Do you have heart palpitations?

Sweaty palms?

A tight, strangled feeling in your throat?

Does the mention of “December” make you want to throat punch an elf?

Well since naming a problem is 4/13 of the way to scoring medication, we have a diagnosis for you!

Maternal Calendar Flippage Anxiety Disorder or McFAD

Ellen: Maybe I don’t speak for all mothers, but my family’s schedule stresses me out. And no more so than in December.

Erin: You are not alone, but I think you’re forgetting about May.

Ellen: Are you trying to send me over the edge? At least after you maneuver through May like an A.D.D. chipmunk on Wipe-Out, you have the glorious summer as a reward.

After December, you have ice . .  and darkness . . . and despair.

Erin: You’re more of a summer person, aren’t you? But I hear you. In addition to the normal homework/sports practices/club meetings/life, you get to add concerts, parades, parties, pageants, and decorating. And YOU have a December baby! Don’t forget about the epic sleepovers.

Ellen: Yeah, I was in danger of forgetting that (read in sarcasm font). My anxiety after flipping my calendar from November to December was nearly crippling. And to add to it all, my newly minted high school freshman has joined a club volleyball team. This means TRAVELING to TOURNAMENTS.

Erin: Isn’t “tournaments”  Latin for games that cost you lots of moolah and keep you hanging as to whether you are forfeiting one day of your weekend or two depending on whether your child’s team is victorious or crushed by defeat? Pretty much, it’s tears if you win and tears if you lose.

Ellen: I could not even open the email containing the schedule last night. My only defense was denial. I still haven’t opened the email, but while I was polishing my avoidance techniques (we all know I was just playing on Pinterest), I got a phone call reminder for my annual gyn exam. What kind of nut cone masochist schedules a routine exam in December??

Erin:  It doesn’t make it any easier that the fall sports are still on the menu as we start piling our plate full of winter sports. We now have to balance the high school soccer banquet in the midst of ferrying the crew to basketball practices. And just to make things really interesting, girl child is in a Christmas musical. And this is tech week. If you are fortunate enough to NOT know what that is, then go break a leg.

Ellen: Motherhood is not a pissing contest, but I suggest you put on your raincoat and galoshes now. I have my gyn exam on the same day that Coco (14) has an emergency practice for the winter concert that is scheduled over top of the travel volleyball team meeting which coincides with my youngest visiting shut-ins with the church youth group. The winter concert is the next day and it overrides swim team practice. I could go on but . . .

Got a handle on the symptoms yet? Don’t make us continue this rant disguised as an informational post any longer. Let’s discuss cure!

Wait for it . . .

Ellen: There is none! Aside from stranding yourself on an island like Tom Hanks in Castaways with only a volleyball to keep you company . . .

Erin: Isn’t volleyball a main source of your stress right now?

Ellen: Okay then. Back to “There is no cure!”

But there is treatment!

Ellen: Pretty much what works for the rest of motherhood too: wine, whine, chocolate, and carbs.

 

Erin: Well, we certainly have the whine down. This season is perfect for teetoalling all variety of sugar-y confections, so you have plenty of options for self-medication. Sugar cookies, hot chocolate, and cream puffs, oh my! You could be free lining powdered sugar with the best of them in no time . . 

Ellen: Free lining? It cracks me up when you try to go all street. Um, it’s either free basing or main lining.

Erin: Whatever you call it, it WILL help. Until you realize that now you can’t fit into your cute holiday party clothes and people have started mistaking you for Mrs. Claus. But there is still hope for you! Holiday music—the balm for the masses. And calorie-free. I hope. Because I have been overindulging in it since the drive home for Thanksgiving.

Ellen: Are you freakin’ kidding me?  When my kids were toddlers, I had the worst massage of my life because of Christmas carols. I was just cashing in a gift card that was about to expire at the end of December to try to get the lump of concrete worked out of my neck. I was trying to give myself the gift of a one hour break, only to be escorted into a treatment room where carols were blaring from the speakers. I politely asked the therapist to change the music because it was was spotlighting what I was hiding from — the shopping, the baking, the cleaning, the decorating, the Christmas carding. She did nothing but cut into my time to berate me about my bad attitude and to pontificate that I just needed to see the joy in the music. This was the first and only time in my life I have ever stiffed someone on a tip, but she got a schooling on the meaning of Grinch.

Erin: Four out seven of my family members agrees with you, but darn girl. Maybe you need some more exercise to work out that stress.

Ellen: Brilliant! Exercise always makes me feel better.

Erin: Hey, we could organize a 5K to raise awareness for McFAD. Donations could go directly to the wine and carb fund.

Ellen:  Hmmm, that doesn’t seem like a counterproductive loop at all. And more importantly, wouldn’t that just put one more thing on our calendars?

Erin: Good point.  

Addendum from Ellen: MY GYN CHASTISED ME FOR GAINING 10 POUNDS SINCE LAST YEAR.  I did just have  a surgical recovery spanning Halloween AND Thanksgiving where I was not cleared to exercise. Put that in your Santa pipe and smoke it.

 

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Check out our books, “I Just Want to Be Alone” and “You Have Lipstick on Your Teeth.”

 

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