On NOT Having It All

I stumbled across this article on motherhood, which, as you all know by now, is (along with fatherhood, of course) the main focus in our household recently. For obvious reasons, I've been thinking a lot about the stress of motherhood (or really, parenthood), lately. Our baby hasn't even been born yet, and I'm already stressed about the choices we're making for her. What with the planning, registering, research and well-intentioned advice (both solicited and otherwise), I can attest to the overwhelmed feeling. And we're still four months away from the real stress. So when I saw that article on the Huffington Post, I took a deep breath and realized I needed to stop stressing, that everything would be OK. 

Right now, a (very) large number of my friends, coworkers, and neighbors are pregnant (I’m attributing this to some sort of strange epidemic). All of us have different living and financial situations, career aspirations, and family resources to work with when it comes to having and raising children. And we are all making different choices, whether those choices are guided by financial restraints or simply by choice. And here’s the thing, that’s ok. It’s still shocking to me that in this day and age, women are judged both for being working mothers AND for staying at home. I know plenty of people raised by working moms and they turned out just fine. And likewise, those of us raised by stay-at-home moms turned out just fine too. In fact, if you looked at our lives, accomplishments and academic records, I bet you wouldn’t even be able to tell who was raised by which.

Which brings us to the notion of having it all. It’s such a silly thing. In what other aspect of our lives do we feel we could ever “have it all”? And is this problem specific to the female sex? I don’t seem to hear many men stress about having it all or being absolutely perfect in every way. So why do we women feel that pressure? I think it may come from our past societal roles and the roles we now take on. The feminist movement wasn’t that long ago, relatively speaking, and maybe we’re still feeling the effects of that change; an inconsistency, a dissonance between what we “should” be doing and what we want or need to be doing. Because, even with the strides we’ve made, for the most part, our society still thinks that raising children is a woman’s role, even when that woman also needs and/or wants to be contributing financially to the family.

(This is something I noticed my grandmother had problems with. She was proud of her granddaughters; that we were going to college, getting an education, finding good jobs and taking care of ourselves. We were taking advantage of the opportunities she was never given. But she also expected us to get married, make babies, have dinner on the table every night, and maintain a spotless home. In her mind, there was no compromise. Because we’re girls, we should do all the things girls are supposed to do, even when we’re doing everything else, as well. And maybe, just maybe, a little of that thinking rubbed off on me when I wasn't looking.)

This is not a rant on our society’s views because, believe me, I could go on about this forever, but instead, a call to mothers everywhere to give up the guilt and the ridiculous notion of having it all. Like the Huffington Post article says: as a mother, you are never failing (Unless of course you’re one of those crazy extreme cases, but still, I’m not judging here. You were probably just under a lot of stress that day because all your friends posted on facebook how wonderful their children are, how put-together their lives are, and just how easy it is to have it all).

In this world of over-sharing and DIY-ing, it’s easy to feel like everyone else is doing it better than we are, to feel like we're being judged. And let’s face it, it’s pretty easy to judge, too. I know I’m as guilty of that as the next person. Maybe that’s why there’s so much pressure felt by parents everywhere to be perfect; to have the perfect children, to send them to the perfect schools, to give them the perfect sippy cup that will somehow give them the brainpower to compose the next great symphony. 

This about sums up my feelings on parenting pretty well: 1: we don’t need to be perfect to raise decent, well-adjusted children, 2: we do need to be more forgiving when it comes to parenting choices, both our own and others, and 3: we need to learn to ask for help. That whole "it takes a village" mentality has become lost in the modern world. It's time to bring it back. I'm no expert, but I'm going to take a stab and say raising children is not and has never been easy. I am sure of that. Another thing I’m sure of? NO ONE, not one person in this entire world, has it all. The ones that seem as though they do? They're the ones not focused on having it all. They're focused on what they ARE doing, not what they should be doing, on how much time they ARE spending with their children, instead of how much time they're not. Or they're lying. One or the other. Either way, we need to stop comparing ourselves to them. Easier said than done, I'm sure, but I'll give it a shot if you will.

Book Review: Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn

I just finished one of the best books I’ve read in a long time. Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn has been a hot topic lately. It’s on the New York Times Bestsellers List and was recommended to me by multiple friends. I finally got the chance to pick it up about two weeks ago. And now I can’t recommend this book enough. It’s incredibly well-written. It’s funny, dark, suspenseful, and smart. For those of you in my book club or anyone who hasn’t finished it yet, stop reading here and go finish it. The plot starts out simple enough: wife goes missing, marriage is rocky, husband is suspected. Typical crime novel stuff. The point of view switches back and forth between the husband in present-day and the missing wife through her diary from the day they met to just before she goes missing. Her diary paints one picture of her husband and their relationship, while the husband’s point of view paints another one. The husband readily admits to the reader he is flawed...and lying to the police. His lies are not revealed until late into the novel, leaving you constantly questioning whether or not he did it. Through her diary entries, the wife is giddy and sweet, eager to please her husband - in a word, likeable. A little more than halfway through the novel, after you've made your decision about how you feel about each one of them, Flynn offers up such an unexpected, brilliant twist, it sends you reeling.

While this is a crime novel at the surface (complete with psychopath), on a deeper level, the book explores the difference between loving someone and loving the idea of him or her. Of the fine line between love and hate and the dependency both emotions can create. How all consuming both can be. If you love/hate someone so deeply that it becomes part of your sense of self, who are you without that person? Who do you become? It's a brilliant underlying theme that takes this novel to a higher level.

The twist in this book is so great that I already want to go back and reread the first part, knowing what I know now, which, to me, is the sign of a great book. I won’t give away the ending, but it’s one of the most frustrating endings of any book I’ve ever read. Part of me absolutely hated it and another part of me absolutely loved it. This book will keep you on the edge of your seat until you finish. And you’ll either hate the ending or love it, (or both, like me). But no matter your feelings on the ending, this book will make you think, it’ll suck you in, make you invested in the characters and plot, and then turn everything on its head, twice. And the ride will be totally worth it, I promise.