Week of Money: Where I get asked if I am a sex worker

DAY ONE

??:?? — I wake up … and I know it is 5 a.m. At least. Little Bun runs back from the living room and confirms it.

5:08 a.m. — We cuddle in the hallway again, underneath my sweater, he snuggles against me and makes what he thinks are baby noises “wah wah.. meh meh.. weee!!” until he wriggles out and insists that he plays on the iPad and gets to play an English app game called Endless Alphabet.

8:11 a.m. — I head out for the morning. I drop by Starbucks, get a Beyond Meat vegetarian breakfast sandwich taste test because they’re launching it tomorrow. This necklace I am wearing was free for me as I used credits, but was originally $300 and STUNNING $4.97

8:34 a.m. — I end up chatting with a regular there whom I have seen from time to time. He is a trader (I peeked at his screens), and we are mutually trying hard to be vegetarians, as we discovered! He’s a nice guy. It is good to meet people outside of your circle once in a while.

8:50 a.m. — These poor squirrels are confused. The ground is frozen and hard, and yet it is warm and feels like spring is here. I hope people are putting out lots of bird feed for them:

10:51 a.m. — I work the entire morning. Lots of urgent issues, and I am pushing HARD back on a vendor who is insisting that we need some sort of special addition that is going to cost another $2000. Are you kidding me? I ask them to show me their proof / requirements because I am 99% sure they do not need it and they’re trying to (A) delay the project and (B) squeeze money out of me (and indirectly, my client).

11:50 a.m. — I go out to try and find this bruschetta mix I have been obsessed with to add to every lunch I have during the week and THEY ARE SOLD OUT. EVERYWHERE. I tried all the stores. I may have to make it myself (not looking forward to this).

12:05 p.m. — I am sorry to this woman that I have to call her out, but this outfit was terrible. Please do not wear skin-toned clothing… especially tight, skin-toned clothing. She looked NAKED like she forgot her pants.

I did a double-take at the lights seeing this woman:

12:41 p.m. — I go home, and eat the meal without it. It tastes bland but … hey. I need to figure out how to make this bruschetta mix then.

1:08 p.m. — Little Bun runs back to play in the bedroom, delaying his nap as much as possible. “Mommy, I will go to sleep and nap when Daddy says it is time” (imagine little devil horns popping up right now)…

1:09 p.m. — I leave for the afternoon. I have calls that I need complete silence for, as I am doing a presentation and I cannot be interrupted or annoyed.

2:40 p.m. — I drop by a cafe, pick up a cheap 50% off treat. It is okay, I should have sprung for the cake instead. $1.16

2:56 p.m. — I feel so incredibly nauseous all of a sudden. Like a wave of dizziness came over me. I get up and drink a cup of water which seems to help.

2:56 p.m. — Oh it’s raining. That’s why. I am already

3:00 p.m. — I go to my car, log in, and wait for the call. I log in and present in the silence of my car in the parking lot because..  I can. It is better than a cafe with music, people talking, etc.

4:15 p.m. — Done! I head home.

5:14 p.m. — We do laundry, play the Train Hide and Seek game, play on the iPad, I feed him his food, I eat my own… same old routine every night.

9:30 p.m. — Bedtime.

Spent: $6.13

DAY TWO

??:?? — I get up to grab Little Bun milk. I AM SURE IT IS EARLY. Little Bun doesn’t want to sleep any more. My partner says crossly: NO. He goes back to sleep until SEVEN. NO MORE WAKING UP EARLY. O_o

4:30 a.m. — We are having an epic fight right now. We aren’t screaming at each other but we are talking VERY LOUDLY. I basically think he should cut out his nap and let him sleep earlier at night at 8 p.m. to wake up at 7 a.m. Or better yet, 6 a.m. because school starts at 8 a.m. in September and I don’t like rushing to get ready and leave. He is screaming talking loudly back at me that I am too lenient on Little Bun and permissive, to let him just wake up when he wants, do what he wants, etc.

6:00 a.m. — NOBODY SLEPT AFTER THIS FIGHT. My partner may have dozed back off but that’s his problem, he sleeps at 11 p.m. at night from studying, and I usually get Little Bun and myself into bed by 9 p.m. I get up, and tell Little Bun to stay in bed while I get ready to go to yoga.

