The Weekend

It is the weekend. I am grateful.

Wonderful to go to a tag sale and find the exact thing I’m looking for.

Relaxing to dig my fingers in the garden.

Enjoyable to shower for as long as I wish.

Future Stripper Moms of the world!

There’s an interesting discussion on pregnant strippers at Live Journal by booju_newju.

There is a dancer at the club I work in (I'm a waitress in a strip club - don't be hatin') who is rail thin but looking about 5 months pregnant. Which got me thinking, at what point of pregnancy would you say it's time to throw in the thong and tassels and maybe get a less physically demanding job than being a stripper?

FWIW we're talking a pole dancing club, full nudity several hours of bouncing around and contorting your body in every possible way. Very physical work, in very absurdly high healed shoes. Also consider the safety risks involved with working in that kind of place.

What say you booj? What stage of pregnancy is it quittin time for stripper-mom?

What an interesting post and responses. I’m quite surprised that most of the respondents to when a pregnant stripper should quit say that it should be when she wants to. I would have expected more moralizing.

I can’t remember any noticeably pregnant strippers dancing in all my years gyrating.

Of course, I can’t remember much of anything tonight. Today was Gen’s birthday: I spent an hour shopping at Target for gifts, had phone therapy, tried to write, did laundry, washed dishes, nursed, soothed teething baby, took care of Nana, dropped off and picked up Genny, took kids to Boothe Memorial Park and playground, got supper, fed family, including Nana, picked up Nick at train, reheated supper, helped in garden, did birthday stuff, made Genny apologize for sticking tongue out at Nana, and…egads! That’s enough already.

Being a pregnant stripper sounds like a breeze after this week.

Only Wednesday?

Another day, another dazed mother.

I forgot about how painful teething can be. It hurts for the baby, too.

Cole’s nursing now and I think I smell a poo.

We just got home from dinner out with Grandma and Grandpa for Genny’s birthday, which is tomorrow.

Before we went out Genny had another clothing freak out. Nothing felt good and everything was too big or too small. This went on for twenty minutes while Cole screamed and I sweated.

My brain feels all discombobulated.

This week can’t get any worse.

Get it Done

Stripper Mom has been pretty stripped down the past few days about her depression and momhood angst.

I really think Cole must be teething with all his ear tugging and screeching.

He went down for a short nap—in his swing. Yes, I know we’ll have to break him of this habit eventually, actually pretty soon since he’s getting too big for the swing, but at the moment, it’s one almost-sure way to get him to take his nap when he’s frazzled out.

As for me, no nap today, but I did have a visit from a friend, which was liberating. We popped Cole in the car seat, drove to Wendy’s and picked up lunch, and then drove to the beach to eat our food.

Not much creative work done though today, but I’m trying.

Come on, Sheila, trying isn’t good enough. Doing is where it’s at. It doesn’t have to be perfect; it just has to be done.

Sweet Sanity

For those of you whom have never taken care of a screaming baby for a day…it can make you want to kill yourself or baby.

I’m fine now. Cole is nursing and not screaming at the moment. And the killing of self or baby is never an actual option, just a scary bubble of emotion that pops up from the brain-piercing screeches and then saws at your sanity.

I am eating a mini brownie as a pumper-upper for what may prove to be a long night. I am thinking there is some serious teething going on inside this house.

Ugh, every day I plan on saving some sanity and time for my dear husband and then something like this happens and I’m a big freaking mess by the time I hear him open the door at eight o’clock.

Oh sweet sanity…I miss you.

My Mother

Yesterday had me asking…Am I manic-depressive?

I go, go, go and then I crash. It hurts to breathe. Depression deep. All consuming. The pace of life required of me exhausts, consumes my head. Cloudy. Crying.

A day like this—I miss my mother. She’ll never be here again. She’ll never celebrate another birthday with Genny. She’ll never meet Cole.

And I wonder, how can I do this life without her?

And I wonder, how do I be a mother?

Why does Genny have to be so rude to me? “I don’t like you,” she spits at me. She doesn’t want to kiss me or hug me except when she’s scared. How long will this phase last?

