Room Mothers

The Working Dad and I are older than your average first-time parents, with a combined age of 85.  So most of our friends' kids are older, in some cases in college.  We've found it, if not hard, certainly not easy to make friends at School.  It's not for lack of trying, but I guess the reality is that when you're a busy professional trying to get to work stopping off to chat with the fellow parents is not always easy.  And your schedules have to match up just right.  We've made some starts at friendships with a couple of sets of parents, but I guess I was sort of hoping for more of the same.  One dad and daughter made it to The Boy's first birthday party, which was really awesome.

And there's a PTO at The Boy's School, which I joined.  I'm not sure exactly what the point of that was since I've never been given notice of any meetings.  Apparently, the PTO only exists to do things on Teacher Appreciation Week, which is fine, but it would be nice if the PTO would sort of function as a way for parents and teachers to get to know each other.  Isn't that the usual way they function?  I'd suggest that, but we've never had a meeting, as far as I know, at which such a suggestion could be lodged.  Alas.

And I volunteered to be a room mother, but I learned just before Teacher Appreciation Week that another mother was The Boy's room mother.  That's fine, and she's done a great job with the Teacher Appreciation Week stuff for our class.  We have tentative plans to go to lunch soon, so maybe we'll make friends.  (In fact, she's The Dude's mom, so that would be GREAT for The Boy!)

Maybe I had my expectations set too high for making new friends.  I guess I had thought that we'd all bond together in our new parenthood.  But we're all working parents, and thus all very busy and under pressure with our old job demands and new family demands.  That leaves little room for socializing and making new connections.  But maybe slowly those will form.  And I guess even these four paragraphs suggest that they already are.  I just need to be something that I am often not:  patient.

Exceptional Motherhood

Every mom, I think, must go through these periods of thinking, "Am I good enough?"  At least, I hope it's not just me who thinks that.  But you want to be great.  You want to be supermom and be the best employee at the office, the best pal, the best wife, and the best mom.  And when you evaluate yourself (when you're me, anyway), you can always find places where you fall short.

And even when you aren't nitpicking yourself, the thought creeps in that you are not giving your all.  For instance, I am sitting cross-legged on my living room sofa right now, The Cat to my left, my iPhone to my right, and my son still at daycare.  Because I got home from work a little early and I decided to have some "me" time before I went to pick The Boy up.  Nothing wrong with that.  Except that the hissy voice of Exceptional Motherhood has been whispering to me from behind my neck, "You should have picked him up.  You are being selfish sitting there on the sofa writing your navel-gazing blog post.  You should be playing with your boy, not thinking about yourself."

There is a drumbeat in the modern mothering culture that, at its root, demands constant self-sacrifice by the mommy.  You must breast feed.  If you don't breastfeed, you are depriving your child of valuable hoosiwhatsits that will protect him from disease.  You must use cloth diapers.  If you don't use cloth diapers, your child will get diaper rash up to his eyeballs and there will be an avalanche of dirty diapers at your local landfill.  You must feed your child organic baby food, preferable lovingly made by your own hands.  If you do not feed your child organic handmade baby food, you are endangering his health.  You must spend your every spare moment playing with, educating, or at least ogling your child.  If you do not do these things, you clearly do not love your child as much as you should.

It may not be stated so starkly, but the sentiments are there in the culture.  As it happens, I did breast feed to the extent I could.  (I never produced enough milk to exclusively breast feed The Boy, unless you count the first six days of his life in which I exclusively "breast fed" him insufficiently so that he was constantly starving and lost too much weight.)  I also use cloth diapers on The Boy when he is at home (but I do not impose them on his daycare).  And he gets a lot of organic food (especially the dairy foods), but it's not all organic.  It's not that I did not/do not do these "good mom" things to one degree or another, or even that I disagree that these are more-or-less good things to do (lest I wouldn't do them at all).  But there is a subtle hiss from the mother-culture that failure to live up to its standards is inadequate mothering is just false.

The time portion of this criteria is particularly wrenching for a working mom.  We really do want to spend as much time as we can with our kids.  We want to work too.  And, mentally, we need a little downtime every now and again.  But the impulse in the culture is to spend all of your spare time on the child and none of it on yourself, which, to me seems good for nobody.

Moreover, I think that working moms can't meet these standard.  Nobody can.  Indeed, I'll go out on a limb, and speak about that which I do not know, and say that it is only the most haggard drudge of a stay at home mom who can be the perfect breastfeeding, cloth diapering, baby chef and educator of a mommy.

And yet, we all love our kids.

So why does the culture guilt us about these ideals of motherhood?  And why are they ideals, anyway?  Because they're the way it was done a hundred or a thousand years ago?  Why is that per se the gold standard?

And why should I feel badly about taking an hour for myself to write this post and, literally, remove the chipped nail polish from my toes?

Is it competition?  Because we want to be "the best."  And if someone else shows inadequacies -- "Gasp!  Is that a Huggies disposable diaper on your child's bottom?" -- then the cloth diapering purists can feel secure in their anti-diaper rash and environmental perfection?

But that's not it because, frankly, I don't really know any moms who are really all that judgy about these sorts of things.  And yet, the judges are apparently out there, somewhere.  Whole books are being written about the subject, after all.

For instance, Elisabeth Badinter's new book, The Conflict: How Modern Motherhood Undermines the Status of Women poses that modern women have submitted themselves to something she calls "ecological parenting," which involves things like doulas, breastfeeding, organic food, the non-use of epidurals, the use of cloth diapers, baby wearing, co-sleeping, constant presentation of intellectually enriching experiences etc., etc. Admittedly, I have this information from the reviews of the book.  I've not read it.  I have not had time to read it, nor am I sure that I have the inclination to read it, having fully committed all of my life to either work or family - save for this one hour.  (Plus, I'm not sure I could sustain interest in this subject for more than the approximately 500 to 750 words that I am currently committing to the blogosphere.) But, generally, she is describing a very, very naturalistic and child-centric lifestyle (again, per the reviews).

