Parenting has really taken me for a loop these last four years, even more in the last year with the ultimate culmination of test in the last few weeks. I always related to kids, always was the one good with kids, thought I would make a GREAT mom to five kids…yes I said five. All those years of watching The Cosby Show I guess. Now, with two and no father figure or other human being around to note, I am really disappointed in myself and totally terrified of my kids!
Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think I am a bad mom, per se. However, I always imagined the perfect little world of me doing artsy learning things with my beautifully well behaved angels between the times old hubby has them outside throwing the ball or wrestling in the living room. All smiles and learning opportunities and wonderfully, blissfully happy children with nothing but smiles all around. Crash land to reality sister! I fully admire those women who can stay home with their kids and teach them the alphabet and colors and go to the park and the zoo and take pictures every month and scrapbook their babies lives all while managing to do the laundry and make sensible breakfast, lunches, and dinners, and feed the animals and read books and blog AND still look gorgeous! I can’t do that. I’ve accepted I can’t do that. My fear lies in what my kids are missing by me not being able to do that. Are those moms the ones who raised the valedictorians and merit scholars I hated in school for having their crap together while I was all about experimenting and boys? Today I struggle with life every day in a hundred different ways. Not as much as many, I am fully aware of that. But I do struggle. Those merit scholars had their life set up long before they were responsible for it. Some may argue that they did not benefit from life’s struggles. They are shallow or one-dimensional people in their own little world. Where I sit, that world looks pretty damn inviting. I don’t think I would feel comfortable there because of who I have become today, but I would LOVE that world for my kids. But that comes back to the original point…..is that the path I’m sending my kids down? Does childhood and upbringing really have that much impact on the rest of one’s life? And if so, how do I know which doors to send them through if I don’t know what doors are on the other side? Every decision I make will impact something in their life. How can I possibly make a single choice without worrying about the repercussions? I am terrified of my kids!
