I explained to him that it was a technique I used to clear negative thoughts from my mind, and that it worked, instantly! He just gave me that "I am not really sure why I ended up with the weirdest mother on the planet," look, and muttered something like, sure it does.
But it does, it really, really does. There is this one thought or thoughts that keeps popping up, over and over and over, and it is really clear to me how angry I am about it. There is no doubt in my mind that I am awful at letting things go -- and I am working on it, and have been. But it's not so easy to just say toodles to years and years and years of resentment.
It is a recurring theme for me because clearly it has damaged me in some way. Damaged me in that I can't get beyond it, and so as they say, the only way beyond is through it. So I am going to examine it as best I can through my handy dandy blog tool! My ventomatic!
There was no doubt in my mind that I would work, and while having a baby came upon me a little earlier than planned, there was never a discussion as to whether or not I would work or "stay home." I worked, it is what I did, I earned a paycheck, I supported myself, end of story. I was not married when I had my first child and that had a lot to do with my need for independence. Which is quite ironic at a time when that was going down the drain in a big way! A focus on yourself is a lovely idea when you are young and single, but it's not even in the cards when you are a family. And I don't even mean a focus on myself -- more of a continuation of being in charge of my life.
HA ha. Best way to learn new coping skills is to work fulltime AND have a baby BEFORE they wrote the "Babies For Dummies," manual. (I don't believe it even exists now, but that is how I always prepared for anything -- through books, and 25 years ago my options were slim and I was reading books that had been written decades earlier. Dr. Spock for crying out loud!)
I have always had strong intuition, so that was really my best ally in those crazy, crazy years. My life was certainly not more difficult than others -- but in retrospect I realize I put a lot on myself. For one thing, I did not put Hallie into day care until she was one. I drove to Manchester (nearly an hour) every single day with her in the car. Some days were fine, some days she cried. Some days she demanded, some days she was sweet. I listened to every children's song invented on the planet, I came up with new snacks to entice her. In other words, before I'd even walked through the door to the office, I'd expended a great deal of energy. Then I had to sneak in actual work between breastfeeding and attempting to get her to nap. I had a lot of help in the office; my mother was there some of the time (she worked part time) and there were other co-workers who were happy to coo to a baby -- but when it was deadline time for either the newspaper or the magazine, we were all under stress to meet it.
Of course I knew that stress transferred to her; and I worked very hard to be present and calm -- to get her to that nap that was so precious to me -- that allowed me to work in an uninterrupted space for upwards of an hour. I would put her in a front pack and go for a walk; or I would put her in the stroller and do the same. I should point out here that every day I schlepped all of this stuff from the car to the office. I didn't have duplicates of anything -- what I used there I also used at home.
The drive home was more of the same -- and by the time I arrived home I was completely exhausted. But I still had to do all the things that need to be done to ensure that you can get your ass out the door the next morning and do it all over again. Run to the store to get more snacks! Do laundry. Feed and bathe Hallie, and then read to her. Put her to bed and then collapse myself.
I had no friends with babies, no support system whatsoever in terms of brainstorming the easiest way to do things. I was completely overwhelmed and alone. What about Hallie's father, you might ask? Oh, he was there. I couldn't even stomach to ask him about his day -- because I knew what it was like! I'd been living it myself not too long ago. I knew there was an easy commute to work in a car alone, I knew that he was able to actually sit and do his work, uninterrupted and that he actually got to go out to lunch! With people and talk, and sit and eat, and actually enjoy the whole thing. I would pick up take-out on one of my get Hallie to sleep walks, and eat it with her either attached to me, or whenever. I did not eat when I actually had the opportunity to work while she was sleeping.
I understand now it wasn't his fault -- and later on in the game I utilized daycare so that I too could bring more of that into my own life. But then? Oh, I just hated him. I hated the fact that he would be sitting there on the couch, watching TV while I'd just endured a long ride home with a crying infant, or a demanding toddler or many years later two small children in the car demanding my last ounce of blood.
I am sure I have written about this before -- because it is a huge part of my life. But I would like to impart to my own children (and I believe I've said this before as well) that it is NOT possible to do it all. It's not. NO NO NO NO NO!
I had no clue. My mother didn't work when I was younger and it was only when I was a teenager and they bought the newspaper that they would disappear for days on end. (That was later revealed to be deadlines, which I grew to understand quite well, believe me). I couldn't imagine in the very core of my being that I could put my baby into daycare and yet, there was never a thought that I would stop working. So what other alternative did I have but to take her? At the time I blamed Peter for just about everything, including the weather. Of course it was his fault that it snowed on my ride home and I had to endure a screaming baby AND icy roads! I guess you have to give him credit for even wanting to stay with someone so angry! And I was angry. But let me give you a few examples!
My mother didn't much take to the whole grandmother thing -- if it was convenient she would shower Hallie with attention, but like say if I asked her to babysit, she would ask me what I planned to do, and I would say I don't know, maybe a movie. And she would think that was a great idea and go herself.
