Though I'd hoped (dared believe) that things would have slowed down by now, such has not been the case, and in all honesty, it's taking some real effort to keep from getting both overwhelmed and extremely frustrated. I feel like all I do is run from one activity to the next, keeping as many balls in the air as possible. Though I'm a high-energy person who doesn't mind being busy and who certainly enjoys accomplishments of pretty much any kind, I resent the times that I don't have the space to take in and relish what it is I'm doing, and likely have worked so hard on behalf of. Back-to-school traffic has been the pits in recent weeks, and in concert with gobs of local construction on and around main arteries of the city, we're spending more time inching along in the car than I'm down with. I've not had much in the way of childcare lately and so today was attempting to get home from picking up Jack as quickly as possible because I had three hours of babysitting starting at 3:30. At one point, I expressed some major irritation with the snail pace at which the other drivers were sneaking along, and Jack said, "I'm sorry you've had a bad day, Mommy."
Well didn't I just feel like a pile of dung! You bet I did.
I said, "I've had a good day sweetheart, I'm just frustrated with all the traffic," and in that moment of being called out on the heel I was being, I realized just how very tired I am of always trying to be somewhere five minutes ago. I felt immensely humbled by my little boy, felt like I'd let him down in some way because we hadn't seen each other since this morning and the traffic sure as hell isn't his fault. But I was, concurrently, so damn desperate to just get to the gym and solider on there in peace and quiet, just 45 minutes that I didn't have to hurry up or answer to anything. At that moment, life's present imbalance slugged me in the face, and I felt how much that is really wearing on me and how it could/does spill over onto the boys in a way I surely don't want it to.
Some moms seem to take the pace of child-rearing more in stride; some have huge amounts of help; some feel just like I do. I find one of the quiet challenges of parenthood to be how to balance your needs with those of your children. There's not a lot of open dialogue about how much parents need and aren't getting. Egads! Asserting what we versus our children need might be construed as selfish, which is not what most media and other portrayals of motherhood (especially motherhood) seem to suggest is a kosher feeling in the arena of your own nuclear family. But it should be a conversation, and it should be one more people feel they can have openly. Selfishness isn't always bad. It's a behavior that makes evolutionary sense (in some situations) and is one that I, and many others I know, brush from our interiors dismissively and judgmentally all too often.
I was caught up today in a web of knowing what I needed desperately (a little bit of time just for me) but being unable to meet that need. And that impacts my children in the sense that they aren't getting me at my best, which to the best of my ability, is what I want to provide them. It's what I feel they deserve. When my reservoir starts to run low, I need to refill it in some way, or I can't meet my own expectations. And then a kernel of resentment starts to suggest itself, and that is the last emotion I want to feel.
In this regard, honoring what women who are mothers or who are thinking about becoming (or not) mothers feel, seems to me not only critical for their welfare and that of the children involved but also an incredibly salient point in discussions on public policy regarding options in family planning, early education, quality child care, maternity and paternity leave and so forth. For all the goings-on about how our children are our most valuable resource, there isn't a great deal of systemic support for them and those who are raising them. And the current Republican platform and the party's psycho-sounding talking points don't make me feel like the country will head in a better, more supportive direction should they win in November. Why in god's name, for example, would we want to withhold birth control from folks who know they don't want any or more children and are trying to live responsibly along these lines? Why would we take away rights of reproductive choice from those we don't know, whose struggles and challenges are ones with which we are unfamiliar or of which we can't conceive?
I wanted to be a mother more than almost anything and I feel grateful every day for my boys. I love them ferociously, with a fervor that's not comparable to anything else. However, I am repeatedly stunned by how hard and exhausting parenting is, by how little other parents seem willing to discuss the hard times they're having with it, by the shiny shellack so many spray onto the mantle of mother. And I'm a fortunate woman who can afford to stay home with my kids but also pay for a break when I need one. There are countless others are can't get away; can't stay home nursing sick kids for fear of losing their jobs; have more children than perhaps they'd like because they didn't have sex ed (Texas) or access to birth control (please don't ban funding for Planned Parenthood you crazy Elephants) or an abortion clinic (wing-nut Mississippi is really trying to screw its women in this regard); don't have access to quality education; don't have enough food; are homeless. This is why I am so disgusted and baffled by present-day Republican politics. They seem to have such blatant disregard for women and the challenges that constellate around reproduction.
I feel so fulfilled by Em-i-lis and the myriad comments from readers who express thanks for my openness regarding being a mom. My hope is that some day, the conversation of what both parents and kids need will be one had more openly, honestly, and publicly. That it will be had with love and acceptance. That it will influence the small-scale (yes, many of us feel frazzled and nutty and forgetful alongside the happy and thrilled and enriched) and the large (public policy and such). My writings on motherhood, parenting, and the challenges and rewards therein are my small attempts to start conversations, make connections and extend the hand of community. Thank you for reading.
Entitled Jerusalem, it's a joint effort by Yotam and his ages-old friend, Sami Tamimi. Both men were born in Jerusalem, Yotam in the Jewish west and Tamimi in the Arab East, and this book is an homage to their hometown through the cross-cultural lens(es) of their experiences. They still work together, today in London with Tamimi manning the ship at one of Ottolenghi's restaurants. I'm looking forward to this book!