I Think My Mom Got It Right

Since I am new at this blogging thing, I wanted to take this challenge and run with it. So here I go.

Last week we were challenged by Mama Kat with prompts to write about in our own blog. While most of them intrigued me, I picked the one closest to my heart, and by that I mean it stings the most. I thought maybe if I wrote about this, and try to inject some humor in the situation then I can work through my issues and not consume so much alcohol when I am actually presented with said issue again. (Yea right, like that's going to happen!)

Without further ado, the topic I have chosen to write about is this:

2.) Not your mother’s daughter…how do you parent differently than your mother did? Is it a good thing or a bad thing?

I’ll start off by saying that my mother and I are very much alike—emotionally. On the normal female emotional scale, which is as follows:

 

My mom and I are about right here:

We aren’t emotional women. My husband sure wishes I was closer to the right side but he’s stuck with my unemotional, pragmatic ways with everything.  Sorry, honey, this is what you got. It was bred into me. You are going to have to go find crazy somewhere else.

Anyway, my mother worked my whole childhood. She was never home and when she did come home it was usually late in the evening and exhausted from busting her ass all day at work then sitting in traffic for over an hour just so she could go straight to bed and wake up and do it all over again. This was the case my whole school-years life. I always knew I wanted to be there for my kids when they got home from school. I wanted to actually know who their friends were and where they were going when they left the house. I didn’t want to absent for everything.

Now, I don’t begrudge my mom for being absent. She did what she had to do to put food on the table and clothes on our back. I just vividly remember wishing she was there more because my mom hung the moon for me. I loved her more than anyone else in the world. It was her approval that I craved so much.

Now that I’m a mom, I’ve chosen to do things completely different. I made the choice to stay at home and be there for my kids. They always know that I am there for them when they come home from school or always there for the simple things like home cooked meals and homemade chocolate chip cookies in the middle of the week. They never have to worry that Mommy won’t be there. Because, I am always fucking here.

Now that I think about it, maybe my mom got it right. Because, like I said, emotionally we are the same. Maybe she knew if she stayed home with us kids she be crazy and would have probably turned into a raging alcoholic by the age of 30. Maybe her coping mechanism was to work all those long hours so she could stay the hell away from all us kids. And my brother and I were good kids. I can’t imagine subjecting her to my kids--my kids are spawns of the devil. My mother would be in a looney bin if she had to deal with them. Because honestly, after a rainy holiday weekend with my kids (read: no school for three days straight to run out all their energy) my emotional make-up is more like this:

Yes, that is my hair on fire. Don’t dis my drawing skills. But yes, I feel that way and I’m not even PMSing. Or maybe I am… let me check the calendar… Nope! Not PMSing, it’s just my crazy ass kids driving me into this pit of hell.

So maybe my mom was a better mother. Maybe I should get a job and get the hell out of this house. Maybe my kids will benefit from it and learn to be a little more self-sufficient and not demand something from me every 2 seconds. They might actually learn to cherish all that I do for them instead of take it for granted. Maybe when they ask for lunch I’ll actually be happy to make it for them instead of scream at the top of my lung to leave me the hell alone before I throw them out the door to fend for themselves like the stray dogs that live along the railroad tracks. But probably not… they’ll probably stand at the back door and say “I’m hungry, feed me, give me food, I’m thirsty, I need a drink, can I have a snack, pay attention to me, I need attention, mommy watch as I do cartwheels in the living room, watch me throw my toys all over the living room and not pick them up, watch me color on the refrigerator where I put all those stickers what will never come off.”

Maybe, just maybe that’s the neighbor’s kids I hear barking all damn day and night, and they’ve been outside for so long their whining has turned into barking and the neighbor is inside drinking her Kahlua and Diet Coke with her earbuds in listening to Maroon 5 and daydreaming about Adam Levine. Oh wait… that’s not the neighbor... That’s me. Damn, I should really let the kids in.