I don’t know about you – but sometimes, it’s kind of easy to forget that I am a mom of three.

Sure, I just turned 35 (UGH!), I drive a Swagger Wagon (with DVD player, thankyouverymuch) and have caught myself singing The Itsy Bitsy Spider in the shower a few too many times for my comfort level, but honestly – sometimes I wonder whose life it is that I’ve stepped into.

I know I can’t possibly be the only one that feels like it was just yesterday that I went to the prom.

I find it truly amazing that most days I can sling a toddler over one arm and send an email with another all while telling the two other kids to stay out of the street and wash their hands. That I can (usually) keep a mental tally of soccer schedules , cook a mean crock pot BBQ or that somehow I just know when someone has a cold.

Because, honestly – I still think of the calendar in terms of semesters. My body clock is still trained for happy hour at 5 pm on Fridays (dollar pitchers aren’t easy to forget!) and I have a serious problem with cracking my eyes open before 7 am.

And sleeping past dawn is not bloody likely with three tiny tyrants, let me tell you.

Though usually, just when I start looking around for these kids REAL mother – something happens that snaps me back to reality (or something close to it).

For instance, let’s take this morning.

It’s pouring down rain in DC today. And like any nominally competent mother would do, I have armed the kids against the onslaught of water with rain coats, umbrellas and a ride to the bus stop (which is all of 15 feet from the edge of our driveway).

It doesn’t dawn on me until I reach the sitter’s house, pop open a toddler sized butterfly umbrella and shuttle the baby to the door – that I have nothing.

No umbrella of my own. No rain coat. I’m wearing flip-flops for heaven’s sake.

My hair is wet, my feet are wet and I am starting the workday looking rather sloppy if you ask me.

But, just then it dawns on me that while I may not always look or feel the part – this role is all mine. And maybe the reason that it doesn’t feel different is because it really isn’t.

{Hold on….epiphany alert!}

I’m still me.

Wait. What? How is that possible after going through three pregnancies, trading in my SUV for that darn van (yes, I am still bitter about it) and surviving on less sleep than is possibly humane for the better part of a decade?

Could it be that the only thing that’s changed is that there are now three mini me’s chasing me around demanding cups of milk?

Or is it that as women we are shape shifters…capable of being mom, a giggly girlfriend and boss all in the span of three hours?

No wonder I’m exhausted.

However, I also realize that just because I don’t always feel different – I am in many ways.

But, not in the ones that matter the most. For all of us, pre or post motherhood, the things that make us laugh and love and carry on are still the same.

We just have greater reasons for doing so.