6:14 a.m. — Little Bun gently sneaks out of the bedroom: Mommy can I tell you something? … I don’t feel sleepy. Also, I had a dream that Little Blue (a character in his app), was being very funny. .. I snuggle him. He runs around and plays in the living room, unsure if he should go back into the bedroom and lie there until seven, or stay out here with me where he is perfectly fine and awake. I whisper for him to stay out in the living area.

6:37 a.m. — I get ready for yoga, and then make my tea and drink it. As I am about to leave, he says: But wait. I want to eat my pasta now… I tell him – go wake Daddy and he’ll get it for you. He nods and runs off to jump on his father to get food. I am wearing a lovely vintage red blazer today with a vintage scarf printed top from my high school days. HIGH SCHOOL. I still own and fit into this top.

8:59 a.m. — At yoga, I had a GREAT session. I left it sweating and feeling really good. I head off to my massage.

10:15 a.m. — I get into my massage, and she tells me I am still holding a lot of tension in my lower back and glutes. I have to de-stress, and unclench, stretch, try to relax. She works my muscles to break up the pain and tension and I am leaving woozy and a little ache-y.

12:08 p.m. — I come home, and eat two of my lunches — I am super hungry.

1:26 p.m. — HAH! This quote could have come from me: If you’re not happy single, you won’t be happy dating someone. Happiness comes from making money, not relationships.

2:28 p.m. — I head out for the afternoon for a long call.

4:27 p.m. — Home. I do the dishes, 3 loads of laundry.

5:16 p.m. — We play “Toy Store”, where I tell him for every $10 he saves, he gets $1, and if he saves MORE, he gets MORE money earned in a HISA (high interest savings rate). I also jokingly warn him that by next week inflation might raise all the prices on his Megabloks. He seems to grasp the concept of saving and getting more money. He’s curious to understand how he can just .. get more money by having money. I explain to him about a base capital, and then building on top of it like a pyramid. Can’t start too early.

6:26 p.m. — They sent me the wrong bag – I got a Prada saffiano leather tote. O_o … I email Poshmark and they send me a return label. I am not impressed with this mixup nor with this terrible Prada tote that I am so happy I never wanted / bought or lusted after. It is a cheap feeling bag, save for the logo, I can’t even tell it is designer or high-end.

My mini review on the Prada Saffiano Leather tote: IT IS A WASTE OF MONEY. You can buy another tote, like coated canvas which would feel exactly the same, like this one from Dagne Dover for a FRACTION of the price. Plus it would have more compartments and a zippered top.

The Saffiano leather feels cheap, like coated canvas. Truly, that’s what it feels like. I know it is more durable, but really it isn’t worth the money if you’re buying it just for the logo. If you’re going to pay thousands for a bag, you might as well buy something that FEELS luxe for that money.

7:28 p.m. — I am amazed there are readers from OVER A DECADE AGO who used to follow me on my old blogs. O_o .. No.. I don’t feel old at all.

7:45 p.m. — I cue Little Bun to start getting ready for bed. We brush our teeth, then he reads a book with Daddy (we have to enforce his second language more), and then we watch an episode of Looney Tunes together, then do a Flashlight story with either Cuddles or Carrots the Bunny (Little Bun directs the plot, and I mumble random words resembling a story), then we conk out to sleep.

9:11 p.m. — Actual sleeping time. It takes a good hour and a half for the above routine.

Spent: $0

DAY THREE

7:02 a.m. — Little Bun wakes up.. AT SEVEN. I guess our epic fight yesterday in the morning made him scared enough to stay down and sleep more rather than forcing himself awake. I grab his milk, then decide on a shower because I feel gross.

7:25 a.m. — While I am showering, Little Bun eats his pasta with cheese and I curl my hair because.. it makes me feel better. A simple act of lipstick, eyeliner, curling my hair, a nice outfit and my mood is lifted. I make a tea.

8:08 a.m. — I leave early. Off to yoga first! I decide on this sheer checked Anthropologie top, and this necklace I have had since I was in high school… I bought it at Green Earth, this store back in the day that sold things like Buddha heads, incense, VERY COOL jewellery (like this necklace), and things that were bohemian, zen, etc…

9:48 a.m. — Yoga over, I head to Starbucks and try their newest addition – the Beyond Meat sausage breakfast sandwich. IT IS DELICIOUS. And I think less gross/greasy than a regular sausage sandwich which always makes me feel a bit ill after eating it. I can sense myself getting addicted to this as a treat $12.42

12:50 p.m. — I basically sit in Starbucks, and work. I work on the blog to schedule until end of July, schedule Instagram until end of March, and start to feel my mood lift. I think the past week of me feeling down and a bit blue has been because of my barometric pressure headaches which I did not know was an issue until it happened, and just feeling like I am drifting.. with no purpose. Which is silly.

