Recently someone came out and asked if I hate my kids. Now I assume this person was joking, although the little winky-wink/smiley face emoticon was not included, so I'm not certain. But I admit, the question got my back up. Got my panties in a little bit of a twist.
And here's why.
Unless a person is a stay-at-home mom or has ever been a stay-at-home mom of more than 1 child, she has no idea what this life is like. Staying home with ANY child is a challenge, but being pulled in more than 1 direction at any given time has the potential to make one come completely unglued.
If you have a job and are away from your child/children more than 5 hours every day, you really can't comment on what it must be like for me, who is around my children every day for a minimum of 10 hours. Every.single.day. For.years. Since February 2004, I can remember only 1 time in which I was away from my child/children for over 8 hours. (I was going to suggest when I was in the hospital in 2007 and 2009, but I had newborns so I wasn't exactly child-free, was I?)
I know many working parents who spend 40+ hours a week (including commute time) away from their kids. And on Saturday and Sundays, I have heard them comment that their kids are driving them bonkers. So add 5 more days to that, and you have me.
This morning, N wanted to do Bendaroos, the sticky little wands that you twist and mold into dinosaurs and circus clowns. She was all, "I can do it," and within 15 seconds was grouchily complaining, "I can't do this. I need HEEEELP!!!"
And then poor little M, also known as Mr. Fussypants, who is going to the doctor this afternoon for a suspected ear infection, was crawling and snotting all over the floor, trying desperately to get away from G who alternated between bugging the shit out of me and N as we tried to make a Bendaroo seal and trying to step on his baby brother.
So N was whiney about not being able to make a "perfect" seal as beautiful as the one on the box. And G kept asking, "Can I touch it?" and trying to grab every sticky wand I had in my hand, while M was crying and trying to climb my leg. Who doesn't love this????
I do not know what it is like to be a working (outside the home) parent. And even though it seems like it might be a little delightful to be able to pee without an audience poking at your pubic hair, I recognize that the logistics of working outside the home and being a parent are tremendously hard. So hard that I have no desire to try to do both.
I can't imagine the frustration of trying to get kids out the door in the morning because you actually have to be somewhere on time. Every day. Most of the places I take the kids we can get to whenever. We have no deadlines.
I can't imagine how tired a person must be to be up many times in the course of the night with a child and then awake and off to work at 6:30 a.m. I mean, if I am super tired, I can lay on the couch and the kids can watch tv all day. I won't win any Great Mothering Awards, but I can rest a little.
I can't imagine the rush of trying to get everyone in, dinner cooked, everyone fed, dishes cleaned up, homework done, kids bathed, books read, and lights out in the window of 3 hours---from 5:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. Every day.
I can't imagine the frustration of trying to clean house, do laundry, get groceries, run errands AND try to spend quality time with the family every single 48-hour weekend.
Since I don't do it and have never done it, I can't really begrudge anyone what they do as working parents. I can't tell them they are complaining too much. I might suggest, as I do to my brother, that he hire a cleaning person so he doesn't have to stay up until the wee hours of the morning mopping the kitchen, but I should just butt the hell out.
I love my children with the fiercest love known to humans. But I also know that some animals in the wild kill their young. I have yet to meet a momma lioness or baboon who didn't have the urge to knock her young into the next wildlife preserve because they were driving her straight up crazy.
7 comments:
I feel I get both perspectives, since I watch other people's children, while also keeping my own at home. I do see a difference with the parents of the children I watch. I will generalize about them, since I can't with other working parents 8-) - they have a different attitude towards their kids. I don't know if it's guilt or just a pure joy of seeing them after 10 hours. Absence makes the heart grow fonder, I think. They tend to not get as annoyed as easily as I do, and they tend to accept more of the annoying/crappy behavior that I won't put up with. They also tend to not say no very much - if at all. It's more of a "why are you hitting me?" attitude, vs. a "don't hit me." Joe and I talk about it ALL the time - would we feel differently about our kids if we worked outside of the home. No way could I homeschool - ever. I've already been chewing Mary's head off over just working on the summer bridge book. Way too much conflict, cause we're around each other too much. Cary
I feel like I have lived both sides of this a bit, even though my full time job was temporary (about six months) which probably changes things mentally. They are both hard. I feel like I'm ready to be a working parent now, but I never would have felt that way if I also hadn't had the time at home that I've had...
Parenting is hard, whichever way you do it, the end.
Carrie, you're spot on as usual. A LOT of people who are content to let others raise their children are the most judgmental of stay-at-home moms as if you've made some tragic mistake or trade-off by committing your considerable talents to your children.
Of course, many will argue that the household MUST have two earners and that that is the sacrifice modern families must make which is complete hogwash in most cases. What they don't want is to give up the income that allows us to remain such consummate collectors of too expensive cars, too big houses, too much shit and gadgetry. But, at what price to our kids?
I remember the first time I heard "Smells Like Teen Spirit" and then saw that iconoclastic video. It was the primal scream of suburban brats burdened with too much time, too little supervision, and a desperate cry for direction instead of another toy.
If you're in the relatively rare situation where one bread winner can earn enough to raise the family in comfort and safety, then you're lucky that the scrambling involves keeping your sanity as your attention is pulled in a million directions, often simultaneously, by the demanding, curious, non-stop pleas of the young'uns.
I don't have the stamina or personality to raise toddlers; prolonged crying has the same effect as Navy klaxons or tornado sirens on my nerves. This isn't to say I avoided feeding, cleaning, bathing, changing, entertaining my children; I just know I would have a very difficult time doing it full-time.