How could I have been mean to my own mother?

And again—I feel so different from all the other moms who coo over every baby murmur. I love my baby and my child. But I ache in such a hard way for my own self. I can’t seem to separate the two.

Where am I? I feel like there is something wrong with me when I don’t feel what other mothers feel.

Does Genny see me as inadequate? Does she sense I’d rather be somewhere else, doing my own things? Does my anguish cause her to not like me? Does she already sense and suffer from my depression?

I need to stop caretaking. I need to stop feeling so responsible. I need to clear clutter. I need to rid my self of unwanted pressure—unwanted physical junk, too. I’m holding onto Mom’s things as if they will bring her back to me. Things will not salve my grief.

Perhaps I have not grieved for my mother enough. I need to have more closure. My mother is not coming back.

I am a motherless daughter.

I am a mom.

This is a Mom

Today I was a mom.

Yes, I’ve been a mom for five years now, but today, I was just a mom.

I did not even try to make time for my writing. I did not work on marketing. I did not work on drawing.

I prepared for a gaggle of little girls to invade my home tomorrow for Genny’s fifth birthday party.

I organized the living room, dining room, and kitchen. I cleaned and emptied the back porch and washed off all the outside paraphernalia. I dug up the dirt and grass that had overgrown our slate pathway. I washed muddy slippers and shoes, which reminds me, they are still in the dryer. I cooked supper for daughter and father-in-law. I nursed. I ferried my daughter to and from school.

My back aches. I’m dirty and sweaty.

I now understand why it takes a mom to run a home, to do all the stuff that needs to get done. It really and truly is a job and a half.

It seems the only way to make mothering work is to commit to it absolutely and completely and only do other stuff if you happen to have some free time. I do not like this. But I think I must accept it. Or somehow make oodles of money so we can hire someone to help with all the housework and drudge work.

I know there will be a balance between me and me-as-mom eventually.

But I can’t expect so much from myself.

Nursing

No one ever mentions the downsides of nursing your baby.

There are obviously lots of pluses: nourishing your child with life-giving food, voluptuous breasts even for the small breasted, and an amazing bonding experience.

There are negatives: never being able to be away from your baby for more than a few hours (unless you pump or supplement with formula), never getting many hours of uninterrupted sleep, and uncomfortable, painful, leaking breasts.

At the moment I have one hard, lumpy, painful right breast, which is always much larger than the left, by the way. Cole is nursing on it right now, so hopefully he’ll help the over-milk full feeling.

Nick just carried Genny upstairs to bed since she fell asleep on the couch. I am soon to bed myself.

Random Thoughts

Lack of sleep is making my brain fuzzy. I’m finding it hard to concentrate. Cole just doesn’t want to sleep for a long stretch anymore. Maybe I’m the one of the lucky moms who gets one of those babies, you know, the kind who doesn’t need too much sleep.

Unfortunately, I’m one of those babies who DOES need a lot of sleep.

This Saturday our home will be overrun by four and five-year-old girls for Genny’s fifth birthday party. I’m watching the weather with bated breath, hoping the rain stays away, so we can play outside.

Cole is blowing spit bubbles and chewing on a toy octopus’ legs.

I am washing clothes and being splashed by spit bubbles.

Did I mention I’m tired?

This is Me

Stripper Mom breaks expectations and conventions. Unintentionally.

How many mothers do you know that wear makeup every day? Not me. Here's a photo of what I look like on your average day after having maybe four hours of sleep. Yes, I do have a five-month-old baby. Four hours of sleep is good.

When I was stripping most people would never guess what I did for a living. I only wore makeup when I performed. The rest of the time I was simply me.

The same goes today. I hardly ever wear makeup in “real” life. I guess I got that sweet bit of freedom from my mother, who never wore makeup.

I’m happy with who I am and what I look like. I thought most of the world was catching up with the attitude that women are most beautiful when they are just being themselves, but then I realize this isn’t so.

There are so many straightjackets of expectations I have dealt with in my life as a girl, as a woman. I imagine this is true for many women, but having been a stripper, a model and an actress, I’ve been exposed to truly confounding expectations from others.