1:28 p.m. — I head home, feeling woozy. I shouldn’t have waited this long to come home and eat lunch. I am certain my blood sugar is low. I am greeted with a surprise — crêpes stuffed with crème de marrons d’Ardèche…. (chestnut cream spread). I eat all of them happily.

2:56 p.m. — I decide to change into yoga gear and stretch out before I head back home. I have yoga again tomorrow in the morning but it doesn’t hurt to do extra when I am in the mood. Especially in an EMPTY gym (I cannot do it in my house, Little Bun is too distracting).

4:05 p.m. — Back upstairs, refreshed, Little Bun is obsessed with Busy Water (this app he is playing) and doesn’t even come out to greet me. I don’t even understand how the game works at the harder levels, my brain is too tired for it but he is OBSESSED.

5:27 p.m. — I start laundry, feed him soup, do dishes, and then log in and work a tiny bit more because it is sort of time-sensitive and I can’t leave it.

6:40 p.m. — I finally shut down. Little Bun in the meantime was hassling me to play with him (obviously), and we build a maze out of blocks. Well, first we drew the architecture of what he wanted, and then we built it to the specs.

7:03 p.m. — I feed him soup while he plays more Busy Water – he JUST got the app and he is already blazing through all the levels, at 89, and almost finished up to the 105. O_o … He is tenacious, I’ll give him that.

8:00 p.m. — I cue him for bedtime – this time, no book with Daddy or video, we read 6 books together, which he loves.

8:15 p.m. — In the meantime, I mention on Instagram that we use Marius Fabre Savon de Marseille to do our dishes – it is less waste than buying dish detergent, leaves no smell, no residue, or bacterial stink (my mother uses dish detergent and it makes me gag each time), and washes clean because it is so harsh on everything (not for body or hair use, in my opinion!). They also use it in hospitals and it is only manufactured in 3 factories in France. It MUST say “Savon de Marseille” or else it is an imitation.

I find I also use less soap when washing versus with liquid detergent (less waste), and it cleans better, without all of those dyes & that awful stink I now smell every time I use liquid detergent elsewhere (e.g. work).

9:15 p.m. —  We are conked out in bed, or at least I am. I am incredibly tired.

Spent: $12.42

DAY FOUR

??:?? — IT ISN’T EVEN LIGHT YET. I take him to the washroom. He wiggles in bed .. and then gets up, softly checks the time, and thunderstomps back into the bedroom saying softly: Mommy it is 5:40… Nooooo…… I really needed an extra hour.

5:42 a.m. — Milk served in bed, I go to the living room and review what I have to get done today – I have calls and then a meeting for that time-sensitive work I mentioned.

6:25 a.m. — My partner is up – he wants to go buy cheese in another county, and has to leave early to avoid traffic. I have an early morning call and instead of going out in the morning I’ll switch to the afternoon and come back early.

7:22 a.m. — I spend the morning reading Aesop’s Fables to Little Bun. He has recently become obsessed with these stories from daycare and from an app that reads the stories to him. I try to explain words like “toil” or “ease”, and ask him what he learned in the story, and why it is important as a lesson. A lot of them are very close to being related to money and so on to be honest.

7:34 a.m. — As we are reading I am horrified to discover his scalp is covered in thick white scales!!! HE HAS DANDRUFF!… This poor baby, no wonder he has been scratching all this time… I tell him we will take a shower when I get back and I need to put medicated shampoo on his head to remove the scaling, (I’ll use it too — it is this: Nizoral and works like a charm, better than any other commercial dandruff shampoo because it is medicated and effective. My doctor told me the other dandruff shampoos are TERRIBLE and should not be used).

7:59 a.m. — I leave early, go downstairs, and he asks me: Mommy are you going to RC? … and then softly, pronounces in French: “Rez-de-chaussée“? HEARTS IN MY EYES. Too cute. I tell him yes (actually first, I didn’t understand he was speaking French to me because he never does), and then I repeat back happily that I AM going there and I will be back just in time for Daddy to go out and get cheese. He tells me DADDY goes out first THEN Mommy, and I tell him it is flipped today.

