Motherhood: cinch or sentence?

There’s quite a debate going on over at Mamamia with regards to an article written by Jacinta Tynan called, ‘Motherhood is easy‘. I read it with some strong emotions myself. I found myself nodding at the idea that a positive attitude towards child-rearing is beneficial to everyone involved. I found myself incensed at quotes like these:

“I can’t see what all the fuss is about. Ask me if I have another, but from where I stand motherhood is a cinch.

Yes it is tiring, and yes it is time consuming with showers and emails a sudden extravagance. But it is not hard. Hard is being tied to a soulless job for 80% of your waking hours. Hard is fighting cancer, or having a child who is. Or not being able to conceive a child when you ache for nothing more. Soothing a crying baby who won’t sleep for love nor money is a privilege not a hardship. Wiping spew off your jacket before bolting out the door to a meeting is funny, not a drama.

It is not fashionable to say so. For the past decade or two – coinciding with most of us trying to squeeze a career in with motherhood simultaneously – we have heard the cry of mothers’ martyrdom. It has become de rigueur to complain about how arduous the whole thing is, one upping on whose baby sleeps the least, chucks the most, and who has less hours in the day.”

“I do think we could learn a thing or two from our mothers and grandmothers. You never heard a peep out of them bucking in to double the workload and double the kids with no online groceries or disposable nappies. Sure they didn’t work (most of them) but they also appreciated that being a mum was one of the better things in life. My mum had six children, no help and, on occasions, a job. Yet she gave it her all with grace and joy. Our generation acts as if we deserve a medal.

It’s not like we didn’t know what we were signing up for. Most mothers want to be mothers, longing for the day when we will hold our own baby in our arms. How tragic to begrudge it because we can’t get a thing done around the house.”

Then I went on to watch the video on Mia’s blog post where she interviews Jacinta, and she readily admits it’s hard. Eh? So which one is it, then? Hard, or not hard?

I agree with her on many things. That motherhood is abundantly rewarding. To not stress over the small things. But the insinuation that if a mother is having a hard time of it that they are ‘making a fuss’ if they complain does not sit well with me. Or that a mother who makes a complaint feels deserving of a medal is ludicrous to me.

I too, once had a first child who was nine months old. I found her to be very easy to look after as well. Because she hadn’t yet hit the stages of toddlerhood and all the wonderful, developmentally normal yet frustrating bits that comes with it. But I was still able to see that I was lucky, and to have some understanding of why some other mothers were struggling. Other mothers had older kids than me, more kids than me. Some parents had less support than me. Who was I to tell them, ‘I don’t see what all the fuss is about?’ I certainly didn’t see them as any less loving of their children or begrudging of having them, simply because they were having a rough day/week/month/life!

When I was a new mother, I too made sweeping statements about parenting issues, though. I was dead against giving any of my children a dummy. Said I never would. And with my  first, I didn’t. Because I was able to focus on one child, and ok, she never seemed to ‘need’ a dummy, but if she did, I imagine being an only child, I would’ve been better equipped in time and energy to provide her with that comfort in many other ways. My next two children had dummies, so of course, I was forced to eat my words! I have since learnt to be very careful about sweeping statements when it comes to parenthood, because they always come back to bite you on the bum.

I believe this: parenthood is hard sometimes, easy other times. When it’s hard, you push through it. The more positive we can be, the better. But it’s ok, necessary in some cases even, to talk about problems we are facing. If we don’t, that stress can manifest itself in unhealthy ways that aren’t good for us or our families.

I remember in April last year, when  my fiance was admitted to hospital for poisoning. He spent a week there. I held my head up and ploughed on as all us mums do when times get tough. A voice in my head, that I didn’t let anyone else hear kept whispering at me,

‘what if he dies?’

‘What if your children lose their father?’

‘You’re running out of energy/strength! You’re going to fall in a heap.’

The first couple of days were hell. Mr Four, who was at the time two, was resentful of me for calling the ambulance and taking his father away. He resented me every time I told him that Daddy wasn’t coming home today, and he behaved accordingly, screaming at me in the supermarkets, as I pushed the double pram down the street and all day long at home. He acted out, destroying things, hurting his sisters and myself.

My fiance had taken our keycard which had all our money so that when this ‘blew over’ as we tried to optimistically believe, he could get a train or taxi home. As a result, we didn’t visit him for the first few days. Then we ran out of toilet paper. Then fruit. I had the other keycard at home, and was biding my time until my fiance’s pay from his job went into that one.

