The UnREAL Reality of Normalcy

I find myself drawn to "reality" shows.  I used to watch the multitude of prime time so called "reality" shows, which really just consist of a group of less than grown twenty somethings consuming large amounts of alcohol and sleeping with a lot of strangers.  I must admit, most of us watch for the same reasons we slow down to survey the scene of a car wreck.  You thank God it didn't happen to you or someone you know and yet for some unknown reason you feel the strong desire to know what happened to the victims and whether or not they will survive.

Will any of us ever survive these "reality" shows?  Now that I'm (gulp) officially in my 30s the "booze it up, get it up" shows hold little to no interest for me anymore.  There's only so much stupidity to go around and how many times can you really watch someone make a fool of themselves in exactly the same manner.  What I watch now are the "unreality" shows that center around families.  Call it another attempt to slow down and survey the damage, but I actually think of it as a way to view through an open window the family life of someone else to compare normalcy.  We all want to feel normal, whatever the hell that means.  We all want to feel like we're doing something right in our marriage, in raising our children.

So I occasionally tune in to some "unreality" shows particularly those involving large families - 19 Kids and Counting, Sister Wives and the like to figure out how the hell one survives more than a dozen kids and multiple spouses.  What I get is this sugar coated attempt at normalcy, the very thing which denies my need to feel normal.  I tune in because previews hint at conflicts, jealousies, potential problems, and what I get is an artificial dose of isn't my life so very normal considering I have 19 kids or 4 wives.  I feel cheated by the whole experience.  What viewers like me tune in for is the hope that someone will say, Good God this is fucking hard to deal with.  Nobody wants to admit that marriage is hard, raising kids is hard, working, paying bills and just getting through life is hard.  Everyone wants to feel normal and so we project our own normalcy onto others.  We are all cheating each other. 

Take me for instance, if anyone was going to show you the real deal it'd be me.  I've long ago, tossed aside any attempt to fake a smile when I want to cry, pretend to be all lovey dovey with my husband when we get into a fight right before company comes over, placate a screaming child with niceties and bribes instead of pulling them out of the restaurant and waiting for the tantrum to be over - theirs or mine, whichever comes first.  I wear my misery on my sleeve and my love on my shirt.  I am stained through and through with the blood, sweat and tears of life and yet no one is knocking down my door offering to film my family.

I want answers just like everyone else.  I want someone to show me how it's done, show me what I'm doing wrong so I can fix it all.  I want to know how women voluntarily share their husband with other women and raise other people's children when I have a hard enough time getting my husband to help with chores and raising two children.  How do they not feel cheated of time, attention, and help?  As for the "look how well we all get along and resolve conflict" I say shut the camera off and wake me when reality calls. 

How does a woman who's spent nearly every year of her adult life pregnant, nursing, and raising kids, say that she never yells?  Give me a break people.  To all my fellow viewers I say don't drink the cool-aide.  They just want what we want, to show the world how fucking normal everything is, despite this amazingly different lifestyle they've chosen to live.  I want to see the child who throws fits because she's tired of being raised by her siblings instead of her parents.  I want to see the wife that wants to fly off the handle but chokes it down because he's got three other women to go to for understanding when he's upset. 

I'll admit that I've thought to myself on many occasions, maybe there's something to this idea of having a wife of my own to cook and clean, and yes even take care of my husband when I'm too exhausted after taking care of two kids who haven't napped all day.  That has more to do with my underlying theory that "wife" and "mother" really mean slave in some exotic language and nobody has bothered to clue me in yet.  I would never, and could never share my husband with anyone, because flaws or not he's mine and if anyone is going to see through my bullshit and still show up than it's going to be him.  I cannot imagine having so many children that scheduling in "one on one" time would be necessary.  I feel enough guilt trying to juggle two kids and make sure they feel special and loved.

So if anyone out there in TV land is listening, wake me up when you do the show about a mom crying in a ball on the floor because she's overworked, unappreciated, and expected to carry on taking care of everyone else when she has nothing left at the end of the day for herself.  I know I cannot possibly be the only mom that feels the cold stone irony of spanking a child because though you've told them a hundred times not to they still insist on standing on the table, counter or dresser and you don't want them to fall and get hurt.  You know that you cannot prevent every injury, but you just do not have the energy to contend with a screaming toddler for five hours in the emergency room tonight. 