9:25 a.m. — What is this @*!#(? This is not the first time I have gotten this #$@!…

Then, I get a comment basically saying that it is NATURAL for others to assume I am a sex worker because:

• I make a lot of money (right because that’s the only way I can make money)
• I refuse to say what I do exactly (are you kidding me? I SAY ALL THE TIME I am a STEM consultant)
• I work with executives like CEOs and lawyers (… because it is completely improbable that I could be doing this professionally as a woman and not on my back)
• 80% of sex workers are women (Are 80% of women sex workers? No. Under 5% of women are sex workers, why would anyone assume I am in the MINORITY of women?)

…. that’s their argument. That’s their ENTIRE ARGUMENT of why it is perfectly plausible that I am a sex worker.

My point was — No, it isn’t plausible. You are only saying “sex worker” because that’s the only job you can think of that a woman would make a lot of money from.

If I were a man, would you ask him: Are you an exotic dancer or an escort?

NO. YOU WOULDN’T. Some people are just ignorant, and refuse to even see that what they’re saying makes zero sense at all because they have an unconscious bias they will defend to the end.

12:45 p.m. — Daddy home, I head out after doing a few math problems with Little Bun. He still isn’t “getting” them but I can see that he is slowly learning the logic / rationale after I explain a little.

12:45 p.m. — This is my look today, I am wearing a secondhand Elizabeth Cole necklace (Victoria) that originally retailed for almost $1000, which I got for $150:

Close-up on it, against this soft cosy gold-flecked Sleeping on Snow shrug:

It is as beautiful as you think it is, truly. I squealed when I opened the package – it is basically everything I love in a necklace.

1:40 p.m. — I am wandering around stores, just to get an idea of what’s out there, and for now, retail shopping especially at mainstream retailers is a big fat goose egg for me. I want secondhand only, to get excited over a UNIQUE piece, or something special, like this Napier necklace by Eugene Bertolli in gold coral I scored for $40 when everyone else was listing it at $300+ on Etsy. I used my credits so it is. $0

Vintage pieces excite me because no one else has it or is unlikely to, and they are just so well made, especially this beautiful brutalist piece.

4:25 p.m. — I head home after wandering around and doing some blogging, to Little Bun. I am scheduled now until end of July 2020 on this blog at the time of this post, and on Instagram, until end of the month.

4:25 p.m. —

Spent: $

DAY FIVE

5:30 a.m. — I wake up, take care of Little Bun, put away the dishes, start laundry, and then play with him in the bedroom reading books.

8:08 a.m. — I go and grab a Starbucks with my mug but they’ve stopped all use of reusable mugs presumably because of the coronavirus. Had I known this, I wouldn’t have taken a drink at all, frankly.

And this policy is stupid, mostly because if someone who is infected comes in, they’re likely to spread it to anyone around their vicinity and to smear their germs on all surfaces including door handles, so even if you give them a disposable cup or a reusable one, IT IS THE SAME GERMS that are easily spread.

Just saying that you’re stopping reusable mugs to be safe, is bulls*t optics for marketing to show like you’re doing something when you’re really not. It’s a feel-good public relations ploy so that people feel “safe” going into the cafe.

Listen – if people are really concerned, they’re holed up at home. They’re not bloody going into a cafe filled with people where they could get it.

The real way to protect your workers, is either to shut down operations completely, or failing that, you make them wash their hands every 15 minutes, or basically after every time they make a drink or serve / open any food packet to give people, make them clear they cannot touch their face (or they wear gloves), and to stand far away from all customers, more than 6 feet (LOL)… so you don’t breathe in any germs.

It’s not from a bloody reusable mug. And besides, you’re putting a drink in that “infected cup”, and then serving it back to the person who is infected. What does that do?

If you happen to already be infected, or touch an infected surface of someone else who came in, you’re going to pass it on to WAY more people.

With this logic – we should all stop going out. Period. For 18 months until a vaccine is found. Instead, we should adopt safety measures and not travel unnecessarily (I am avoiding busy metropolises like NYC with millions of people and international travelers this year and I am even reconsidering going to Toronto in the summer), wash our hands frequently, avoid sick people, avoid going to mass gatherings like church or cruises where people are confined in one space, and not go in to work when sick.

I’m rather ticked off by this in the end but on a positive note, I will be saving money by not going to Starbucks. $4.97

2:08 p.m. — I end up working rather late on an issue until I go back up to the apartment.