You have nothing for which to apologize, Carrie. You have a rare opportunity to spend the formative years of your kids' lives intimately involved while also acknowledging that it can sometimes be a pain in the ass. Especially when someone, probably a confused yuppie or guy who believes that "rearing babies is woman's work, says so in the Bible! Mebbe you oughta read it to help you get through the tough times!" Piss off. Can't change a diaper with scripture.
Bravo to you and anyone devoted to spending as much time with their children, because as I'm finding out as my eldest serves our country on active duty, the time you get to spend with them is to be savored before it's gone. JR
Carrie, you're spot on as usual. A LOT of people who are content to let others raise their children are the most judgmental of stay-at-home moms as if you've made some tragic mistake or trade-off by committing your considerable talents to your children.
Of course, many will argue that the household MUST have two earners and that that is the sacrifice modern families must make which is complete hogwash in most cases. What they don't want is to give up the income that allows us to remain such consummate collectors of too expensive cars, too big houses, too much shit and gadgetry. But, at what price to our kids?
I remember the first time I heard "Smells Like Teen Spirit" and then saw that iconoclastic video. It was the primal scream of suburban brats burdened with too much time, too little supervision, and a desperate cry for direction instead of another toy.
If you're in the relatively rare situation where one bread winner can earn enough to raise the family in comfort and safety, then you're lucky that the scrambling involves keeping your sanity as your attention is pulled in a million directions, often simultaneously, by the demanding, curious, non-stop pleas of the young'uns.
I don't have the stamina or personality to raise toddlers; prolonged crying has the same effect as Navy klaxons or tornado sirens on my nerves. This isn't to say I avoided feeding, cleaning, bathing, changing, entertaining my children; I just know I would have a very difficult time doing it full-time.
You have nothing for which to apologize, Carrie. You have a rare opportunity to spend the formative years of your kids' lives intimately involved while also acknowledging that it can sometimes be a pain in the ass. Especially when someone, probably a confused yuppie or guy who believes that "rearing babies is woman's work, says so in the Bible! Mebbe you oughta read it to help you get through the tough times!" Piss off. Can't change a diaper with scripture.
Bravo to you and anyone devoted to spending as much time with their children, because as I'm finding out as my eldest serves our country on active duty, the time you get to spend with them is to be savored before it's gone. JR
Carrie, you're spot on as usual. A LOT of people who are content to let others raise their children are the most judgmental of stay-at-home moms as if you've made some tragic mistake or trade-off by committing your considerable talents to your children.
Of course, many will argue that the household MUST have two earners and that that is the sacrifice modern families must make which is complete hogwash in most cases. What they don't want is to give up the income that allows us to remain such consummate collectors of too expensive cars, too big houses, too much shit and gadgetry. But, at what price to our kids?
I don't have the stamina or personality to raise toddlers; prolonged crying has the same effect as Navy klaxons or tornado sirens on my nerves. This isn't to say I avoided feeding, cleaning, bathing, changing, entertaining my children; I just know I would have a very difficult time doing it full-time.
You have nothing for which to apologize, Carrie. You have a rare opportunity to spend the formative years of your kids' lives intimately involved while also acknowledging that it can sometimes be a pain in the ass. Especially when someone, probably a confused yuppie or guy who believes that "rearing babies is woman's work, says so in the Bible! Mebbe you oughta read it to help you get through the tough times!" Piss off. Can't change a diaper with scripture.
Bravo to you and anyone devoted to spending as much time with their children, because as I'm finding out as my eldest serves our country on active duty, the time you get to spend with them is to be savored before it's gone. JR
I meant to comment on this and just realized I never did.
I think I figured out early on that if I didn't embrace the idea of "boundaries" - even if I didn't call it that - that I would go nuts, and my relationship with my children and husband would suffer greatly. I think that's why I developed the nerves of steel necessary to institute things like "room time," and "playpen time," and to keep saying, "No, Bailey, I can't play with you. Please find something to keep yourself busy" until she finally realized I was serious, and...found something to do.
This is not to say that it's not still maddening sometimes to have, as you pointed out, a 24/7/365 job. I just realized a couple weeks ago, after thinking through my list of friends who are parents, that you're my only mom friend who - like me - has never had an overnight getaway of any kind, either alone, with a husband, or with friends. It just hasn't been practical for me/us up to this point, but Dion and I might go away for a night for my 40th birthday. I wonder what that would be like....?
I was thinking about what I commented here and wanted to clarify something (as if you take notes from my comments to use as a Parenting Manual...). Anyway, when I referred to having nerves of steel to establish rest times, playpen time, roomtime, I was referring to the initial periods of setting those up, when the kids resist.
There was lots of crying from the playpen, and lots of moans and groans and begging me to change my mind when I declared "Roomtime!" at first. Same way with rest times. But now, playpen time and roomtime are such a part of our lives that it would seem weird to the kids NOT to do them. (We stopped rest time a little while ago, when Audrey became easier to deal with.)
When I say "Playpen Time!" to Jonah, he immediately runs to get all of his alphabet letters and joyfully throws them into the playpen so they'll be there to play with. Actually, lately, Audrey has opted to play in the playpen with Jonah rather than have roomtime, which is fine with me. They have a great time together, and as long as she's tucked away somewhere safe while I'm cooking dinner, it's all good.
Anyway, just wanted to clear that up. I feel so strongly about the benefits of these built-in breaks in my day that I sing about them to any mom who will listen, and I wanted to make it clear that the nerves of steel are only necessary for the intial transition period.
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