Show me the wife like me who is sick to death of hearing that all the tantrums she throws in an attempt to get "help" (that is another blog post entirely) really are hurtful when I just want to say I'm attempting to make it clear that I am completely crushed by the weight of my responsibility right now and I'd really like you to just step off the dirt that's covering me, and dare I dream, grab that shovel over there and take a little of this off me right now so I can just BREATHE.  If you've got any shows like that, I'll tune in faithfully, cause I know that I would love to know how she does it all correctly.

Parenthood is the BEST Birth Control

Before you have children, you use birth control because you THINK you are not "READY" for the RESPONSIBILTY of raising children. Once you have your first child, the decision to have another child becomes a sheer act of will. You must BELIEVE that you are "READY."

The irony of ironies is that already having a child or children is the best birth control. Even if you are "READY" to have a child and even if you're down for some...um..shall we say "practice" you have to fight with all the child related obstacles - lack of privacy, time, sleep deprivation, to-do list overload, etc. So just keep in mind, it takes knowing what you're REALLY in for to know whether or not you're REALLY "READY." That my friend is why, crazy as it sounds, Parenthood is the BEST Birth Control EVER!

Everybody's Mother??

So is it just me, or does everyone seem to need more mothering nowadays? When did everyone start crying for mommies well beyond the years that it's acceptable to do it? Seriously, when did people just decide, nah forget personal responsibility that's just too much work. If things don't go my way, I'll just whine that it's not my fault because someone else should have don't it for me.

I truly hope that I raise my own children to take responsibility for themselves and their actions. I would hate to envision them out there in the world, just balancing their lives on the edge of excuses. Excuses not to live their lives the way they want. Excuses that allow them to blame others for anything that doesn't go their way. I can hear the explanations of adults in childish words "But it's not my fault mommy, it's my boss's fault for not anticipating that I might need extra time getting that project done."

It seems like if it isn't the "after the fact complainers" I hear these days it's the "can't you read my mind cause I sure expect you to" people. Holly hell people, have your forgotten your mothers long quoted mantra "Use Your Words." If people don't know what you want then you can't complain when you don't get it. If you wait for people to magically guess what you need or want then you're in for a long and disappointing life.

Here's a novel idea that just may work- ask, just ask and give others a chance to help you. Also expect that you still may not get everything you ask for, but you definitely won't get anything if you never ask. After reading "The Five Languages of Love," I agree with the author, you can make requests of loved ones, but not demands and that means that sometimes they will not be fulfilled. But the bottom line is, it's better to have someone want to fulfill your requests than someone who resentfully complies with an order. The workplace is a whole different battlefield, but I think the same idea rings true. If you make a respectful request, you are much more likely to be happy with the result than if you issue a bottom line demand. All people want is to just feel respected; that's pretty much it.

Lastly, I hope to teach my children to value and respect words for they can hurt or heal depending on how you choose to use them. I hear grown adults all the time wielding hurtful comments at each other without batting an eye. They have no idea how long those words live in a person's mind or heart. Words that hurt can spread like a virus attacking self-esteem and making us ever more numb to the healing words. Hurtful words drown out the good ones. I read once that it takes twice as many nice words to balance out the effect of hurtful words and I believe it. I hope that I can adhere to all these lovely ideas because I know that I'm not immune to forgetting these lessons, but being the mamma of two little ones sure gives me an ever present reminder.

Motherhood The New Career!

I have decided that we ought to be paid to be mothers. We work from sun up to sun down and even in our sleep we hear phantom babies/children crying or simply calling for us. Even the woman, like me, who can sleep through most anything will wake up at the smallest muffled cry when she has children. I can't tell you how many times I've been in the shower and heard my son or daughter cry for me only to realize that in fact it was perfectly quiet and they are both still tucked in and sleeping peacefully. What I'm getting at is that motherhood doesn't shut off, even in our unconsciousness.

