Not going to sugar-coat it. Today I feel annoyed, frustrated, short-tempered—BITCHY. I keep yelling at my kids because I am too programmed by my upbringing to be non-confrontational to yell at the housekeeper like I want to, although I did tell her I was upset that she was an hour and a half late without calling, which is a huge step for me. This is going to sound very ‘poor little rich girl,’ but it’s worth the possible label and criticism to be able to vent. Today this smiling, beautiful, probably overworked, incompetent teenager tried to wash the girls dry clean only, hand blocked quilts I told her last week were dry clean only (this is after washing 4 of Dan’s work pants and putting 2 in the dryer when I told her they were dry clean only), who spent 2 hours today watching her sister’s wedding video on Dan’s computer (she invited me to watch too, so in the middle of working on a client’s resume in the one second of time the kids would let me work, I obliged) after taking a lunch break, who left for the day without mopping the floor with the kids’ dinner rice scattered around like I had asked her to. She has also turned everything white I own to light blue or grey, burned a hole through my favorite shirt while ironing, may have stolen a ring of Evie’s that my dad made, sits around talking on the phone when she thinks I’m not looking, and cleans Mia’s room when she is napping inevitably waking her up or getting her up out of her crib when she cries for more than 5 minutes even when I have asked her numerous times to NOT DO THAT. But yelling at her or firing her would be acting entitled and unkind, and aren’t I here to try to help instead of becoming a pampered housewife? After all, she needs the work and has so little. I feel guilty that I have so much, and am so demanding of her. But swallowing my anger has made me grouchy and passive aggressive and I am paying her, so who does sucking it up really help? But she seems like she is trying some of the time, so how can I be angry with her? And she doesn’t have a computer at home so I need to let her use ours to watch her own sister’s wedding video, for goodness sake! But if I say nothing about what she is doing that I don’t like I am not training her, but when I ask her to do things I feel like I am being too bossy, which is something I was accused of all the time while I was growing up until I turned into a shy little girl, too afraid to raise my hand in school to voice my opinions for fear of being called “bossy,” but that’s another post all together.

And it’s not just this incompetent young housekeeper, and my inability to express my feelings about her work, but I’m also grouchy because I am an expat in a strange, new land and I am trying to figure this place out while being a full-time mama to 3 little kids on summer break. I am trying to meet people, plan outings for the girls, make sure they are well rested, healthy (easier said than done—today I found out I have to get them dewormed every 6 months), happy (some days this is impossible), having what we need for food and for the house, all while the kids are fighting incessantly, begging for unhealthy food all day long, interrupting when I am trying to understand what someone in Kannada is trying to tell me over the phone, pulling off diapers and peeing on the rug, and whining at the top of their lungs about pretty much anything and everything. I NEED A DRINK RIGHT THIS MINUTE.