I realize now though that I truly am fine with what others think of me. I know I can’t control how others perceive me. And I certainly don’t intend to try to figure out what others might expect from me. As long as I am happy with myself—that is all that’s important.

My greatest hope for my daughter is that she will always feel secure in herself just as she is. This is my dream. This is my goal.

Itsy Bitsy This!

Today is one of those days that feel like the universe is laughing at me.

It all started with my second Itsy Bitsy yoga class this morning. Cole napped on our way there and was in general quite happy during the class. I, on the other hand, was cranky.

It must be my post-partum depression coming out because I was thoroughly unhappy with yoga class. I felt so out of place with the other new first-time mothers who were just so happy about everything baby-related.

The instructor asked us to share something “funny” about our birthing experience and that word just ticked me off. There was absolutely nothing at all that I could describe as funny. And then as I listened to the other mothers happily sharing their different levels of labor pain, all I could think about was how horrible my birth of Genny was five years ago.

Nick’s mother passed away the night before Genny was born and my own mother was horribly ill with cancer. To say there was stress involved is putting it mildly.

Cole’s birth was much better, but still, there wasn’t anything funny or fun about it.

The other mothers were also just very happy about the whole motherhood thing. They were laughing and bubbly and loving everything baby-related. I was not. I felt out of place. Out of sorts.

And then the whole Itsy Bitsy yoga thing started feeling so wrong. All the moves are done sing-songy and yes, I do speak to Cole in a cute, sweet voice, but there was just something so fake and contrived feeling about this today.

I’m thinking I should write my own baby-yoga book, but it will be about letting out our mother-angst. There will be drum beating and wailing and moaning and writhing about on the floor. Once we’ve let all that out then we’ll turn to our babies with love and say, “I love you, but I really would love some time to myself.”

Mom’s Day

Stripper Mom was reminded of her past today on the drive to her step-sister’s house.

We drove through the valley along Route 8 and passed through Waterbury.

I remembered The Patio—a strip club that was also a restaurant where I once thought I was going to have to strip for a very elderly woman (her husband removed the unaware woman before the strippers started their shift).

And I remembered another Waterbury club, whose name I can’t remember, where the bar back kept sneaking a peek of me through a large crack in the dressing room’s door.

And at the moment, my children will not let me have two minutes on the computer: Cole sits on my lap kicking me and blubbering, and Genny will not stop saying, “Mommy, mommy, what does this say?” as she scrolls through the LOLcats on icancheezburger.

So I will end with saying Happy Mother’s Day to all the mothers out there.

And a remembrance to my own mother…

The Nursing Post

Multitasker Extraordinaire!

This is the nursing post.

I can nurse while doing just about anything…radio interviews, cooking, playing Chutes and Ladders, blogging…you name it and I bet I’ve nursed and done it.

And now I’ve just been spit up on while blogging! How cool is that?

The coolest part about nursing that no one talks about is how all the closet stripper moms can expose themselves legally wherever they wish. If you’ve always wondered what it’s like to bare your breasts to strangers then just become a nursing mother. Although don’t expect to make any tips.

Men can get pretty uncomfortable when they see breasts being used for something other than their pleasure. The funniest result is when a man comes up to speak to you, not realizing you’re nursing, and then does a crazy fast turnaround in embarrassment.

It never bothers me if people see me nursing, but perhaps that has something to do with my past.

I actually sometimes wish that someone would come up to me while I’m nursing in a public place to tell me to cover up. They’d wish they’d kept quiet.

“Cover up?! It’s my legal right to nurse in public! I’m feeding my child! Nourishing our future!”

Here’s to our multitasking breasts! Lovely to look at and nutritious to suck on!

Suck on!

Radio Time

In case you missed Stripper Mom’s interview today on WLW 700 am - Cincinnati, Ohio, here’s a link to the podcast.

Well, I thought it was a beautiful thing that you could hear Cole nursing in the background of the radio program today. It was pretty funny (considering I was talking about stripping) to have a baby attached to my breasts.

