The Guilt List

The following is a book-inspired blog contribution to the online bookclub, From Left to Write. I received the book from the publisher free-of-charge, however I was not compensated to write this entry. You can read what others had to say in reaction to the book here.

M.F. Chapman’s Take the Cake: A Working Mom’s Guide to Grabbing a Slice of the Life You’ll Love is a quick read that offers practical suggestions for moms to achieve a more “balanced” life. Chapman eschews the “mommy wars” and avoids any discussion of staying and working at home v. working outside the home, which allows this book to be relevant for all moms.

Now, I’m not a big fan of the word “balance.” I think it’s one of these “pie-in-the-sky” ideals that goes along with being “guilt-free” and “perfect.” I prefer terms like “less-harried,” reduced-guilt,” (except when it’s applied to food) and “increasingly comfortable with imperfection.” But as my mom always says, if you can take away one thing (from a book, a training, a talk, etc.) it hasn’t been a waste of time. And Chapman had more than one strategy in her book for improving one’s quality of life. I could easily have addressed her chapter on television watching, “unplug,” playing outside, “fresh air,” or nutrition, “eat well,” but those are all things that I feel fairly good about. I thought it would be more meaningful if I mined what is, perhaps, my greatest struggle as a parent:

GUILT.

The Guilt List
Chapman recommends that you: 1. Brainstorm all the different aspects of guilt you feel in relation to your child, spouse, friends, work and most importantly, self (I will focus on “child” here—otherwise this could reach novel proportions.); 2. Determine which truly have negative consequences and delete any that are “moderate or inconsequential when thinking about the big picture.” 3. Examine the remaining items and determine whether you can live with the guilt because the item is in service of something larger or you can’t live with the guilt and what you are going to do to change it.

So here goes…my guilt list (in no particular order):

1. Letting Sophia lounge in bed a little longer while I try to grab a couple extra minutes of sleep. Particularly since she has to go to the bathroom when she wakes up.
2. Not wanting to pretend with, read to, or complete a puzzle when I do fetch her from the crib. Particularly pre-caffeine.
3. Getting impatient with her as she dances around the room and I need her to get dressed so we will be on time for whatever comes next that day.

That’s three pangs of guilt before breakfast.

4. When we are out and about I feel guilty about underutilizing our post-diluvium basement playground. When we are in I feel guilty about not taking her somewhere fabulously stimulating and engaging that day.
5. Checking my email/hit count/FB on my iPhone (when I could be interacting with Sophia).
6. Setting Sophia up with a pile of books while taking a shower (when I could have taken one during her nap, but was too busy responding to emails, writing, etc.)
7. Not involving Sophia more in my household chores (cooking, laundry, cleaning, etc.) and letting her fend for herself while I do them.
8. Not giving Sophia a sibling.
9. Making a phone call or simply receiving one when Sophia is around.
10. Missing a “bath day” (because, as it is, I only wash her ever other day)
11. Playing with Sophia too much (not letting her have enough independent time).
12. Not playing with Sophia enough (see #8 not giving Sophia a sibling).

I detect a theme here. Okay, so my list is mostly about attention and active engagement and the constant question that plagues me: Am I giving her “enough” of me? I am fairly certain that this would be true whether I was working 16 or 60 hours/week (though I’d definitely be feeling it more if I was working full time). It never feels like enough.

Of course the minute I start doing playing with Sophia out of guilt and not genuine enthusiasm, it becomes inauthentic, to which I’m pretty sure all kids are fairly attune. In fact, I would venture to say that it is far better to let her play by herself (which she does enjoy) than to have me doing it out of guilt (and either neglecting my own needs, which breeds resentment, or neglecting our household needs, which creates a whole other host of problems) just to assuage my guilt. The right amount is probably whenever the spirit moves me (which it often does; I like to play), and not when it doesn’t. But I tend to ignore all evidence in support of this (that Sophie happily reads while I’m taking a shower, that Sophie is not deprived—she has plenty of opportunities to play with other children through playdates, school, outings, that Sophie is becoming increasingly independent and creative on her own) and only listen to this nagging inner voice that constantly berates me for not doing more.

To return to Chapman’s task: The fact of the matter is not one of these things would have a negative consequence…well, maybe if Sophie wet the bed that would kind of suck. But I don’t think Sophia is going to be sitting in therapy one day talking about the fact that her mother never paid any attention to her. In fact, what could happen instead is that she finds herself talking about how I didn’t give her enough space, how I wouldn’t give her opportunities to be bored and create…or worse…how I poisoned our relationship with leaked resentment that stemmed from my perceived need to constantly attend to her.

I know I need to chill out, back off, and deal with the anxiety that pops up as a result. I wish making dramatic changes in one’s psychology was as simple as making a list, but alas, it’s not. I take some comfort in knowing that awareness is an important first step in the right direction.

Keeping Score

At the end of each day, I take stock of my “accomplishments,” which sounds harmless. But it isn’t.

