The "Other" Set of Parents That Made Me Not Want Children

I have been waiting for the perfect time to write this blog, especially after typing my first post about stay-at-home-moms. When I wrote that post, I divided the mom (parenting) groups into two categories of parents who bothered me the most. One was the over-achieving types that make having babies seem as easy as tying your shoes. The other was those that make parenting seem like the worst thing that has ever happened in the history of humanity.
I started with the over achieving parents, because they were honestly the hardest to discuss. At least they talk about how much they love their children, and while I will admit to heavy sighs, huge eye rolls, snorts of credulous laughter and fun gossip sessions with Jeri and Amanda about these parents, at least I know their children are being cared for and loved.
With the other group, not so much. And that group makes me have flashbacks to my own childhood. I despise that group. THAT group was the number one influence for me not wanting children. To those in that group: It’s your turn.
We’ve all seen it. The parents who have THE WORST kids ever. They won’t sit still. They won’t be quiet. They won’t eat. They won’t sleep. They won’t play on their own. They always need something. They fight. They scream. They cry. They laugh. They act like… well, kids. You know, those tiny, amazingly intelligent, curious, resilient people we are responsible for raising? Yet, some parents seem to think their kids are like puppies and should be paper trained within a few weeks. I see it. I know you see it. The complaints… always with the complaining!
“Little Bobby cried because I told him he couldn’t go outside and play. Does this kid do nothing but cry?”
“Little Susie won’t sleep at night. I like to get at least 10 hours of sleep every night. She’s four weeks old, shouldn’t she be sleeping by now?”
“I don’t understand why Joanie can’t sit still. She’s six. She should be calming down by now. Maybe she has some disorder. What do you think?”
And on and on and on. I once posted pictures of my kids covered in mud, playing in the rain, having a blast… and right below it was a post from a chronic complainer about her kid tracking mud in when he took the trash out. The thing that struck me the most was when she ended it with something like this:
“Johnny is always getting dirty. I swear, this kid does it just to make me mad.”
Yes. Of course. Your child’s sole purpose in life is to make you angrier than you already clearly are. So glad you figured that little psychopath out before he was let loose on society. (/sarcasm)
This is not to say that we don’t all have our moments, or even full days, weeks, or months, with our children. I remember M didn’t sleep a full night for her whole first year. I was not a fan of that child when bed time rolled around. But when she smiled at me, and did all those cute baby things, I couldn’t be too mad. Most well-balanced parents would say the same, no matter how sleep deprived they are. I’m not referring to those parents (here’s looking at you, Amanda, because I know you are thinking I may be hinting at you… I am not!). Venting is ok and normal.
I am talking about those parents that have nothing nice to say ever. The ones who were clearly delusional that having children was going to be easy. The ones who love attention and sympathy. The ones who like to have little punching bags (be it verbal or physical) and want a reason to justify treating their children that way, so they complain about the child’s very existence.
Those parents made me think having kids wasn’t for me, and even when I had kids and they weren’t as bad as these people made it out to be I thought maybe it was because I wasn’t a SAHM (that was the group I found to be the repeat offenders in the over-complaining department), and that made me think I should never be a SAHM.
Then I became a work-from-home-mom, and you know what? It wasn’t that hard. It wasn’t that easy. But it wasn’t a daily nightmare of screaming, poop, dirt, tears, and breakdowns. And even on days when I did experience all or some of the above (believe me, there were plenty) I could always find something funny in it. My kids frustrated me, sure, but they weren’t doing it just to do it. They were being kids. And how can you be mad at that?
Something these parents obviously have forgotten is what it’s like to be a child. Having kids has reminded me of the things I loved to do as a kid, and that is one of the many reasons I am happy I chose to be a mom. When I was a kid, I loved playing in the rain. I loved running around half naked, and getting into mud, and catching frogs and bugs, and camping in the backyard, and jumping on the bed, and playing dress up, and trying to bake, and building forts, and so much more. And I STILL love to do those things, so why wouldn’t my kids? When do we forget what it’s like to be small?
That’s not all we forget, though. Parents, trust me when I say your kids won’t remember everything they did wrong, but they will remember how you treated them when they made a mistake. Little Johnny may not remember why or how he tracked in the mud, but he will remember his mom publicly shaming him and talking bad about him.
If you take a learning opportunity and squander it to bitch about your kids, you have no one but yourself to blame when your kids don’t learn from their mistakes. You have no one but you to look at when you go trying to find where things went wrong.
Kids are fantastic. The way they view the world is magical. They can have fun with a stick, which is something to be praised. Their laughter is contagious. Their curiosity is inspiring. They are tough. They are loving and kind. They are our future, and they are being raised by us. Remember that when you go to say something like “kids these days.” They are being raised by negative, miserable, bitchy people like YOU. And no one in their right mind is feeling sorry for YOU. We feel sorry for your children being raised by someone like you.

SAHMs stress me out

While I won’t say that being a stay at home mom (SAHM) is harder than being a working mom, I will readily admit that I am more stressed out now than I was as a working mom. And it’s not because of the kids. It’s because of stay at home moms.

You ladies stress me out for several reasons.

One, so many of you seem incredibly happy to have children. Not in the “I love my children more than anything” kind of happy. More so the “My life was never meant to be anything more than this” kind of way. And that’s so foreign to me. I never wanted children.

(GASP!!! The horror of a mother admitting that. I know, I know. Take a minute to recover from the shock…)

Seriously. I never wanted them. I didn’t even want them when I was pregnant with my first. I am thankful now that Brett talked me out of an abortion, but it was something I seriously considered because I truly did not want kids. I wasn’t happy about my body not being my own anymore. I wasn’t happy about my body being “ruined” by pregnancy. I wasn’t happy with the thought of waking up every few hours to feed a screaming baby, or change a diaper, or find a pacifier, or any of the things that go along with having children. I was especially not happy about the thought of how it would mess up my career.