5:11 p.m. — Home. I had a SNAFU emergency to take care of. I get another ping as an email and I log back in. The good thing about my job is flexibility but it also means when things hit the fan, I have to be there.

6:47 p.m. — I log off and leave it for the weekend. In between working, I had to play with Little Bun and help him with his math problems while dealing with an issue. This, is something my partner never deals with – even if he is completely free, Little Bun comes to me — yet another stark example of mothers having to do double duty no matter what.

7:13 p.m. — I feed Little Bun, and then we play “Maze” with his blocks, and then I cue him for bedtime. Meaning – let’s go brush our teeth, now do you want to read 6 books with Mommy tonight? Or do you want to do 1 book with Daddy and watch a video with Mommy? It’s up to you. I am a big believer in giving children choices and letting them learn agency, and how to make their own decisions. I want him to think for himself and CHOOSE, not have his life chosen for him.

Spent: $4.97

DAY SIX

??:?? — He wakes up and insists, while crying that he doesn’t want to sleep any more. Anyone that whiny, needs MORE sleep. I tell him firmly he has to go back to sleep and try again because he is very grumpy and grumpy grumpkins need sleep. He whines and cries, and finally he tells me he wants water. Fine. I get him water, and he conks out almost immediately.

??:?? — Wakes up again, insisting he doesn’t need sleep (must have been a 20-30 minute nap), and I give him more water and force him back down to sleep because he is still grumpy and whining. I of course, get NO SLEEP AT ALL because I cannot fall asleep after having to fast talk a child back to sleeping, and I am all worked up, and now “awake”. I am going to be dragging today.

6:15 a.m. — He’s up, I grab his milk. He doesn’t want to drink it all, then insists on pasta. After eating pasta, tells me his stomach hurts because of the pasta. OMG. I take deep breaths.

7:22 a.m. — My partner bakes croissants (from frozen, they aren’t bad at all..), and Little Bun eats his happily. He tells me afterwards “the croissant cured my bellyache”. RIGHT. I AM SURE IT DID.

7:59 a.m. — We go through all my things after Daddy leaves, I clean up and organize the selling pile and get rid of a few things to donate because no one is liking them, therefore they are not selling.

8:12 a.m. — I spend the morning cleaning a highlighter stain out of a bag, and then I end up with a rubbing alcohol stain on the leather itself. FML.

10:40 a.m. — Is this not the chicest outfit ever? I love the oversized turtleneck with the wool white skirt. I don’t have either exact piece, but I can recreate some of it with a white skirt if I can find a white turtleneck somehow, or use one I have that is fuzzy (I am not such a huge fan of turtlenecks).. It looks like the skirt has draping in the front as well. Maybe it is actually a dress. I even have camel spotted heels I can substitute in for this look.

11:26 a.m. — Absolute clusterfk of a morning. Little Bun, ever since he was a baby, would scream, cry, or make loud noises in anger if I tried to talk to Daddy or have a simple, adult conversation; he hated having any of my attention taken away from him. So this morning, for the umpteenth time, Little Bun runs in and interrupts, and starts talking over his father. I can’t listen to both of them at once, so I am weary, and my partner loses it – he tells him sternly that when someone is talking, he isn’t.

11:31 a.m. — Little Bun starts screaming. Cue meltdown. More scolding. It escalates to him being sent to his room for Time Out. He refuses to stop screaming. I am trying to talk to him, he is screaming his head off, so I leave him to scream alone and close the door. He screams some more, and then starts smashing on the bedroom door in anger. NOW I AM ANGRY. I go back and tell him he has chosen The Hard Way, and now I am FURIOUS. More screaming.

11:34 a.m. — I leave the bedroom and let him scream it out because I have learned that to calm myself down before I go into a blind fury of rage, I need to separate myself physically, so I do. I take deep breaths, and once he stops somewhat screaming, I go back in to him red-faced, sobbing, etc.

11:40 a.m. — I calmly talk to him after I have collected myself and tell him we tried The Nice Way (telling him to wait his turn), and now he has chosen The Hard Way, which is unfortunate and not my preferred way of doing things. I explain how he likes it quiet when he does his math, and we like the same sort of respect when we are talking to each other. I also say there is only ONE MOMMY. ONE. MOMMY. Mommy needs Mommy, Daddy needs Mommy, Little Bun needs Mommy. I cannot be all three at once.

