the kids look up from the crayons and paper strewn across the kitchen floor. There are streaks of colored wax on the tile that I’ll have to clean later. My husband doesn’t notice the mess. I almost cry but stop because my husband looks so proud of how he’s managed the kids and dinner.  

Everyone eats their basic noodles. No one argues like they do when I serve vegetables. I poke at the mushy pasta and say, “Great!” when my husband asks how it is. “I’m just not hungry, is all.” The one-year-old lobs a noodle at her brother. It lands in the middle of the table. I stop myself from saying anything. I try to let my husband be helpful. 

“For dessert, let’s have cookies,” my husband says. That’s a weary way of saying he’s weary already. I don’t have the heart to tell him he still has hours of being helpful today. 

“I’ll get them,” I say. I’m not sure why I’m helping when I’m the one who’s weary. 

I grab the box from the pantry, but the package feels too light. I pull out the plastic trough. Only one. Not enough for all of us. I look on another shelf. I stall. One will create a squall. I don’t pause—I eat it in one bite. I wipe my lips. I still feel weary. I want to go back to bed. 

After the kids cry because there are no cookies, and my husband and I try to comfort them with grapes, I feel even wearier.  

My husband tells me to take a bath, that he will handle bedtime.  

I tell my family, “Thank you for helping tonight.” 

“I love you,” my husband says. 

“I love you,” the four-year-old says. 

“I love you,” the three-year-old says. 

The one-year-old hugs me. 

I try to speak but can’t without crying. I smile at them all as I head to the bathroom, still weary, but grateful, even as I know tomorrow’s mess will make me wearier than ever.