But you professional mommies… that’s a dream come true for you. You go into mass amounts of detail about how your bodies changed and you became this life-giving goddess, and your lives changed, and it was love at first sight when you first held your child (something I did not experience), and it’s so magical and special to you all that it makes me feel like a freak that I don’t feel the same way.

In the working world, I rarely encountered that with another woman. In fact, I rarely encountered other women my age that even had children. The ones that did would tell stories about their kids, but most didn’t delve into such detail about their parenting techniques, or how their labors went, or if their kids were pooping on schedule. We had other things going on and our personal lives were kept pretty much personal. Therefore, there was nothing to compare the way it is with SAHMs. Parenting is your job and you compare it the way we would compare interview notes.

Which brings me to point two: I am better with adults than children and stay at home moms seem to have the kid thing down.

Again, I can compare articles I’ve written or bounce ideas for articles off my coworkers. But let me start planning things for kids and it’s “we’ll make crafts out of paper plates, go to the park, go to the library and then eat a healthy snack. That’ll take care of the first… 3 hours only!?!?!”

But SAHMs it down. Or so it seems. I’m not saying they do for real, but they sure do know how to make it look like they do when they post pictures on Facebook of Bento lunches they made while simultaneously breast feeding two children and repainting the Mona Lisa. And speaking of the Mona Lisa, what the hell kind of artistic kids are you women birthing? My child is just now coloring inside the lines at age 4 and some of you have 1 year olds that can knit sweaters for the homeless.

My problem is that I don’t have the patience for kids. I barely have patience for adults. I can play with kids. I can talk to kids. I interact fine with my kids. I just feel like I’m doing it wrong when I see how seasoned SAHMs do things with their kids.

And the way you do things is stressful to me. Point three is that sometimes I feel like less of a mother and less of a woman because I am not baby wearing twins on my back and teaching a toddler Latin while picking an all organic, vegan lunch from the garden in my back yard. While that may seemed far fetched to some, I assure you it isn’t. I have Facebook friends that do these things. And even though I did not want children, when I decided I would have them, I made the decision to do what’s best for them.

For me, that included breastfeeding as long as I could. Great, right? Not for some SAHMs, and they’ll tell you all about how your child is going to have a horrible immune system, have mommy issues, only look at breasts as sex objects, and a whole host of other things to drive home the point that Breast is Best. And don’t you dare tell them that maternity leave only lasts six weeks and while it would be nice to still pump breast milk for your child while working, some jobs just don’t allow for that to happen. No, if you tell them that, they’ll tell you you’re selfish.

I also chose to cloth diaper. It’s good for the environment and for children with sensitivities to the chemicals in disposable diapers. That’s a fantastic choice, right? Well, that really depends on the brand you use, the type of diaper rash cream, if you use a reusable wet bag, and on and on and on! And this type of scenario applies to all things parenting and it started to feel like I was making parenting decisions that were better for the SAHMs I know than for my own children.

And that really stressed me out. Because the whole purpose of me becoming a work at home mom (WAHM) was for the good of my children. And they are happy children, healthy children, well adjusted, funny, intelligent, independent, kind, loving children. And when they play with other children it doesn’t matter to them if little Bonnie on the playground was breastfed or not, has two moms or two dads, or not, eats organic or canned fruit, or not, so why should it matter to me what other SAHMs/WAHMs are doing as long as their children are also healthy, loved, and taken care of?

Do Over

I am a writer. It's all I have ever wanted to be, and chose journalism as my career path. Because of that there are things I always expected to hear come out of my mouth.

"Can we hold the story for a quote from the mayor?"
"Would someone just get shot already?"
"I have Senator so-and-so on the phone."

Those are just a few examples. Being so career focused, I never imagined having children. Therefore, I never imagined saying certain things.

"Stop eating out of the trash can."
"Why is there poop on your hands and where are your clothes?"
"Quit trying to drink out of the toilet!"
"Dog food doesn't go in the dryer."
"We don't yell about farts in the grocery store."

Those are just a few examples. And I have them because I have children and my life has effectively gone from deadlines at local newspapers to playtimes with fussy toddlers. Surprisingly, my writing material has become exponentially more interesting and I find myself wanting to write even more.
Unsurprisingly, I no longer have the time to write about things because I am too busy living them.

When I chose to become a work from home mom in January, I had plans of being some super combo of June Cleaver, Lois Lane, Joan Jett (I'm still a rocker at heart) and Cyndi Lauper (colorful... let's leave it at that), with a Bettie Page twist (yes, I planned on putting on makeup and fixing my hair daily. I'll wait while you seasoned moms laugh). It didn't happen. In fact, I started this blog in February and the first post was utter crap. Here it is four months later and I am just now finding some bit of sanity to write again.

I have not written a single thing since no longer working at an office daily. It's not that I don't have time... I don't have the mental capacity. When your day is full of answering the question "why" for EVERY. LITTLE. THING you do, say, wear, or think it's hard to form thoughts that adults want to read.

Being a working mom is no harder than being a stay at home mom/work from home mom. It's just a different level of difficulty and stress. My old job brought the stress of having thousands of people analyze my every word. This job brings the stress of raising kids who don't turn into the next Hitler. Or George W. Bush. Or Sarah Palin, since I have girls... or, hell, even Bristol Palin.

That's some stressful stuff right there.

And I have to feed them multiple times a day!

Anyway, I am not going to promise to update this often. Nor will I promise this blog will be quality writing, ever. But I will be grateful to all who read it, share it, and comment on it. It will make me feel like there are adults out there who understand what my new life is like, even if those adults live in my computer.