This was advice from my dentist. I said, “I would be a lot more bored being a dentist.” OK, fine, I didn’t say it aloud. If he said it now, almost four years later, I would retort out loud. And probably, loudLY. Then, though, I just kind of shrugged. I was still pregnant, and I hadn’t really decided what to do. Maybe I would be bored. I sure thought I was going back to work after my maternity leave.
Fast-foward to the hospital room with the newborn baby in my arms. OK, now try to rip it from me. Impossible. Even doting grandparents had a hard time holding that baby. I’m not advocating these feelings as the healthiest or most desirable–evidenced by my first time out without the baby as I exclaimed to my sister, “Hey, look at us! Two girls out at night going to CVS! This is so awesome!”
Actually, I did get bored sometimes, especially when it was just me and nursing or sleeping baby hour after hour, but that’s not the kind of bored he meant. The message was loud and clear–that I was too smart, too capable, too into other things, to possibly give everything up to raise children full-time. I was too good for that.
And really, damn him and everyone else who think I live a soap-opera-and-sweatpants kind of life. But while I talk tough, I have to still admit that the stereotyping of mothers who are staying with their children gets to me. I got a publication from an academic honor society the other day, and at the back were car stickers, pendants, and key chains with their symbol. I have barely perused this magazine in the past; it’s from a long-ago college thing. I couldn’t care less about stuff like that. (I only remember the banquet because I was staring at my watch until the minute I could escape, then sprinting down the hall to make a Sarah McLachlan concert on time.) But now, I actually considered ordering some kind of key chain. With a sinking feeling, I realized that it would only be to say, “Hey, look, I’m smarter than you probably think I am! I could actually go back to doing smart and important things if I wanted to instead of being at this playground!” So even though I have not regretted giving up a paying career to stay home, and even though I am disgusted by insinuations that a parent taking care of children full-time is something to look down on, I guess I still let it get to me. Yuck.
I love your honesty here (and always) Marjorie…
I work, but I have moments when I’m somewhere with a child (or two) and I’m just dying for someone to ask me what I do. It’s like I need to have a career as a stamp — look how valuable I am. It’s partially my own baggage, of course, OBVIOUSLY I have something to prove to someone, but it’s my baggage in a context where parenting is so devalued (well, valued rhetorically and then bashed in praxis) that I fear I’m nothing without the stamp of my degrees/employer/etc.
That was hard to say out loud. Thanks for prompting me to do so.
This is so nicely written, a perfect explanation.l Thanks.
I missed this somehow, sorry about the late comment.
Thanks for the post. I hadn’t realized that’s why I ordered license plate frames from my school.
There’s something about getting so lost in another human being that makes us stumble toward the lightswitch of our old life, just to prove it’s still there.
The stereotypes of staying at home (which aren’t always helped by others who are doing the same job we now do) made me grab for something to make me different. And the thing I clung to before baby is the one I went running back to when I felt I’d been swallowed whole by his needs.
You couldn’t pry my son out of our sling for the first year, and family joked that he’d never walk because “his feet have never touched the ground.” But as soon as he weaned I was surfing the alumni web site for some local meeting, so I could be with a group who recognized me as something other than a stay-at-home mom.