One of my online friends, Annie, recently linked to an article on Facebook that discusses joyless parenting. After clicking on the link about a week ago, I read the first two paragraphs and then had to add it to my Read Later file because I already had tears in my eyes and my stomach ached.
It ached because I’ve said “I love Drew but I hate my life” so many times that it breaks my heart. Each time those words slip out of my mouth I spend the next five minutes desperately clammering to Daniel I HOPE YOU KNOW I LOVE DREW and DO YOU THINK I’M A BAD PERSON? He always smiles so sweetly to me and calms me with things like yes, you’re a good mother and a good person. You’ve just been through a lot. You’ll adjust.
That’s all well and good but after I finally got the courage to read the entire article, I knew that I couldn’t just wait for Someday When I’d Adjust. I’m not suffering with crippling depression anymore and mothering for me isn’t so much about resentment (as it was during the most horrid days of depression) anymore as it is about joyless repetition. I know that’s horrible. 🙁 It hurts to type that.
It isn’t through any fault of Drew’s though! He’s the most genuine, loving, happy little boy and even if he WAS a fussy kid, it still wouldn’t be his fault that I have succumbed to the lie that modern parenting is drudgery. I haven’t thought it was all drudgery though – we have had these AMAZING moments lately, when the stars are aligned, in which we’re all three HAPPY and SWOONY and I suddenly think, wow, parenting is fun! But it’s as though my brain has categorized mothering as something I have to live through and that it’s mostly difficult, fussy, and I may have one or two days a month that are wiggly.
But that is not what I want at all. I want my relationship with Drew, for as long as we each have breath (and my hope is that we’ll be able to giggle together until we’re both old and wrinkly, wondering where time has gone), to be wonderful, delightful, fun, and dreamy. I want to walk with him, while being emotionally and physically present, as he learns about the world.
Realizing all of this has made me face the reality that I’ve been holding Drew back quite a bit. He turned three in April and for the past six months, he’s been mentally and emotionally moving ahead and yet I’m still treating him like he’s younger. Our list of Things To Work On includes teaching him better table manners, play dates with other kids, getting completely rid of the high chair and sippy cup (he uses a booster seat at the dining room table and a regular cup at the table but the high chair is used a lot for pizza night, movie night, or when I’m just lazy – and he uses the sippy cup at night-time and for most of play-time and I’d rather just get him a water bottle to carry), lots more structure in his day-to-day, and POTTY TRAINING.
I’m always pretty aware of parenting fads, and when Elimination Communication became the Thing To Do (Drew was less than a year old), I bought the book + a baby potty chair. And the potty chair sat in the corner, with dust, because the reality was that I was fighting depression and there was no way I could deal with potty training an infant.
Around two, we bought a real potty chair and pull-ups and had a few conversations with Drew (and attempts) about what should happen and he was pretty upset about it to the point that I decided to wait a month or so. Even though my Granny was calling and writing letters to me about how I should have him potty trained YESTERDAY, I knew that he wasn’t ready.
And then, at some point, we crossed into the reality of Drew being completely ready and his mother ignoring the issue. I’m not sure where that line is and when we crossed it, but we’re totally there. He wakes up with dry diapers each morning, I absolutely know when he’s going to poop or pee and he talks about it all matter-of-factly. But I haven’t been ready. At all.
And when I started pondering the reality of my joyless parenting, I realized that this is a huge opportunity to place myself back in the present of walking with Drew as he encounters these big, new changes. We brought him into the world over three years ago and were SO happy and thankful to have him here. I’m not going to hate myself for going through thick depression and severely struggling with the balance of parenting, but now that those dark clouds have lifted, I’m having to kick myself pretty hard to get back into active mothering and being prepared for constant change.
So, my current plan, if all goes well, is to make this weekend the weekend of Change. We’re spending the next few days talking about it all, re-doing his bedroom and closet, buying pull-ups, big boy underwear, his own soap, and wipes for the bathroom. And then making cookies together as the reward for having met his goals!
But, I’m smiling while doing it. 🙂 I’m really eager for this. I’m aching for it, to be honest. I love Drew so much and I feel like he’s really lost out on wonderful parts of life in the past year or so (just as I have) and I want to make it up to him by showing him that part of growing up is learning all these new wonderful things and that even if it feels overwhelming at times, that I’m going to be there with him, every step of the way.
After breakfast this morning, we sat on the couch and talked about potty-training for a few minutes and I explained that we were going to be talking about it a lot over the next few days and I asked him if he was excited about learning to go in the potty all the time and he said, “no thank you.”
So, if he ends up peeing and pooping all over the carpet, I’m just going to eat all the cookies, have a good cry, and keep trying.