Tonight I was reminded of my blog…oh! My blog!  I forgot what that was for a minute. 

Unfortunately I have started my “next post” more times than I can count in the past few months, saved the beginnings thinking I would have time in a day or two to come back to it and finish, and then never did.  Now, and with every new day that passes, the previous beginnings seem more and more irrelevant.  So…here I go again.

What’s important right now is that it is 1:37AM and I am still awake.  Still awake and scavenging the FB boards for Matilda Jane re-sales that “Olivia” can’t live without and learning all the in and outs and names of knots and tops and ruffles and peasants.

I have never struggled with my memory.  It was sharp.  Give me a number, name, face, concept---whatever, I got it.  I could understand it, learn it, and remember it in seconds.  Now.  Haha!  On a conference call with my largest client's entire staff a week ago I made the mistake of asking (as they were trying to create a boiler plate document) if the headline of the contract “North American Contract” would be replaced for other countries such as Mexico.  Tick, tick, tick.  Oh no you didn’t?!?!  Oh, yes.  I did.  Unfortunately. 

It’s funny, I have been told to write down the important stuff and the rest, just let it go.  Well, now, apparently, the important stuff is the names of MJ Platinum Dresses and not an accurate concept of geography.

The trouble is…you can’t write down how to have a conversation or how to not stick your foot in your mouth.  I have always been a little socially awkward.  I blame it on being in “the gifted program” and being labeled as weird or a dork as a child.  It made me massively insecure through high school--I mean, really, I'm still scarred.  I got drunk at my 10 year reunion to prove I wasn't... which just made it worse.  So, conversation and being able to make friends or even interact at parties or in groups has never come easy to me, but now---I can’t even talk to my dogs.

It is truly amazing the phenomenon of “mom brain.”  I can remember how many and what type of bowel movements my kids have had in a day, but have to write emails as opposed to answering phone calls for work so I have time to gather and assess my thoughts, thank God for spelling an grammar check.

Ken just laughs at me, but in so many ways it is frustrating in a way that, well—I don’t have the words for.  If you have read any of my blog posts, you know I have an ongoing “identity” struggle between wife, mom, professional, and Bridgette.  I don’t want to entirely give up who I am to be just one of these, but at the same time, who I am, I have learned, is constantly evolving. 

I am still the person who strives for perfection with her work—and it absolutely eats at me every day that my work suffers and is in ways neglected for the time I spend with my kids, but then again---the alternative is that my kids are neglected and that person that I have become, Mamamama (as Olivia says), is far more important than Director of Marketing or Consultant of anything. 

With life changing and moving more quickly every day, it’s hard to imagine missing a word or a step or even a hug—Oliver gives the BEST hugs.  Olivia, Olivia kisses, big, wet, open-mouthed kisses all over your face. 

So, no, there are no more trips to LA, or Seattle, or Chicago or New York, London or any other cool, important “business” places.  There are about 20 steps to my office, in my pj’s, hopefully with a cup of coffee, to hammer out 30 minutes of work during their morning nap and pray the dogs don’t bark and wake them while I manage my team remotely with texts and emails, to 1-keep from embarrassing myself with another Mexico incident and 2-have a paper trail to reference back to before I forget everything they told me two minutes earlier.  I beg off vendors with doctors appointments and sick babies, and dodge sales reps with crying infants. 

The fact of the matter is…I’m not giving up parts of myself, I’m just not that person anymore.   

The days of taking an hour or so to shower and dress at my leisure are long gone—I usually have between 10 and 30 minutes to quickly throw myself together.  Being anywhere before 10 or on a schedule---it’s just not going to happen.  Having clean Tupperware, glass accessories on shelves, curtains that touch the floor, hot coffee, clean clothes, remembering (or having the time) to feed myself, just running in the grocery store real quick, lunch with friends, painted toe nails, plucked eye brows, silk (or any other clothes that require dry cleaning), time alone, phone conversations, coherent thought…these are just a few of the things that are no longer part of my life.  Instead, I get these guys….purely amazing, perfect, smart and happy little people:

These two tiny humans don’t care if I know that Mexico is in North America, and aren’t going to ask me to discuss agendas or tech issues or even politics---I don’t have to worry about creating a conversation or remembering a word or trying not to feel weird or out of place when my thoughts are jumbled.  They just want to know where the heck their juice bottle is, and why their diaper is wet.  Those problems, I can fix—then to them, I am awesome.  Awesome is good.  I like the new me.  I can live with Awesome.