But it totally brings up one of my biggest points about the difficulty of being a mother AND a sexy woman at the same time. Eddie Fingers and Tracy Jones were talking afterwards about how it was “creepy” to hear Cole nursing during my interview.

Why creepy? Because it’s hard to imagine moms and sexual beings in the same thought? This is the dichotomy that mothers struggle with. We have social expectations to be a good mother, which doesn’t include being a stripper or even having been a stripper.

I’ve got news for you world—if we’re mothers, we have indeed had sex at some point!

And mothers who are strippers do indeed use their breasts for something other than as objects to be viewed.

Actually, if you want to talk about creepy and breast milk…I do remember one stripper at The Hideaway who was lactating who would put shots of breast milk into customers’ drinks. I was only eighteen and quite naïve when I saw this spectacle. I actually asked some customer at the bar, “What is she doing?!”

He thought this was quite funny.

I can’t remember if this was the same stripper who also put lit matches around her nipples and swung them around in flaming circles…

Ah, the good old days…

Stripper Mom’s Busy Day

A busy day for Stripper Mom!

I’m the featured poet on my cousin Alison’s awesome Haiku Blog…Provocative Haiku.

You know you want to read some stripper haikus!

And Stripper Mom was interviewed for a radio show airing this afternoon, WLW 700 am - Cincinatti, Ohio…3PM-6PM EDDIE FINGERS & TRACY JONES…For Mother’s Day - Eddie & Tracy support single Moms – and the strip-clubs where they work.

And you know what else? I’ve changed two diapers, nursed four times, washed one load of laundry (one more to go) and one sink full of dishes, dropped Genny off at school, and showered. Not too bad for an overtired mom.

The Thong Post

You know you’re no longer a stripper, but rather a mother, when you are getting dressed in the morning, stepping into your usual underwear choice, a thong, and your almost-five-year-old daughter says, “Mommy, you put your underwear on backwards!”

You spin your head around as she continues to say, “Your tushie! I see your tushie!”

When you tell the story to your husband, he says, “Perhaps it’s time to start wearing regular underpants.”

This freezes you in your tracks. Regular, uncomfortable, full-bottomed, granny panties? The ones you only wear when you have your monthly “visitor”? The ones that show panty lines in your jeans?

You briefly consider making the switch for sake of not wanting your young daughter to want to start wearing thongs, but then you realize, if you’re already feeling unsexy as it is, aborting g-string usage may just completely push you over the edge into wearing mom jeans and baking cookies.

So, right then and there you decide the only answer possible…you will only dress or undress out of daughter’s eyesight. When wandering the house in undies and a tee, you will give in and wear cute, low-slung boy shorts.

A compromise made…your thong is saved for another day!

Everyone’s Doing It

It’s the latest hot trend for the mom on the go: stripper pole dancing.

Britney Spears swears by it for exercise, but it seems a little freaky to want one installed in a schmaltzy hotel suite while on tour with her young sons.

"Britney loves pole dancing, it is her new favorite work out," says a source. "She gets the toning that she needs without having to hit the gym, and she wants to be able to do it in the privacy of her own hotel room."

When I first started as a stripper way back in 1989, there were no stripper poles at any of the dozen clubs I worked at in Connecticut. Imagine my surprise when I first encountered one in New York City.

“What am I supposed to do with that?” I wondered as I took to the stage.

I watched as other strippers athletically flung their bodies against the pole, rolling, flipping, and making awful thigh-smacking sounds. It was decidedly unsexy to watch. Not to mention the nasty bruises on their inner thighs.

I never became one of those gymnastic stripper pole dancers. I would just gently grasp the pole (that sounds kind of pornographic) and swing my body around it.

Another wonderful use of the pole was as a leaning device when the men weren’t tipping.

And there was a club across the street from David Letterman’s theatre that had a regular old swing. This, I liked. Once again it had nothing to do with the sexy-factor, which was again, non-existent.

When the club was slow or the customers were jerks, I would sit on the swing, close my eyes, and pump my legs (again, pornographic-sounding). My platforms’ toes would pop against the ceiling; a cool smoky breeze would rush through my hair-sprayed curls. I would forget where I was for a few brief, lovely moments.

