Mastering everyday life as a mother of two 

I’m not very good at math.

It’s a flaw that comes with being a person whose brain deals better with words than numbers, and it forces me to leave the simplest of mathematical equations up to my iPhone calculator. However, something is not adding up at my house and even my math-less mind has noticed.

With the addition of one new member to our family, my laundry has doubled. Three plus one does not equal six, but my bottomless pile of laundry begs to differ. Landry Day has turned into laundry every day. Did we start wearing more clothes? I guess it’s possible with the onslaught of newborn spit-up. But beyond soiled burp cloths and the sour-smelling shoulders of our shirts, my maternity leave has been a fashion show of T-shirts and pajama pants – or yoga pants if I’m feeling dressy – so how is my hamper always full?

My friends warned me this would happen. That with a second child would come a whole new set of challenges and transitions. Bringing home your first child is difficult because of your inexperience as a parent. Bringing home a second means the workload just doubled, and one-on-one time with your children calls for a zone defense rather than man-to-man, although your first child still expects your undivided attention. That is, if you’re comfortable being alone with them at all. At times I am convinced my 2-year-old and 2-month-old are in cahoots and staging a coo – “Mom’s alone. Let’s take her down.” And at this point, I’m scared to find out what happens with the third child, but I’m certain it calls for a high-efficiency washer and dryer.

Things that would have bothered me with Tilly hardly phase me with Grady. When Tilly was a baby, my husband spilled a small amount of breastmilk on the kitchen counter. We nearly had to call in a marriage counselor to get over the spilled milk. Last week, I found a 6-ounce bag of breastmilk in the backseat of my car with no knowledge of how it got there or how long it had been riding around between my children’s car seats. As a mother of one, I never would have understood how the liquid gold could be left behind. Now, as a mother of two, I supplement with formula.

My husband and I are dedicated to keeping our baby on a schedule. That has been the same for both children even though Grady’s schedule tends to be more flexible. With Tilly, I kept a journal of her feeding schedule and how much she ate at each feeding to use as a quick reference. A few weeks ago, my husband and I woke at 7 a.m., looked at each other in sleepy confusion wondering if either of us had gotten up to feed Grady in the middle of the night.

“Did you feed him?” I asked. “I don’t think I did,” Ty said, half asking and half stating.

“I don’t think I did either, but I’m not sure.”

It was not clear that Grady had slept through the night until we checked the refrigerator to count bottles and verify that neither of us had to answer the cry of a hungry baby in the middle of the night.

And the changes don’t end there.

Recovering from a second baby requires that Spanx be worn with everything. That is if you can sausage yourself into the ones you wore prebaby. How can you not spiral into postpartum depression when your Spanx don’t fit anymore? Who outgrows Spanx? A mother of two.

But not to worry, the baby weight will be gone soon. Most days, I don’t realize I haven’t eaten until around 2 in the afternoon, and at that point, I have time to grab a box of reduced-fat Wheat Thins from the pantry and eat them in the car as I drive to daycare to pick up my daughter. I enjoy what I can on my five-minute drive because when Tilly sees the Wheat Thins, she wants them and my lunch/snack time abruptly ends to avoid a toddler meltdown.

This is not a laundry list of complaints – not to bring up laundry again – but rather a testament that the Jordan family, especially this mom, is embracing the crazy. My desire for organized living is taking a backseat to a “git-r-done” mentality. Long gone are the days of grocery lists that are organized from the produce section to the frozen foods. As long as I have ground beef and chicken breasts, something can be whipped up for dinner.

I am becoming the mastermind of everyday life as a family of four. Even the simplest of tasks take close coordination, timing and planning. If I can get everyone fed, bathed and in bed at a decent hour, then my mission has been accomplished. Clean clothes? Well, that’s a different story.