11:50 a.m. — He sobs and curls into my arms, wrapped in his blanket. I let him cry it out, he starts to whine again. He finally calms down, and I explain very gently but FIRMLY about manners, waiting your turn, Nice Way, Hard Way, One Mommy, etc.

11:59 a.m. — He lies down and I tell him I won’t play with him right now until he is calm and green again (the colour green, right now he says he is flashing red and green); he was insisting the whole time as he was screaming that he wanted to play with me, and I won’t give in. I explain that I’d rather have him be calm and green, and would he like me to read a book to him while he calms his colours down? He nods tearfully.

12:11 p.m. — I pick up the rather sexist Peter Rabbit collection of books my friend bought for him (lol she thought Peter Rabbit was a “safe” choice but they are really not written for modern times), and read him a few stories. Then I check on him to ask him what colour he is (GREEN), and I snuggle him. Then I ask what he’d like to do, and he heads out to the living room where we play Trains in a Maze.

12:45 p.m. — Lunch time. I don’t know what happened but normally we buy ONE avocado a week, and my partner came back with 15 because “They were on sale”. I guess we’re eating a lot of avocados this week. I put hot pepper on mine on top of his fresh homemade bread.

1:00 p.m. — I head out, tired. He insists before I leave, that he DOES NOT FEEL SLEEPY. I wearily tell him that he needs Quiet Time from 13:00 to 15:00 for his sanity (and ours). I leave.

1:30 p.m. — I am dragging today. I drop off the bag of donations, and call to cancel a credit card.

2:11 p.m. — I drop by the thrift store to look around but it is so busy, and I get overwhelmed by the crowd. I don’t mind people, I even enjoy going out to just be amongst the energy of people, but when it is too many of them (or like at Winners), I feel overwhelmed and anxious. So I leave (but I didn’t see anything worth staying for). I should really come and thrift during the weekday when it is quieter.

2:35 p.m. — I try to read my book in the car in peace and quiet but I cannot even concentrate on the words – I am so incredibly tired. I go and have a blueberry tart as a treat but then remember too late that they don’t make them as well here, and I should have gone to another bakery. Oh well. $4.56

4:18 p.m. — I head home, driving slowly, very tired. I wish I could just go to some quiet place, with 400-thread count Egyptian cotton sheets on a fluffy King-sized bed (I need space), lie there, watch all of my favourite random shows that my brain loves and never tires of like Castle, Mr. Monk, The Rachel Zoe Project, etc… and zone out on the bed while I get ANY SNACK I WANT homemade on command – fried eggs, tacos al pastor, maybe a raspberry fruit tart, then .. another fried egg because I love them. I also want a facial done while I am in said bed, and a Swedish massage followed by a Thai massage to really stretch my muscles. Maybe a dip in the hot sauna, and back to bed to veg and zone out on TV shows. <— this is my fantasy right now.

4:40 p.m. — I take a break in the lobby and just breathe before heading upstairs. I had planned on doing yoga in the afternoon but this fight sapped all my energy and I am very very tired right now.

5:23 p.m. — At home, he has completely erased what happened this morning and is perfectly fine after his nap.

6:45 p.m. — We have dinner, then I do all the dishes, dry them, and we play Train Maze on the floor, read 6 books, more Aesop fables, and then play “Baby”.

7:45 p.m. — I cue him for bedtime. He takes forever to go get his teeth brushed etc, so I know to do it 15 minutes before if we want to sleep at a decent hour. He reads his book with Daddy first, then brushes his teeth causing trouble in the bathroom (I hate this, it causes me stress when I hear him acting up and my partner scolding him), and then we settle in to watch videos together.

8:30 p.m. — One episode of Baby Looney Tunes. These messages are really good in these episodes, but Granny is clearly fictional. She is WAY too nice, she bakes ALL the time, she is SUPER patient and for some reason she’s able to leave all of these diapered toddlers running around coming up with schemes on their own while she builds robots, works out and watches TV quietly? WTF? …. Total fantasy.

9:12 p.m. — Bedtime. I tell him a story, but not with a flashlight, apparently it is broken. I suspect my partner confiscated it from Little Bun because he was doing something stupid with it.

Spent: $4.56

DAY SEVEN

6:53 a.m. — I wake up refreshed, surprisingly. Little Bun whispers: Mommy do you want me to sleep 7 more minutes? It is 5:53 in the living room but 5:54 in the bedroom … he doesn’t know it is daylight savings time, so he actually woke up closer to seven. OH BLESSED MORNING!!!! I slept in and I FEEL GREAT.