Now, as positive as I tried to remain, this is where it gets important to tell others if you are struggling. I confided to my best friend who lived just around the corner from me, that we’d run out of fruit and toilet paper. My beautiful friend, as soon as she could, was at my doorstep, presenting me with fresh fruit for the kids and loo paper. It got us through until that money showed up in my keycard, and I will be ever grateful for her help.

There was no shame in being honest about a difficulty. Over the next few days, we visited my fiance in hospital everyday. It was what kept him hopeful, during so much uncertainty. It was what kept the kids hopeful. Every night, we’d eat a family dinner together at the hospital kiosk, and be completely grateful. It was looking doubtful to us all that he’d be out of there any time soon.

I would come home, keep doing the mothering gig with three tired little ones, and collapse on the lounge. There were thousands of negative thoughts to fight off, and I like to think I did my best. But they were still there.  I talked to my father on the phone, and I finally admitted that if my darling was going to be in hospital for a long time, I’d need to work out a routine, because the day trips to the hospital were physically taking it out of me, no matter how positive a spin I wanted to put on it.

From that discussion, my dad suggested that I take one day off a week from visiting the hospital. I cannot tell you the relief it felt for someone to give me permission to say, ‘this is too hard, is there an alternative?’ and actually have one offered, when I simply could not think anymore. I just felt that my head was going to pop open, and all ability to reason and problem solve was long gone. If I hadn’t talked about this negative, I truly believe I would’ve lost the plot or lashed out at someone. The good news? He was out within a week.

That’s my arguement for why I think we need to complain as parents, sometimes. I also am a strong believer in being positive. I remember a few months later, my fiance’s mother died. At exactly the same time that our family got the swine flu. My fiance was down the coast with his family, making arrangements. The night before his mother’s funeral, my eldest daughter vomitted everywhere then became unconscious to the point where I couldn’t rouse her.  I put her in an ambulance, and hot-footed it to the hospital with the two littlies in the double pram, on a freezing winter’s night, on a train.

I had no idea if I would be able to make it to the funeral the next day, but of course, it was a high priority. I just knew I couldn’t leave my daughter in someone else’s care the next day if I had any doubt she’d be ok. We waited hours to see someone, as there were many other families afflicted with swine flu also. I kept telling myself, ‘just keep pushing on, entertain the kids as much as you can, ride it out, ride it out…’ Just when I thought we could not spend another minute at that hospital, they finally let us go home with the doctor’s blessing that she’d be ok to be looked after by someone else the following day.

My body felt as though it was on empty, and that horrible little negative voice, came back:

‘now you have to take that trip back home’

‘you can’t do it, you’re ready to collapse, yourself’

‘look at your daughter, she can’t make the trip home, even. You are so screwed!’

I tried to reassure my eldest daughter that we’d make this trip as quick and easy as we possibly could. She looked doubtful. I don’t think I was very convincing.

Then, a miracle happened. Mr then Two piped up in his adorably shrill voice, bright as a button, ‘we had a fun time at the hop-it-tal, didn’t we?’

Here I was, thinking how terrible it was that I’d dragged these two little ones out in the cold, and I had no idea what an adventure it was for them! My eldest daughter and I looked at each other, rolled our eyes, and laughed so hard at the irony, that it gave us the strength and energy to make that trip home more easily.

I guess what I’m saying is, in parenthood and life, there is a balance of good and bad. Positive and negative. To deny one and ignore the other is counter-productive. We can’t be all doom and gloom 24-7. We can’t be Pollyanna all day long either. What I’ve learnt from this? We all have our easy times, and our hard times.

When you’re up on your luck, spread it around. Go help out the other person who’s down on theirs. When everything’s turned to crap, tell someone! It doesn’t make you less of a parent, nor a person. Let others help you.

As for now, I will never, ever, say parenting is easy. It’s hard. But you know what? All the things in life I’ve valued the most have never come easily. There’s a huge price to pay, and I pay it willingly. I love my fiance, I love my kids, my own little family, with everything I’ve got. And if I want to bitch and moan because Missy Two has smeared her poo (again!?) then I bloody well will. Then I’ll laugh about it later.

What is motherhood to you? Easy, hard? Or somewhere in between?