Yesterday was a banner day:

1. Read to Sophia (Sophia: "Read this book!" Wham!)
2. Bathed Sophia (Sophia: “Mommy, how do you spell “Kevin?)
3. Cooked breakfast: (Me: “Just one more bite and you can get up from your chair.”)
4. Took Sophia to Spanish: (Me: “Sophia, ven! Come back here! Sientate!”)
5. Picked up farm delivery: (Sophia: “You bought me my eggies?”)
6. Read to Sophia: (Me:“ No. NOT the Dora book. I’m throwing that book away. I’d be embarrassed to GIVE it to someone.” Sophia: “YES DORA!”)
7. Cooked lunch: Me: “Just one more bite, and I’ll sing you a song.”
8. Practiced Spanish with Sophia: (Me: “Dame el circulo mediano, por favor.”)
9. Read to Sophia: (Me: “It’s time for us to get snuggly.”)
10. Ran 10 miles (Kanye: “Work it harder, make it better, do it faster, makes us stronger)
11. Cooked dinner (Me: “Just one more bite and you can have some ice cream.”)
12. Did crossword with Kevin (Kevin: “What’s a six-letter word for “histrionic?”)
13. Read 40 pages of my book (Louise DeSalvo: “If my husband had his way, I think he wishes I wouldn’t have written about our life, wouldn’t be writing about it now….”)

This act of keeping score is how I measure my success as a parent, a spouse, a friend, an employee and a “balanced” human being. If my list meets with my approval, I feel somewhat self-satisfied. If not, I beat myself up about it, focusing on where I think I fell short that day of some invisible ideal that matters to no one but me.

I already know that today is not measuring up: I haven’t exercised (the pool was closed due to a swim meet), I didn’t bathe Sophia (I do it every other day, but I still like a slacker on the days that I don’t), and I haven’t so much as kissed my husband (who had a stomach virus yesterday that I really, really don’t want to catch). There have been some accomplishments, but they are overshadowed by what I deem my failures.

Failure is not doing something poorly; it’s simply not doing. There’s nothing I hate more than a day of doing nothing. Laying around, letting the laundry pile up, letting the kid run wild, letting the minutes pass without getting a single…thing…done. It’s not because I don't enjoy it. It’s because I feel so…guilty. And yet, the truth of the matter is I’d love to be able to fail in this way…fail without the guilt, that is. But I am relaxation-impaired. When I have free time, I fill it.

In contrast, Sophia has nothing but free time. As far as I can tell, she experiences no compulsion to complete a task; she has no obligations to meet. She fills her time pursing happiness and acting creatively. If it is quiet, she’ll fill the air with song. If I turn on music, she twirls. She invents new purposes for objects, new narratives for books. She plays, she dreams, she dances through life.

My demands creep in…take a bath, eat this, put your coat on…and these are moments of resistance, for they seem unnecessary to her. They interrupt her flow. I’ll suggest a new activity, “why don’t we go out and play in the snow?” And she’ll decline, “No, mommy. I want to stay right here.” She sees no need to go anywhere to do anything other than what she is doing in this very moment.

I don’t mean to romanticize Sophia’s way of living in the world. It is not always practical. We do have to eat, and take baths, and occasionally put our coats on, and she probably doesn’t do enough of any of these things.

But when I think about balance, as an adult, I fear I am valuing the wrong things. Balance is traditionally thought of as managing a family, a career and self. But when “self-care” becomes yet another chore, another obligation…it is drained of all its pleasure and restorative properties. When I need a checklist to determine whether I should feel good about my day, I have sacrificed the joy of doing for the joy of getting it done.

I want to stop keeping score. I want to mentally burn my lists. I want to play and dream and dance through life as much as I possibly can…and not be concerned when I can’t.

I want to be more like Sophia.

The Case Against...

Is it possible to overthink the question, “Should I have another child?”

I mean, making a person is a huge responsibility. It’s a gift. It’s a blessing.

It’s irreversible.

And it’s not just about me. It’s about Kevin, Sophia, and this other human being who I don’t want to find staring into a mirror when he’s fifteen saying, “I wish I never was born.”

Here are my fears:

Sophia is healthy, sweet-tempered, somnolent, engaging, book-obsessed, wide-eyed, attention-mongering child. In other words, she is the trickster-baby. The perfect first child who cons parents into having another. I’ve watched what happens: Lulled into a sense of safety, parents bear a second and are horrified to learn that the combination of their genes can also result in a sleepless, colicky, inconsolable human being who only eats chicken nuggets.

Having another child is fucking with fate. It’s getting greedy. It’s pushing the bounds of what I’m allowed to have in this lifetime. It’s asking for more when I already have everything I’ve ever wanted.

I could never give a second child the quality of attention that I’ve given Sophia: the hours I’ve spent talking, singing, and reading to her, the close scrutiny of every day of her development, the readiness with which I abandoned all other things to tend to her needs. Isn’t it always the first child whose every move is captured on film, every word recorded, every gift treasured? The second is a blurry image, an uncertain history.

I could never love another child as I do Sophia. A second child would always feel like second best. I would be forced to pretend to love this second child as much as I love my first, my attempts at equity painfully transparent, psychologically noxious.

Having a second child would create a rupture in my relationship with Sophia that can never be repaired. She will always resent her sibling, always harbor anger towards me, and always long for a time when she, and she alone, was mine.

I’m trying to maintain a fragile balance of work, couple-hood, self, and motherhood, which, on any given day appears tipped towards one of these poles, to the distress of another. One more would throw my life into chaos, forcing me to constantly decide, “Who am I going to disappoint today?”

I’ve asked parents of two to give me a reason why I should do it. They all told me they loved the second just as much as the first. No one admitted to regretting the decision. Many shared touching moments when one child empathically embraced the other.

But they’ve all said it is exponentially harder than having just one.