打破好妈妈的神话zt（一）

I am daughter, I am mother, I am also wife. I pursue true self. On the way, I am puzzled, I feel uncomfortable, I made mistakes, sometimes I doubt myself, I still persist.

Je suis fille, je suis mère, je suis également épouse. Je poursuis l'individu vrai. Sur le chemin, je suis embarassé, je me sens inconfortable, j'ai fait des erreurs, parfois je me doute, je persiste toujours.

I don’t know anyone who has embarked on the journey of motherhood and hasn’t at some point felt overwhelmed by the job. We’re often embarrassed to admit it, even to each other, preferring instead to suffer privately with our feelings of guilt and panicked moments when we lose confidence in what we are doing. At times we feel judged and utterly out of control. It can be a truly horrid place to be.

 

Good moms like us, well; we just can’t seem to cut ourselves any slack! We come down hard on ourselves, thinking we’re screwing it up and convinced we’re on the verge of emotionally scarring our children. Under all this pressure, we wind up doing the very things we swore we’d never do in our parenting, and we’re left to wonder: What happened to all the fantasies I had about being a mother?

 

No matter how hard we try to get to everything we’re supposed to be doing and to do it all well, it just feels like it’s a near impossible task. Yet we’re convinced others are doing it, making it, hitting the mark. So why can’t we? What’s wrong with us? Our solution: push ever harder, hoping that somehow, with more effort we’ll get it “right”. But have you noticed that we never seem to get there? We never seem to arrive, kick back, relax, and allow ourselves to simply enjoy motherhood. We never get to perfect.

 

Contemporary parenting is fraught with worry and anxiety, isolation and performance pressure. Yet, one of the most pervasive cultural myths of our time is that we’re meant to be totally enjoying it. After all, becoming a mother is what many of us have pined for since we dragged our dollies around with us as little girls. So now “real” motherhood is here, and it’s supposed to be the best thing that ever happened to us, right?

 

I don’t think it helps matters that our generation is coming into motherhood at a time in parenting history when our culture wholeheartedly believes that children are ever-so-fragile and utterly dependent. We feel that whatever happens to them is on our shoulders. We have taken on the entire responsibility for how our children’s lives evolve, and that’s a BIG deal! We’re near paralyzed by the fear that we simply can’t afford to slip up. We’re told that what we do as mothers will forever case their future. How do you like having that responsibility?

 

So, what do we do? We take on childrearing with the same driven attitude and perfectionism that our achievement- oriented, competitive culture espouses for seemingly every task these days, from education and careers to driving, cooking, and sure, why not go for your black belt in yoga while we’re being ludicrous? “Competitive peacefulness.” Wow-this is a sign of how far off the mark we’ve come!

 

Parenting has become a competitive pursuit, and it’s fuelled by a child-focused culture that has put our children on a precious pedestal. We’ve lifted childrearing to new heights. This is no longer an intuitive job for the masses. No. It apparently requires resources, research, and skills training to “execute.” Seems we are now in the business of “people-building” and “unlocking potentials,” and frankly, it’s starting to look a lot more like project management than parenting, with our kids becoming the measure of our mothering success. Yech! The trouble is, our own self-worth is so tied to it all that we can’t seem to let go of it, even when we know better. Let’s face it-deep inside we abide by the belief that if we fail motherhood, it will be our ultimate failure and, alternately, if our children “work out,” it’s our crowning accomplishment. Isn’t it? Are we courageous enough to admit it?

 

So how do we know if we are “doing it right,” “being successful?”

(to be continued)