Several days after I came home from the hospital with Hallie, Peter and my father-in-law started to build the front porch on our house. Peter had so progressively taken off the newly formed "paternity leave" that his company had so progressively offered, and it was clearly a perfect time to work on a house project. Hallie was born on August 12th, so on August 15th, while I sat one wall away in our hot house with a fan blowing on me, feeling as though my insides had been turned outside (and they had) and a deep, dark depression fell on me, they hammered and nailed and sawed.
I am not sure how depression hits others, but for me it was tangible. I could feel it. In fact, I welcomed it because how the hell else was I going to explain what was going on? I'd gone through 42 hours of labor, half of it in a birthing center before having to rush to the hospital because there were complications. Then I started to bleed out (and I remember that feeling too) and needed to be rushed to surgery and transfused with blood. I'd also been diagnosed with toxemia two months before delivery and had been on strict bed rest. In other words, I was a flaming wreck and my husband (or soon to be) interpreted paternity leave as ignore your wife and child and build a flipping porch.
So yes, I was a little angry. And then my mother-in-law would come in carrying a box of food (Peter had turned over such details to his mother, because when I explained that because of all that had just happened to me I was supposed to be sitting and regaining my strength and would NOT be able to provide meals, and that was what HE WAS SUPPOSED TO DO BECAUSE THAT IS WHY HE WAS HOME ... he found the perfect solution) and she would say "I have to feed the men first."
Yes, I see. Those amazing creatures who had borne nothing, who had not had every cell of their being affected by a difficult pregnancy and birth, who were turning my life into a living hell with their noisy shit ... yes, of course they needed to be fed first.
Oh yes, the darkness that enveloped me ... the sheer joy I would feel at staring up at the huge trees on the embankment across the street and willing them to crush me ... good times. Such good times.
I understand that every generation has their woes. My mother will tell you that men weren't allowed in the whole birthing process and that she was taken to a room and left alone and eventually gassed and delivered. You see, to me, that sounded like sheer heaven ... why had I been fed a stream of bullshit at a Lamaze class that a "natural" birth was the way to go? How come progress had gone from gassing women to making them suffer naturally? Who the hell is in charge of all this anyway?
Every woman has their birth story(ies) and I've got three very different ones, none of them greatly improved by my own previous experiences! So it's not as though we can figure out how to "fix this problem" so that future generations of women can release their babies with ease. But my advice is that as a woman you are NOT doing yourself any favors if you believe you can do it all. I made that mistake and it just meant years of resentment and frustration and well, I am still living it! I still can't let it go, and my youngest is in high school!
So here is why it keeps coming back to me. I do not work anymore. I don't even bother to put in quotes "outside of the home" because in truth I don't spend lavish amounts of time keeping my home clean and I no longer have small children to tend to. I stopped working when Charlie was in third grade because he was having problems in school, and things had changed dramatically at the newspaper since it had been sold. It was of course a difficult decision to make, but in the end, there wasn't one. I had to figure out how to improve his school experience. So I basically moved into his classroom. It was a fine year, the teacher loved me -- free help! -- and with my presence Charlie was fine. I dove deeply into PTA and other volunteer activities and basically replaced my paid work hours with volunteer ones.
Anyway, as the years passed the situation with Charlie was always tenuous. In fact, I just realized as I was writing this that this is the first time, if ever, that I don't have to worry about him and school. I think he is making his way -- I think we have actually survived what was really an incredibly horrendous situation. But the public school system is another big bone I've been chewing on over the years, and has no place in this vent!
So let's let another companion enter our story: Guilt. Now, I wasn't working and I was dependent upon someone else for my livelihood. This was hard. Oh, you have no idea how hard it was in the beginning (I'm so over it now!) and of course Peter has told me that I need to work all these years, because why wouldn't he? Who doesn't want as much money as they can get, and I worked for over 17 years and he was accustomed to a dual income. So was I! But not much had changed over all those years. I was still in charge of it all -- the commuting with kids, taking them and picking them up from daycare or school or sports, shopping, cleaning, cooking, homework, the whole enchilada. And in all that time were two houses that were constantly under construction. In fact, I've never lived in a house that wasn't under construction for one project or another in all these years. So yes, there were plenty of times that I felt guilty for not pulling my own weight -- which basically meant 10 jobs instead of a handful -- and I would go back to that store room of resentment and pull out a file ... oh yes, the day that I was running down the stairs when I was very pregnant with Charlie because I was going to be late picking up Maddie at daycare because I was struggling to finish a deadline and almost fell and realized that I could have killed both my baby and myself. Whose fault was that? Peter's! Of course!
So, it has been very easy these past few years (and it really is a few compared to the number that I worked) to assuage that guilt with vivid images of all the sacrifices and crazy shit that I have done over the years. And no, not any more than many women, I get that. But this is my story! MY story, MY life ... and until I get over it, I won't be able to move on.
