Today I made a difficult decision. I decided to cut
something out of my life in an attempt to try and make things a bit less
stressful. I decided to let go of something not because I really want to but
because I feel I have to in order to stay sane. Today I decided to quit cloth
diapering. I tried to make it work but I just couldn’t. My poor toddler has
crazy sensitive skin and no matter what I tried he always ended up with nasty
rashes in cloth. And my baby finally got big enough to use the diapers I have
and it turns out she hates them. Like, really hates them. We’re talking crying,
fussy, miserable mess because no matter how often I change her, the minute
she’s wet she feels it, and she really hates feeling wet. Plus, the fact is
that cloth diapers are more work. Eco-friendly? Yes. Economical? Yes. Easier?
No. Sure, modern cloth diapering has come a long way, but lets not kid
ourselves, until those diapers start to magically wash themselves, they’re
still more work. Frankly, with four kids-two in diapers, I’m barely keeping it
together and something has just got to give. However, the worst part in all of
this is the fact that I feel so guilty for quitting. I hate that. I hate how I
feel like I wasn’t “mom” enough to hack it. Its ridiculous to feel this way,
and I know the only one making me feel this way is myself, but I still feel it.
There’s
the problem really: modern parenting is so filled with guilt. That’s not to say
that parents in the past didn’t deal with feelings of guilt or inadequacy. I
think those feeling are as ancient as you can get, but it seems like these days
its all so in your face and hard to escape. I blame the internet; social media-
Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest (bloody hell, definitely Pinterest!). Not to
mention the plethora of parenting books, blogs, websites- there’s plenty of
resources out there that will try to tell you how to parent- and point out
everything you are doing wrong. I try to avoid all the “advice” and just do
what I think is right, but for some reason doing so still doesn’t necessarily
negate the guilt of knowing someone else is probably doing it all “better” than
me. I know I’m my own worst critic, and I’m really starting to piss myself off
with all the inner judgement. The constant internal dialogue and second guessing
is exhausting. And the worst part of all of this is having to try and put on
the happy face and pretend that parenting is the most blissful thing in the
world. Don’t get me wrong, I love my kids. I wouldn’t trade being their mom for
anything in the world. And even if I could go back and change things, knowing
how hard it was going to be, I wouldn’t. But that doesn’t mean that it’s all
rainbows and daisies and happiness galore.
Let’s
be honest, there are moments, hours, even days when this feels like the most
miserable job in the world. Worthwhile, definitely, but often the most
worthwhile things are also the most difficult. Adding the guilt on top of all
the difficulty is what becomes so soul crushing. So, I’d like to say that I’m
not going to feel guilty anymore, but I know that’s totally unrealistic.
However, I’d like to try and maybe ease up on the guilt a bit, and I think one
way to do that is through brutal honesty. Feeling like you need to hide your
parenting flaws is where the guilt comes from, and a lot of the things I feel
guilty for are totally ridiculous.
For
example: I didn’t throw my kid a 1st birthday party this past year.
I just couldn’t handle it at the time. We still had cake as a family, but there
was no party, no stack of presents, and no balloons. Guess what? He didn’t know
the damn difference! So why did I let myself feel so bad about it? Like not
having some Pinterest worthy party to post pictures of somehow makes me a
failure. Is it just me, or do kid’s birthday parties seem to have gotten a lot
more elaborate in the past few years? I don’t really remember elaborate parties
like that when I was a kid. Not that I think we shouldn’t celebrate my kids’
births, but damn! Can we celebrate without stressing me out to the point that
it causes me an anxiety attack?
Or
there’s the fact that my kids don’t exactly eat a perfectly healthy diet.
Frankly, most days I’m just pleased that they actually eat, forget weather or
not they’ve had a balance of all the food groups. Sometimes we even eat at
McDonald’s! On a side note, if you want a good laugh, listen to Jim Gaffigan’s
bit about McDonald’s here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6YDTfEhChgw. Of
course, if you’re not making homemade, organic, gourmet meals every day then
you are failing your kids, or at least that seems to be what the self-righteous
food snobs are telling us (I’m talking to you, Jamie Oliver! Back the hell off,
man!).
Oh,
and bathing! Since when did it become necessary to bathe your kids every night?
You must have the exact bath time and bedtime routine or your kids will never
learn to sleep at night! Trust me, they learn to sleep even if they don’t have
the exact same routine and even if they don’t smell like soap when their heads
hit the pillow. Are kids dirtier than they used to be? What happened to
Saturday night baths? Unless they’ve hit puberty and BO becomes an issue, I
don’t’ see why my little kids need nightly baths. Confession: my three
youngest only bathe once or twice a week. I know, how disgusting! Oh the
horror! Seriously, they’re not playing in the dirt all day long. They change
their underwear and put on clean clothes. They wash their hands and face and
brush their teeth, and if I’m really lucky I can even manage to get a brush
through my girl’s hair each day. Good enough.
Here’s
the real heart of all of this: in order to be the kind of parent I want to be
to my kids I have to ease up on myself. The fact is that the guilt leads to all
sorts of nasty feelings, and it creates so much added stress that spills over
onto my kids. Maybe I’m not doing things “perfect”. I may not stand as an
example in the “how-to parent” guidelines (I might even make it in the
“how-not-to” column quite often). But I think I’ve got to learn to be okay with
that in order to stay sane enough to actually remain a parent. Maybe I screw
up. A lot. Maybe I have days that I call a success and I totally rock it. And
maybe I have days where I end up hiding in my closet, curled up on the floor,
and balling my eyes out. Or as I like to call it, yesterday. It happens
sometimes. Life is messy and I am often a total disaster. What can I say,
sometimes shit happens.
Of
course, from now on it will just have to happen in a disposable diaper.
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