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We are all America's Worst Moms, aren't we? At least at some time or another. I know I feel that way, probably more often than most. That is why I'm drawn to the stories of Lenore Skenazy and Ayalet Waldman, both considered America's Worst Moms by the media, society, everyone except other moms who are honest about their feelings.
In Lenore's case, I just came across this article in The Week about how last year she caused a huge media stir because she let her 9-year-old son ride the Manhattan subway home. I missed that "scandal" living in Alaska where we get criticized for letting our children out of the house in minus 45 degree weather (not to play, mind you, but to get into the warm car to drive to a warm place).
I've corresponded with Lenore in the past, and she's a smart, sassy, talented woman. I can totally relate to her account of the Worst Mom incident and subsequent maelstrom. People in our society are generally intolerant of mothers who step outside the boundaries of their completely unrealistic standards and ridiculous molds to do something heartfelt, honest, different.
Lenore's Worst Mom crime? Empowering her intelligent, resourceful and curious son with the means to explore his environment without an overprotective parent looming down on him like a vulture, ready to feast on his confidence because of their own irrational fears. Her whole Free Range Kids movement and book address this parenting pitfall.
Ayalet Waldman did something different - far less endangering of her children but far more sinister in the minds of "society." She dared to confess in a New York Times essay "Truly, Madly, Guiltily" that she loved her husband more than her kids. Shock. Horror.
According to her Wikipedia page:
The essay explores her conviction that a woman should consider her
spousal relationship more important than her relationships with her
children. She writes that a clear hierarchy of love is essential to a
stable and healthy marriage. Waldman summarizes her ideal family
dynamic: "[W]e, [husband Michael Chabon] and I, are the core of what he
cherishes... the children are satellites, beloved but tangential."
Waldman posits that children who are made aware of their secondary
rank in their parents' affections "are more successful, happier, live
longer and have healthier lives" than those who grow up with different
expectations.
I totally agree with Waldman. If you think about it, we divorce our spouses far more often than we divorce our children and if we put our partners first in our hearts, then we'll hopefully have a stronger, more stable and loving relationship to show our children who will be so much better off in life seeing that than thinking they are the center of the universe and the most loved.
I've lived in a microcosm of this scrutiny every day that I blog about my true feelings and my less-than-"normal" parenting style and my self-doubt as a mother and resentment of motherhood and all the other lovely things swirling in my head and heart. Any good mommyblogger probably experiences the same scrutiny because they dare to express the not-so-perfect moments of their lives as mothers.
I still refuse to buy into the "isn't being a mother grand" and "aren't our children the miracles of our lives" style of motherhood. When anyone asks me "don't you love being a mother," I respond without guilt "Not really. Maybe sometimes." I can't tell you how many stunned individuals recoil from me as if I were Medusa with snakes coming from my head ready to devour my young. But occasionally, I get an awkward laugh and a "wow, that's honest."
I would rather live my life as a human being, a woman, a wife, a mother, and all the other roles I play this year being totally and brutally honest than sticking my head up my butt in self-denial or lying through gritted teeth to tell people what they want to hear. If more people did this, we'd have far less ambiguities, far fewer unrealistic expectations and misunderstandings. I, for one, would feel like I fit more into the world.
But since we don't and I don't, I just blog about this stuff because I know my kindred