So, before you run out and install a metal pole in your house, consider putting in the lesser-known (and less athletic) supposedly sexy strip club paraphernalia, the swing.

Better yet, just go outside and use your child’s jungle gym.

Now there’s a sexy workout for you.

Beauty Queen

Miss California USA Carrie Prejean has been quite the newsmaker.

I didn’t have such a problem with her pageant answer to how she feels about gay marriage as many others did. She spoke what she believed and I can’t blame her for being true to herself, even though I disagree with her.

But now racy photos of Prejean have surfaced and landed her in some more controversy. Her supporters will agree with the fact that they are simply modeling pictures, but her detractors are going to have a field day with an ultra-conservative Christian being photographed semi-nude.

The most ridiculous argument is that a Miss USA shouldn’t be seen in photos such as these. She has an office to uphold for young women everywhere. OK now, let’s get real. It’s not alright to appear in lingerie in some long-ago forgotten photo shoot, but it is alright to parade around in a bikini with fake breasts on national television? Somehow that’s being a good role model?

As a mother who would never be able to hide all the “racy” photos taken of her as a model over the years, I’m disgusted with the whole thing. The whole idea of female beauty as a show thing is the problem, not how much or how little of a woman’s body is shown.

Why can’t we use this whole tabloid sensational story to expose the real issues? The true question is not whether Prejean should lose her Miss California crown; the real question is why it is so important to women to be beauty queens in the first place.

The Two Pounds

Just when I think I’m totally over caring what my body looks like, I’m proven wrong.

Yesterday was a big body issue day for me. It began innocently enough when I decided to go with a pants and a shirt instead of a dress for Nick’s cousin’s baby christening. Little did I know that when I tried to squeeze my fine self into the aforementioned black slacks my body would have nothing of it.

Nothing. Of. It.

Or any of my other nice black pants. My thighs strained at the seams. My tushie was pushing at the fabric’s strength. And the zippers were all definitely screaming, “Ha, ha. That’s a good one!”

It dawned on me that I would not be wearing pants. We were already running late because Genny decided for some reason to have a problem with every dress she owns. The flowered one had “a line on it,” the purple one, which fits perfectly, was “too big,” and so on and so forth with half-a-dozen other dresses.

She went on to have a major meltdown while Cole joined in on the action. He hadn’t even had his diaper changed yet, let alone have an outfit picked out that would fit him (if you will remember, Cole is having similar body issues).

Thank goodness Nick came to the rescue, scooping up Genny and helping her find the one dress that was satisfactory, and taking Cole and changing him. This gave me five minutes to run into the bathroom to shave my legs, since I was now going to wear a dress and could not hide my Mommy hairy legs beneath slacks.

The easy part taken care of, I then had to find a dress that fit. Fortunately for me, my soft jersey, yellow dress fit fine with no embarrassing bulges or straining.

So what happened to my cool? I’ve been fine with my slight weight gain so far. It isn’t even really a weight gain; I only weigh two pounds more than what I was before I was pregnant.

It’s the squishiness factor that creeps me out. I miss being more solid. More firm. More…”me,” or more the “me” I’ve always seen myself as.

Suffice it to say, I’m sure no one at the christening thought I looked any differently than I ever have. It’s all in my mind. Well, not ALL in my mind…there is the matter of those extra two pounds.

Our Garden, Part Deux

Our garden is planted.

Genny was so looking forward to gardening until she saw how much hard work was involved. It took all day Saturday to prepare the ground: ripping out onion grass, hand tilling the soil and then realizing we should rent a rotor-tiller, which we did at Home Depot, and mixing in the fertilizer and peat moss.

This morning was all about the planting, but unfortunately Genny realized this involved dirt. She didn’t want to walk through the dirt after about half-an-hour, so she retreated to the yard.

We will see what grows.




Gardening can really bring out your issues. I was faced yesterday with all the hoeing and weeding and wanting to run away. It’s been a long time since I needed to do such hard physical labor, but I stuck with it and my body is good-sore as a result.

Tomorrow Cole and I start our first Itsy-Bitsy yoga class. I will definitely need a good stretch by then.