Where there are little girls, there are mothers to be. Playing with dolls, dressing them, changing them, and coddling them with the innate function of love that gives the term “motherly” its definition. Perhaps motherhood is something born into a female’s DNA just as deeply as other strictly female traits. Yet, the fact remains that motherhood is by far the most challenging of all genetic responsibilities—a responsibility so tightly monitored by societal expectations that many mothers feel like failures. When the urge to have kids takes over, and the first infant is born, no one explains or talks about the immense commitment of motherhood that can change a woman from her subconscious core.
The Untold Reality of Motherhood
Some mothers just seem born to take care of children. They don’t mind endless hours on the floor playing with blocks, reading Mickey Mouse books, or carrying babies on their hips. They also manage to find time to make perfect cupcakes, act like short-order cooks, and show up with their children looking like the poster family for Family Circle. Their minivans are probably packed full of coupons, magazines about cooking, organizing, cleaning, and all the joys of motherhood—along with the latest gadgets to promote safety. They are that one mother who, no matter what you need on the road—a band-aid, ice pack, baby wipe, disinfectant, or diaper—is sure to have it. These are the mothers who make the rest of us feel bad. Whether we like to admit it or not, there is a lot of competition in motherhood, and there are many things we feel like we should be doing but aren’t. Few mothers go to sleep at night feeling as though they did it all—had every important conversation, signed every paper, or made their children feel loved enough. Motherhood and guilt go hand in hand.
At the same time, no one really prepares you for this exhausting job. After a few years and a couple of kids, it’s only natural to become agitated and annoyed because you can’t read a book in peace. Being interrupted on the phone day in and day out gets old quickly, and you feel angry that your life no longer seems important to anyone. The fact that you can’t follow the best TV programs because children are always around makes you resentful. The constant fighting, whining, and the expectation to always take care of someone else before yourself takes its toll. It gets tiring to hear about the latest struggles with a friend at school or a teacher, and it becomes exhausting to be forced to dig deep for the perfect advice when all you really want to do is shout, “Shut up and get over it!” But you don’t, because that would make you a bad mother. Instead, you replace your Grateful Dead CD—which used to take you back to those good old days—with the latest songs from High School Musical or Dora the Explorer and begin singing along with tunes you don’t even like. Disdain naturally sets in. Essentially, that is the metaphor of motherhood.
But no one tells you that it’s okay to feel this way, and that there will be days when you wish you didn’t have children at all. No one warns you about the commitment of motherhood or tells you that you will feel like you’re being held hostage. No one admits that there are days when mothers don’t really love their children or their lives the way they feel they should. So when a mother feels overwhelmed, ignored, and like a mere shell of the person she used to be, guilt bubbles up. Then most mothers begin to think there is something wrong with them for feeling the way they do. They wish they could be that perfect, overly cheerful, cupcake-making mom, and think that their mothering instinct gene must be missing or warped. But it’s not! So don’t worry! Every mother—although few are strong enough to admit it—has days, nights, weeks, or months where they wish they could just disappear into the crowd and feel the freedom of spreading their wings again. Most sane mothers think that 10-year-olds are geeky and emotional, and listening to their 5-year-old read through books every night is annoying. Really, how many times can they misread the word “cat” before they get it? And many mothers reach a point where they spend a lot of time pretending to listen—nodding their heads and smiling—but in reality, they have no idea or care what their child is saying. This doesn’t mean there is a lack of love; it’s simply a survival technique to help mothers endure the immense commitment of motherhood that no one had the guts to warn them about when they were obsessed with ovulation.
Perhaps, even if we knew ahead of time how tough being a mom is, we would still have children, hoping that our home, family, and sense of mothering would be the exception. What is most disheartening is that, although the majority of mothers love their children deeply and passionately, they don’t feel it’s okay to still want to be their own person sometimes. They feel judged and guilty for that. You must remember that if you didn’t have children of your own, you wouldn’t be spending your life hanging around 3, 7, and 10-year-olds for companionship. Why? Because they would never be able to meet your social needs, and the world would wonder what was wrong with you. Along the same lines, you can’t expect to have your needs met by your children, either. The way you feel some days—wishing for just 5 minutes of peace, for everyone in the house to go away, fend for themselves, and leave you alone—is absolutely natural. Counting down the days until they are all in school is nothing to feel bad about. All animals push away their young; humans are the only ones who feel badly and lose sleep over doing so.
The commitment of motherhood is forever, rarely talked about realistically, and goes way beyond conception and changing diapers. The reality is that the cupcake mom probably cries herself to sleep at night, will lose her mind when her children grow up, and has absolutely no sense of self or security in life unless she is being needed and wanted. In doing so, she works hard to keep her kids dependent on her while neglecting to teach them the skills they will need to become good people and parents themselves one day! Just because you committed to being a mother doesn’t mean you should have to be committed for feeling guilty, sad, depressed, unworthy, or worried that you’re not a good mom. You are. And your thoughts—whether positive or out of frustration—are completely natural. There just wasn’t anyone around with the guts to tell you so, and even if they did, there’s a good chance you wouldn’t have believed them until now!
