Wednesday, July 14, 2010

Not Mom of the Year

Head over to the Mommyologist or Life Without Pink to see the details of this one.  What a great contest to participate in and topic to blog about!


I'm not mom of the year.
I cannot hide my humanness from my boys.

My anger, my sadness, my frustration--
I wear openly and publicly.
Raw and unbridled.
They see me.
Cry when I've had enough.
Yell when my short limit is reached.

Sometimes what they have to say invades my very core, my naturally quiet being.
I tune out stories of Pokemon and Bakugan.
I hold my tongue so I don't bitingly say,
"I really don't care, buddy!"

I'm selfish.
I crave quiet.
Often their daddy weekends are a beacon of light.
That seemingly endless stretch of 48 hours.
Belonging to me alone.
And then.
Then I feel guilty for that honest, raw desire.
The intrinsic need we all have for center and selves.

I used to be on a quest to be the perfect mother, mom of the year.
But I forgot that mothers are human too.
Not June Cleaver with a pressed dress, shiny pearls, a plastic smile.
The TV ideal that has skewed women's vision of motherhood.
The ideal that has made us afraid to own our emotions, so instead we guiltily sequester them away.
We rage. We cry. We feel.
To the very depths of ourselves.
And these little parts of us watch.
And learn from our humanness.

I don't always have fresh baked cookies waiting.
I've been known to skip baths here and there.
And sometimes I let DS time stretch a little too long.
But I love my boys.
In the most human, not mom of the year way I can.

10 comments:

  1. I LOVED this post!! I love how open and honest you are...we need to be that way more as moms. I love my alone time too, and I don't think it is something we should feel guilty for. As moms, we often lose our identities and forget that we are still individuals, and we still have needs and desires.

    I am so glad you entered our contest!

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  2. I love your post. So poetic and truthful!

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  3. What a honest post! I too admit I love when my husband takes the boys or when he is off of work. To me its a break and a sigh of relief. I feel bad but like you said we are only human.

    Thanks so much for writing this and for linking up.

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  4. This is a great reminder that it's okay to crave "me time". I enjoyed reading your entry.

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  5. Thank you all! It was hard to post something so honest, but I wish I would have known it was normal to feel these kinds of things. I'm glad for the prompt to post it! :)

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  6. thank you for writing this! I too, have to bite my tongue, otherwise I'd always be yelling, "I don't care!" But the love is real!

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  7. I'm so glad I'm not the only one wants to yell that all the time!

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  8. Such an honest and real post! Love it.

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  9. "I really don't care, Buddy." HA! True that.

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  10. Beautiful post! I think we all feel that way, but want to keep on the "perfect mom" face.

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