Mommy drugs

Sometime after turning 3, my little guy really began battling nap time. It's to the point sometimes that we will take him to the beach or the park and run his little brains out to try and tire him, and STILL he fights it. Today at the neighborhood splash park he was trying to lie down on our pile of beach towels, he was so tired.

We went home and grabbed some lunch. Afterward I tucked in his tired little butt and said good night. Before long, as per the usual, he was up and being loud. I went into his room and -- I will confess, this is not the first time we have done this -- I promised him M&Ms after his nap if he actually slept. We've been bribing him with M&Ms for weeks at daycare dropoffs -- If you nap today and have no potty accidents, you  get M&Ms after dinner tonight. He seems to get it OK.

So the little smarty pants looks up from the book he's reading in lieu of napping and says "I don't want M&Ms." Turd. I went to the kitchen and returned with the bag of M&Ms. His eyes lit up like it was Christmas morning. I said, OK, you get some of these if you sleep.

I'm not kidding -- like, 5 minutes later he was asleep. And slept for three hours. So, um, did Mommy. Oh happy, happy mama.

I should have tried this yesterday, a very, very tired day. Bright and early at 5 a.m., I met up with friends for our usual Saturday long run -- 14 miles. Long story short, it sucked. I managed 13 miles -- OK, not so bad, I guess -- and the most walk breaks I've taken during a run since the 2010 Rockford marathon. Which also, coincidentally, sucked. Every now and then you have a bad run. I've been running long enough to know that. This one was a doozy and hopefully that's it for awhile. Nap time was pretty futile. I was feeling so tired and my little monkey was up and down and never did sleep. 

But, I did hit a couple of small milestones on that that I'm happy about. I crossed the 500-mile mark yesterday, nicely at the midpoint of 2012, so I'm on target to hit my personal goal of 1,000 miles this year. And I hit 30 miles for the week, my highest weekly mileage since 2010.

During my run yesterday I was with a great friend with whom I've logged hundreds and hundreds of miles. She endured a grumpier than normal running companion (me) and was awesome. During the last sweaty, humid mile my head desperately searched for something happy to think about to distract from my grouchiness and I thought of my little daughter and her hair in pigtails, grinning at me from her little pink armchair her grandpa bought her. I was talking to Tonya about how seeing her at daycare pickup, how she brightens at the sight of me and begins bouncing excitedly, is so amazing. Tonya agreed my daughter was cute and said "Mommy drug!" I laughed.

And then thought about my favorite Mommy drugs.  Running and yoga are a few of mine. And yeah, there's that glass of wine after the kids go to bed. But yeah, it sounds sappy to say it, but there's nothing like my kids' smiles when I'm tired, grouchy, stressed, whatever. That's the best Mommy drug. That, and sneaking a handful of my kid's M&Ms when he's not looking. *whistle*