Babies are hard.

I guess I knew this ahead of time, but you never REALLY know until you’re doing it. You have to come to terms with the fact that this tiny human owns you.

Cancer is hard.

Something, I also knew. When Joe was first diagnosed I remember him begging me not to marry him, not to do this to my life. At the time I didn’t understand what he was talking about. Now I do.

What I never was prepared for was dealing with a baby and cancer together. Now I realize, we’re dealing with the real double whammy over here.

Joe cracks Mira up with a few clicks of his tongue and he goes crazy over every new thing she’s learning. Yet, there are days those simple joys are hard for him to even muster up the energy to enjoy.

This week has been a rough one. Joe’s pain has been unbearable and it’s forced him to spend a lot of time in bed.

Mira started teething. Oh, yea and our dog got worms. I honestly thought I was being punked.

These regular life things are magnified when you’re dealing with cancer. Your plate is already full and it’s hard to make room for normal times.

So, it was all hands on deck. My parents took Wrigley to the vet. Joe headed off to the oncologist by himself. His mom headed downtown to pick up his meds. I stayed home with the queen of cranky and my grandma folded our laundry.

We had three sleepless nights of teething, fevers and Mira’s first real cold. The coughing and runny nose just about broke my heart. And who knew how hard it was to squirt Tylenol into their little pinched up mouths?

By Friday, I was cooked– overdone— burnt.

Thank goodness it’s Grandma Doreen’s day to babysit. I almost didn’t go anywhere because I felt guilty leaving her with a sniffling baby. Joe was passed out upstairs dealing with his own insomnia plus the added bonus of a baby in our bed all week.

I told Joe’s mom I was going to workout. I was running errands. I was, you know, doing very important things.

My head was spinning with all of our stress as I headed into the parking lot towards Babies R Us for formula. That’s when my plan went array.

Something else caught my eye.

A sign for a $49 massage. I was on a top-secret, undercover mission as I slid in the door to get an appointment. They could get me in but it’d be a couple of hours. I don’t know why I felt like this “me” time had to be so kept quiet. I guess I felt like there was too much to do, too much to deal with.

Clearly, I let all of that go quickly as I found myself  across the street at a Mexican restaurant alone and ordering a skinny margarita. (Sidenote, I will order anything with the word skinny in it. Skinny burrito, Skinny ice cream…)

Two skinny drinks and a large order of chips and salsa later and I was starting to feel like myself again. Or a slightly, buzzed version of myself.

I paid with the cash I had leftover from our cruise so there was no paper trail. I suddenly felt like I was having an affair with my fish tacos.

Next, I went in for my massage and spent 50 blissful minutes with a man named Demetri. I text my mother in law that I was just leaving my workout and I’d be home soon.

I sang all the way home. I let my shoulders press down and away from my ears.

I pulled in the driveway and got a call from Mira’s doctor that she wanted to see her before the weekend since she still had her cough. I was re-freshed and back in action and you better believe I got that baby to her appointment in 20 minutes flat. ( I was sober at this point, please don’t call DCFS.)

This supermom stuff is hard. This cancer stuff is harder.

It truly takes a village… and a margarita.