If you work "outside the home" and you're a mother then you really work two full time jobs. In my case one and a half. Since I work "outside the home" part time you can count that as my half a job. I hate that 1950s term "outside the home." Work is NOT a place; it's a state of being. It's a to do list that never ends, replenishing itself the second one item gets crossed off. That is motherhood -WORK.

Even if a person LOVES their job. At the end of the day it's still a JOB. So if you have a CAREER is it different? Is the To Do List outlined in glitter? Do you skip to work? Do you hum while doing menial tasks like filing papers, typing notes or sitting in a marathon of meetings? My guess would be a big fat NO, but then again I have a JOB. What that means is that I work for the paycheck, the occassional pat on the head if it's offered and the chance to keep my brain from turning into baby mush. I often wonder if I would forget how to speak "Adult" if I were home by myself with my kids all day. I like my JOB, but I know there is no UP; there is nothing to work toward in terms of advancement. Is that a CAREER? Wanting to move up toward something better, towards a position more full of responsibility and one hopes pay??

Is a CAREER a calling, a strong desire to do something you would do even if money were no object? Is a CAREER the willingness to step into a role (sometimes knowing that you will need to grow into that role) that is more responsibility and one hopes more rewarding as well. If that is the case, then why the hell is MOTHERHOOD not a CAREER? It's perfectly clear to me that we do it, the never ending to do list that is motherhood, with money being no object because it doesn't pay a dime. I happen to think the world would be a lot better place if it were a CAREER. There would be a hell of lot less war, crime, greed, and corruption.

It would be great to get paid for all the work I actually do. I am shaping a future generation and I do it while balancing a bank account that is always teetering on the edge of empty. That means that I'm constantly balancing many other things as well- my marriage, my children, my home, and my job. My responsibilities are hovering around me every second of the day. I'm proud to be able to contribute to my family's income, but I know that if I lost that income I could not afford to stay home and simply raise my kids. So it absolutely sucks on those days when my life and my responsibilites to all those that I love feels like a JOB. If MOTHERHOOD was given the proper respect it deserves, and if it paid just half of the amount good parenting would save our society in punishment of crime, then it would definitely be a CAREER.

Triage On The Parenthood Battle Field

If you have more than one child you have now entered the fun triage zone of the parenthood battle field. There comes a day usually early after you bring home baby number two when suddenly both kids are crying at the same time, and here comes the instant triage scenario: You do a mental checklist, trying to come up with an assessment of which child needs you most urgently at that moment. Is one child hurt and the other simply lonely? Is one child hungry and one is tired and cranky?

The mental checklist is long and we mothers go through it at a supremely fast rate. To outsiders it may look like we are playing favorites when we quickly rush to one child's side over another, but what outsiders don't know is that we fight the war of guilt that consumes us all the time. It's all because we had the audacity to have and love more than one child, all the while knowing that we are simply one person with the limitations of being one single person who can not possibly do all things for all children all the time. Then we find ourselves begging our children to wait, be patient, hurry up, quiet down, behave, the list goes on and on. All because once your family goes from "one child" to "one more child" we have inadvertantly given our children the upper hand. Now we are out numbered.

When one child is sick the choice may seem easy. You go to the child who is sick first. But life and motherhood are not so simple. Just because one child may need you a lot more, you still must tend to the other or others. My heart goes out to women who face impossible choices every day, who carry guilt that they can not untangle from their love and devotion.

I guess all we can do is remind them, remind ourselves, to look up from our medical kits and our bandages and our checklists to see that there are other nurses and doctors in this triage tent of ours. That love can come from more places than we can possibly imagine and though the feeling of responsibility seems so overwhelmingly ours alone, it simply is not. Our children get love and guidance from our close and extended family, friends, friends of family, co-workers and neighbors.

I think that because mothers are responsible for our children from the moment of conception a part of us never lets go of the ENORMITY of that responsiblity, but sometimes, just sometimes it's ok to allow ourselves to step back and let someone else take over. It's ENORMOUSLY important for us to relinquish the responsibilty to our spouse, mother, father, sister, brother, friend or anyone who loves us enough to take some of the responsibility off our plate. We, as mothers, can not afford to look up from our checklists one day to see that it is no longer our children on the triage cot, but ourselves.