My first labor was 40 hours long. I missed a c-section by the width of a gnat's ass. I had a fever the whole labor, I had a bad reaction to the epidural drugs, I won't discuss the tearing, and by the time my beautiful perfect son was born I was tired in a new kind of way. I will never forget what my mother told me my first night home. Actually, I can't remember her exact phrasing. She either said: "Your first night home with a baby is the only time in your life you can expect help." Or she said: "deserve help" or "get help" or something like that. What I remember clearly is bottomless relief. I thought to myself: thank you thank you thank you thank you oh sweet Jesus thank you! She held my son while I slept the first night, for like five hours. And she came back the next day with food. I remember feeling guilty for needing so much special attention. For real, I remember feeling guilty.
My best friend got married six weeks later. I was either Maid of Honor or a bridesmaid. I can not remember which. What I do remember is how I very much did not want to go to the wedding. I did go. I stood on the alter through the ceremony in front of friends and family, in a satin sleeveless dress, dripping milk, bleeding, and trembling. I took the dress off an hour after the ceremony and we left about three hours later. The family let it be known I had post partum depression. How else to explain my behavior--not being more engaged in my life after the baby? How else to explain changing my clothes an hour after the wedding? Never mind the dress was stained with milk on the outside and blood and fury on the inside? Have you ever nursed at a party in a spaghetti strapped satin gown? Oh but, my son was six weeks old. He should just wait it out, right? After all, we were at a wedding. There are more important things in life than nursing a six week old infant. I was being so selfish!
Just last night, for heaven's sake, I sat drinking a beer in a bar with my husband and both of us were nearly in tears we were so tired and frustrated with each other. He for his good reasons. And me because I feel so guilty for not also holding down a paying job while raising our children. I feel so guilty for being so lame and unproductive. I fought tears because we were in public. But I wanted to weep. He stared at me like monkeys were flying out of my ears. From his point of view, I have been working.
Just last night, for heaven's sake, I sat drinking a beer in a bar with my husband and both of us were nearly in tears we were so tired and frustrated with each other. He for his good reasons. And me because I feel so guilty for not also holding down a paying job while raising our children. I feel so guilty for being so lame and unproductive. I fought tears because we were in public. But I wanted to weep. He stared at me like monkeys were flying out of my ears. From his point of view, I have been working.
I could go on and on. There are so many important points in this essay. It relates to everyone. It relates to my husband who won't take a day off work when he's sick because it makes him feel too guilty. It relates to our healthcare system and how much we get it wrong. We get it wrong all up one side and down the other. I just....ugh.
What appears to me, is that if we were both working earning money, the children would not have any soil to grow in....you have done the opposite, it seems: you have foregone the security of work for the sake of the kids, and that is a level of trust and egolessness (is that a word?, okay, no, that is not a word, but it is for now) anyway...that I respect. I respect your patient, faithful, devoted, loving, sweet, nurturing soil, so much in fact, that I source pretty much MOST of my faith in our life choices in YOUR life choices. so there.
ReplyDeleteBlogger Cecelia (CC) said...
ReplyDeleteAs for recovery time...Ha! Really? That's not just in sit coms and tabloids? People really expected you at a WEDDING!? I sat around and nursed. Once in a while I sipped a little coffee as a treat in my one outing of the day, where I actually put on clothes and went strolling, but usually I stayed in, or if I did go outside, it was as far as the pool. Like the article says, I often ate at 2 pm when the difficulty of getting food was finally overridden by hunger. And can I repeat that for, hmm, maybe four months, in my parents' empty apartment (which I had all to myself all day) it was just me and my baby, with my spouse coming over every night to help out, so I could sleep. I loved that time. It was ALL I could manage to get the child fed, cleaned and slept. All through the summer, well into the Fall, we stayed int eh cocoon until finally my husband asked if I would consider coming home. It is SO HUGE to mother a newborn. Are you serious? This is not understood?
I just typed a small novel in response, dear CC. And my computer ate it. arghhhhh!
ReplyDeleteI know of a girl who just turned three, was weaned a couple of years ago, is now potty trained, and has been coached through her jealousy of her baby brother. I guess she is big now. She's just started school. She was bullied the first day and after the first week they are noticing personality changes. Her parents are wealthy enough and mom is home anyway. They justify: its good for her, she's learning about the world, she's learning math. (Math is very important, right?) I mean, this is all for a good reason, right?
ReplyDeleteThere are good reasons sometimes both parents must work. This is true.
But what little children really learning is that feelings have no intrinsic value in the world. Time to be is nothing. And most of us do what we do because its what we were made to do so it must be important to do it. We'll make our kids do it, because its important. And around it goes. And what of the parent's job? If preschool is more important than love and time to be? Parenting has nearly zero value, parenting produces not much more than fodder for schools. Of course, no one actually believes this is true, everyone wants to bristle at the idea that what we value as a society is meaningless. Yet, look what we constantly choose. Look what we teach. Everything your soul yearns for is meaningless, children. One dollar plus one dollar equals two dollars, that is what matters most of all.
Our society places no value in esoteric things like feelings, truth, healing...women's work. Time has only monetary value. Feelings have no value, truth has no value. Only productivity matters. Babies have no value. Children's lives have no value. There is not much meaning in any of it, looking at the value systems in society. Look what we do to sick people and old people! Look how we treat the people who care for those people.
Trust and egolessness? I've had several paying jobs through the years. We've found them very expensive considering my earning power (a joke), the cost of work, and the stress on everyone--including our marriage. If we could both earn genuine money, both working part time, that would be ideal for us. Asking my hubby to work a serious full time career without backup, someone to cook and clean and run errands and care for kids and parents and etc? Its too much, the price is too high. Who can do it all? Even still, he cooks and mows and drives kids around and washes dishes too.
On one level, I know these things. On another level, I can't shake my shame, my lack of productivity, my sense of failure compared to all the women I know who do real work for money, or real work times 2 plus 10 kids, or ... on and on it goes. Shame knows few boundaries. There is more to life than school, work, and money. Isn't there? Hard to find the evidence, if there is. This is our cultural poison. We learn it in school. Productivity is what matters.
Wow! Shutting up now.
Just keep whispering to yourself, "Quality of life".....
ReplyDelete