7:15 a.m. — We do some money math problems but time and money are difficult concepts for him to add and subtract still. He gets it.. but he doesn’t get it fully. I may need to focus a bit more on these two areas for adding and subtracting. I make a tea.

7:39 p.m. — Who is this bougie girl taking cabs to art class three times a week?!?! This is obviously an activity book not written for children of personal finance geeks. The answer is she is spending TOO MUCH on cabs.

7:40 a.m. — I promise Little Bun to be home at 11:30. He is a stickler for time. I quickly throw on my new-to-me Versace navy sweater with sheer panels (it’s a men’s sweater!!!), and a Stella and Dot Aida necklace (also secondhand) because.. it is fun, over top my yoga gear:

8:22 a.m. — I log in and quickly do a check of my upcoming Money payments, across my bank accounts (I do this every week or so just to be sure), and I am HORRIFIED to see a cheque coming out for $1000 more than it should. How could I have miswritten that cheque so badly? I am off by $1000. I quickly pack up my things and rush to the bank to withdraw money and deposit it in cash immediately, praying I have done it in time to not incur NSF charges.

9:19 a.m. — Yoga. I am “late” so I have to take a random spot, when I normally get here half an hour early.

10:56 a.m. — I am beating myself up before, during and after yoga class so much that I skip savasana (where you just lie on the floor and relax), I skip my practicing of my splits and I head back home in the lobby to re-check all my banking to be sure I am not going crazy. I must have just written a cheque for an extra $1000 more by mistake. I guess I did it in a haze which makes sense because I was doing it while Little Bun was pestering me, and I just wanted to get the cheque written and deposited.

12:10 p.m. — Lunch – omelette, and my partner finally changed up lunch for the week and did something new — fried rice with eggs and mushrooms. FINALLY.

12:28 p.m. — If recruiters think I am going to do their job for them, for free, they have another thing coming.

3:11 p.m. — Little Bun is up. I give him milk, we cuddle, play trains, read books, do some math…..

3:45 p.m. — My headache is starting up something fierce. I try not to take any of the pills prescribed for my barometric pressure headaches (when it rains, I want to vomit), and I power through it by doing dishes slowly and watching videos.

4:28 p.m. — Maybe eating will help. I make some noodles, and I feel better with more food in my stomach.

6:12 p.m. — I get a message with unsolicited parenting advice (I am fine with this), but it is phrased in such a shame-on-you, holier-than-thou tone, that I feel like I am a terrible mother (which I know I am not by the way):

I don’t need prayers, Felicia, I need SOLUTIONS on how to get Little Bun to learn how not to interrupt me.

I am not raising my child to be happy or to be my best friend, I am raising a responsible adult because I am his parent. To shame me in a message and then also berate me for creating a “negative cycle” in my home, based off ONE INCIDENT versus the 99.9% of the time where things are great, is not only unfair to me, but also self-righteous. Most people who messaged me, were empathetic and told me to hang in there, they knew how I felt. One, offered a solution.

By the way, got a great solution for this and I tried explaining to Little Bun the new “Household Rule” already. If he wants my attention and I am talking, he is to come to me, put his hand on mine, and I will acknowledge I see him waiting, with a hand back on his. Then, (I didn’t say this part) when we are ready to talk, then I will thank him for waiting so politely, and then give him my undivided attention. See that? MANNERS. That’s what I want in my child. We will try this the next time and I will remind him of our new rule of “Waiting Your Turn”.

Another offered the solution of their kid raising his hand and waiting patiently until he was “called on” to speak. That’s another good one.

For the record: any parent who tells me that they have NEVER lost it on their child, is a goddamn liar or just simply wasn’t around to interact with them 24/7 to lose it – they likely had nannies or a lot of help as buffer in between them and their children. I can tell you I am a much calmer person when I come back from being away from Little Bun, but if I am with him all the time, it is very difficult to keep your patience and cool especially while sleep-deprived. My mother is a GREAT grandmother because she isn’t with him 24/7. She is patient with him because she has fully loaded reserves he has not sapped yet!!!!!

7:44 p.m. — Cue for bedtime. I am so tired. I really am. We do our routine – brushing teeth, reading a book with Daddy in his second language (he is getting better), then watching videos together.

9:13 p.m. — Bedtime.

Spent: $0

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Want more? Read all of my previous Week of Money Diaries.