By Beauty Damned

Mommy Mayhem

Today was the first day of a whole week of fun-filled studying and lounging around my house. I worked very hard today, if I do say so myself. I also took a lunch break from studying to watch an Oprah show that I had tivo'd. One of the big topics was women who focus so much on their kids and are obsessively entangled in their childrens' lives to the point that they completely neglect to have a relationship with their husband. Interesting show. How can you not love Oprah? So a lot of women place their children above their husband in terms of priorities. Their justification for this is that children need them and their men don't. But I tended to agree with those "controversial figures" on the show who insisted that if you neglect to have a relationship with your spouse you aren't doing your kids any favors.

It really is weird how schmarmie many women have become about their children. "My children! My children! My children NEED me!!! I don't have time for anything else!" to the point that it's obsessive. I think Freud would have an absolute field day with all of this. Maybe he already did. Another thing that was touched on in the show was how some women have replaced the romantic love they once had for their husbands with a romanticized love for their children, misplacing those feelings and leaving the husband as a fifth wheel. Part of this probably has to do with the fact that men aren't always equal partners and sometimes leave all the child rearing and chores to their wives, simultaneously feeling neglected and deprived of intimacy; feelings that could probably be remedied if men would participate more in child rearing and housekeeping. But there are undoubtedly many cases where women are just overextending themselves when it comes to being involved in the lives of their children, feeling like they have to have this constant control over who those children become by being a part of everything they do. I guess they call it the Supermom Syndrome. Someone on the show pointed out that this would also seem to create a generation of kids who think they are the center of the universe, and rather than gaining the skills that are necessary to become independent, as intended, they instead become clingy and feel a dependency on their parents that they might not feel if they had been raised with a little less coddling. Who knows whether this is as significant as they made it out to be or not...you hear a lot of crazy psychobabble on that show. But occasionally there's something to it.

Of course, the whole controversy was started by this woman, who dared to write an article about how deeply she loves her husband and feels that he is the centerpiece of her existence, above her children. This outraged many women and catapulted it into a discussion about the excessive meddling of mothers in their children's lives and the diconnect that often occurs between couples after they have children. This women, Ayelet Waldman is her name, simply feels that her relationship with her husband is the foundation of a healthy life for the entire family. Her logic says, without that strong relationship between the two of them, how will the children have a real stable sense of security in the family around them? How can your kids have that if their parents are completely disconnected? How are they supposed to learn what a marriage should be like, if their parents treat eachother like roommates? And how are they supposed to be independent people, if they are taught to believe that mommy will always be there every step of the way, holding their precious little hand?

While many women on the show were feeling very judgmental towards Ms. Waldman for her statement that she "loves [her] husband more than [her] children," I thought they all seemed a little repressed. I couldn't quite understand why they insisted on accusing Waldman of not loving her children enough. They also insisted that they don't have time to have a life outside of their children. I can see how a person would come to think that way, but it makes me sad. I guess that's part of why I've decided to wait to have children. I've always been afraid to give up my own freedom and priorities to focus on the priorities of a child. As a women in the second half of my twenties and yet to have any children, I thought it was an interesting subject of discussion. I never want to be a smothering mom who can't balance out the love she has for her children with the love she has for the man who helped her create those children, but I also want to be a devoted mom who gives them the nurturing they need without going overboard. I want to continue to have a compelling, intimate relationship with the man I love even after having kids with him. Is that possible? I guess that's what the show was all about. How to strike a balance. If I ever get married again, I'm putting that in the vows "I promise that after we have kids, I'll still find time for you."

My mother had my brother and me by the time she was 23. She had a third by the time she was 27. I know she sacrificed and suffered a lot for us kids, but I know that I, for one, was never coddled. Perhaps my brother was, a bit, but his health was always in a somewhat precarious state. More than anything she was protective of our physical safety. Beyond that? She was never a PTA mom or a baking-cupcakes mom or a mom who hung out with other moms (not that there's anything wrong with that). She helped us as much as she could with our schoolwork and was heartbroken when all three of her kids turned out to hate school to the point where each of us eventually asserted a complete unwillingness to go. She was a great mom and our dad was a great dad. But you can't plan who your children will grow up to be. I can't say she's a hundred percent glad about the way all of us turned out, but she did her best. No amount of coddling would have made a difference. We also witnessed more than our fair share of love and war between our parents. But their interactions with eachother are what molded us, even more so than the interactions that each of us kids had individually with our parents early on. I know marriage was never easy for my parents and having kids so young didn't make things any easier. But they always talked. Kathleen has said that her favorite thing about staying over at our house was waking up in the morning and hearing my parents talking. They always found time to talk about books or politics or religion or shitty neighbors or whatever interesting things were going on in the world. They were always in love (even when wars broke out), they were never afraid to be a little affectionate in front of us. Dad would grab mom's ass and she would spank him back and we would giggle. More than thirty years later, they're still ticking, and more perfect for eachother than ever.

It made me sad to hear all these women in their late twenties and thirties and even fourties talking about how they have no interest in sex with their spouses and that their children are far more important to them than their husbands. One women even said that she watches Jeapordy while her husband "does his thing." UGH. Many of the women there expressed their disinterest in intimacy, saying that all of their love and energy is for their children. I really think that's a sickness. Please god don't ever let me become one of those women! And please don't ever let the person I have children with turn out to be someone who doesn't want to lend a hand to help out. I definitely think that's a big part of the problem. Men just don't help their wives enough with kids and chores. So women, stop being so fuckin frigid and hyper-involved! And men, stop being so goddamn lazy! And your kids will be a lot better off for the happier relationship that ensues...

I don't blog enough. When I do it's like a freakin avalanche. ;o)