Last night, after dinner, Peter was piling the dishes in the sink. This is his method of "doing dishes." I had spent all afternoon working on dinner. I had pored through cookbooks looking for something new and exciting, I had gone shopping, I had cleaned the kitchen from the night before's method of "doing dishes," I had timed it all so that it would be done as soon as I returned from picking up Charlie and afterward I sat there thinking, great, now I get to do dishes. And I thought, BULLSHIT! Why should I feel guilty that he WORKED all day? I worked for years and years (are you seeing a pattern here!) and he wouldn't have even considered feeling guilty if I both cooked and cleaned after a long day at work. So why am ***I**** feeling guilty? Why? Why? WHY? And so I said, I'm not doing dishes, and of course the kids scattered screaming they had homework to do and Peter was like, I am letting them soak, and I said no, that's just a cheap way to get out of doing dishes and I AM NOT DOING DISHES.
This particular rant has no resolution here! It's not like I can say, "and then after he was done doing the dishes he came into the living room and said `honey, I realize that you are still mad over all those years that I should have done more, but now I will do all the dishes and you don't have to do them ever again...' or something along those lines!" No, he was of course pissed that he had to do the dishes and then stormed off to the TV room and ignored us all until he went to bed.
And I am just trying to evolve! I'm trying to destroy that room full of nasty old files of every wrong that I perceived as an injustice to my humanity! I do want to move on, and maybe I can, but I also want my children and any other young women out there to understand, only WE can make the change that so needs to happen if we are to co-exist as equal partners. It is not equal for one person to do the brunt of the work; and yet, as women we also don't know our boundaries. We are forging new ground all the time -- the one thing that a man can do is look back through the generations and see that it is his job to go to work and provide for the family. I am sure there is great comfort in that. And while back in the day the man went to work and the women did everything else, unfortunately we got a taste of what the work day looks like. And it's a whole hell of a lot more fun than sitting around the house tending to small children, cooking, cleaning and shopping. Oh yes, it is!
As women we can look back through the generations and the formula is not as definitive. And apparently today we are all ever so progressive and equal and will be sure to live happily ever after, right? What I see the trend to be now is women pursuing their careers in their 20's and 30's and waiting to have children. In theory, this makes a LOT of sense. But then what? Now, these women who have been in the workplace for 20 plus years are now going to stay home? Or will be able to convince their partner's that it is an equal deal? I am sure that goes on, but those of us women who ended up with men from very traditional backgrounds know there are more of them out there!
I am glad that I didn't do that -- I am over the moon thrilled that I have several very juicy decades ahead of me to take all that I know and all that I have yet to learn and mix it all together into a really fabulous life. If I had had my first child at 39, I would still be dealing with elementary school, and quite frankly, we women need to realize that we change as we get older. We get less patient with EVERYTHING ... it is our time, as we go into our late 40s and early 50s to become the best version of ourselves. To be saddled with round-the-clock motherhood at this age is not right. What I am saying is, that it is not the answer, and I hope that there are vocal women out there who will tell it like it is. So that future generations have a plethora of information to sort through to make their own choices.
I can't blame Peter for everything any more. I shouldn't have blamed him right from the start. But he was my villian! He was the person NOT being as miserable as I was. Of course I put it all on myself, for the most part. He did not share in the decisions I made about the children and daycare and such, because in my mind he wasn't going to be a part of it. Do I know for sure that he wouldn't have? No, not really. And he has helped over the years and would tell you with absolute belief that he did way more than I give him credit for. And I tried to show him otherwise -- I remember putting up a chore chart on the fridge, because he believed that he did half of everything. And I said, okay, every time you do one of those things, check it off. And then at the end of the week I would look at the chart, and he'd only done a few things, but that wasn't proof, he'd say, he just forgot to mark the chart. OHMYGOD it was so frustrating!!!!
Wow, long rant! Probably at this point it is just me ranting to myself, because who wants to read something this long!!! But that is fine. This is it -- this is the place in my life where I say things I should probably not put out there, but I am anyway. Because if I had come across a blog such as this when I was in my 20s, I would have found it FASCINATING! Would I have agreed with it? Probably not, because I always did things my way and if someone had told me it was going to be hard, I wouldn't have believed them.
And that is life -- but there are always ways to improve upon old systems and beliefs. What would have been different (if anything) in my life if my mother-in-law had rushed into the house and insisted upon taking care of me first? If my own mother had insisted upon taking care of my infant so that I could have some time alone to regroup? If someone, anyone! had shown me some care and compassion and nurturing so that I could get strong and share that with my own child. But they couldn't because they didn't know how. And I probably taught my own children to be fiercely independent and depend on no one because that is what I learned was the safest way to get by.
Crazy, crazy crazy.
Clear.
Cancel.
Delete.
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