I happen to like being The-Boy-centric.  He's pretty much the greatest thing I've ever done, so I really like hanging out with him and I find it tremendously fun (except when he's screamy).  And I like cloth diapering.  I like the idea that not as many disposable diapers are going into the landfill.  And the breastfeeding that I was able to do, I enjoyed that too.  But the problem in trying to be a culturally perfect "ecological parent" is that it saps the joy out of being his Mom.  Strive to be perfect and I think you will find yourself perfectly unhappy.

So I am ignoring that little hiss at the back of my neck.  Shoo, be gone!

Rather than worry about whether I'm perfect according to the Exceptional Motherhood Code, I think I'll just be perfectly content to use the rest of this hour to read a New Yorker article about Kraftwerk and then go pick The Boy up at about 6:30 so that we can have a rocking good time until it's bedtime.  That seems perfectly wonderful.

I wasn't there.

Bad weather is rolling through the Dallas area tonight.  The forecast is for thunderstorms and possible damaging hail and straight-line winds.  No tornados.  Not like a couple of weeks ago when we had 12 blow through the area in the early afternoon.

I was at work in downtown Dallas.  The Boy was at School, in our hometown, approximately 23 miles away.  Downtown Dallas was under a tornado warning.  I watched a tornado from my office window go through an area south of downtown.  At points, downtown Dallas was pitch black.  We were told to move to the interior of the building, away from the windows.

This was not the scariest thing about that day.

The scariest thing was the tornado warning that included my hometown . . . the tornado warning that indicated that the storm was moving, not just in the general direction of my hometown, but directly towards my hometown.  And I was not there.  My little, little boy was at School, in the path of the storm, and I was not there to protect him, to lay my body over his like I would do if a storm hit when we were all at home together.

I think that this is the worst part of being a working mom.  You have to be away from your child, who is your heart, and you cannot protect him.  You have to trust that others will take good care of him and that he will be okay.  (And, of course, the ladies at his School were wonderful and did take excellent care of the kids during the horrible storm.)

I sat there at my desk quietly sobbing with this unbelievable urge to throw myself in front of whatever may be heading toward my boy, who was 23 miles away.  I felt completely and utterly helpless, and terrified.  I suspect that all mothers eventually have this feeling of needing to protect their children and not being able to.  I suspect that they all feel helpless and terrified.  It just maybe comes sooner for a working mommy.

In the end, a tornado did not go through my hometown.  It went south.  We got damaging winds and baseball sized hail.  Lots of cars were destroyed.  Some people lost fences, windows, sunlights.  We're going to need a new roof.  But The Boy was safe and sound.  In fact, he was his cheerful little self when I picked him up, as if he has not spent three hours of the afternoon in the daycare's saferoom.  I was relieved and glad.  I know they will always take care of The Boy when danger strikes.

Still, I'm comforted that tonight, if the weather threatens, if I need to, I will be there to hold him to my chest and lay over him as the storm passes over our house.  It will be scary, but I will be there.

"Do you work?"

My sweet little son has RSV, respiratory syncytial virus.  Merry First Christmas, right?  He caught it at school.  Actually, I'm pretty sure who he caught it from.  I think he caught it from The Dude.  Poor little guys.  RSV is highly contagious, so I fully expect that nearly every kid in his class will catch it.  It's one of the well-known downsides of daycare:  your kiddo is going to catch everything.

Yesterday, we took The Boy to the doctor because we had learned about the RSV outbreak, and The Boy had a cough.  We wanted to get on top of it if it was, indeed, RSV.  My fellow working mommy friend, whose daughter just had RSV last week, also encouraged us to get in there early to get on top of the disease.  So we did.

The pediatrician, not our normal one because of the holidays, watched him breathe and determined that his breathing wasn't too bad, especially given that his blood oxygen level was 100%.  She noted that his nose was quite congested, and had two nurses come in to suction his nose.  It took three of us to do it:  Mr. The Working Mom and I to hold The Boy down, and one of the nurses to do the actual suctioning.   The Boy is an incredibly strong little creature.  That same nurse also swabbed The Boy's sinuses to get a sample to test for RSV.

While all this was going on, the other nurse, who was in there for God knows what reason other than to annoy me, prattled on about the benefits of nose suctioning, even going so far as to imply that The Boy's RSV infection may have been prevented had we but regularly suctioned The Boy's nose.

Give me a break.  The Boy has RSV because he, The Dude, and all the other kids in his class suck on the same toys five days a week.  For Heaven's sake, they steal each other pacifiers.  When one of those kids caught the virus, it was inevitable that The Boy would get it too.

So I was a frowny-faced mommy.

They offered me the bulb syringe, when it was all over.  I responded, snippily, "I use a NoseFrida to suction his nose," and did not take the stupid torture device.  Mr. The Working Mom, however, politely took the bulb syringe because he doesn't like that I tend to catch whatever The Boy catches by way of the NoseFrida.  (Mister is, generally speaking, more polite than I am, I would say.)

And I really do feel that this nose suctioning is torture for The Boy, even with the NoseFrida, and I don't really like to do it.  Here they were telling me to do it every couple of hours!  (Anyway, I always understood that you shouldn't do it too often or you could give the kiddo a nosebleed.  But nevermind that, 'tis not the point of my tale.)

Around 3 p.m. yesterday afternoon, I got a call that the RSV test on The Boy had come back positive and the doctor wanted us to come back today for a recheck.  So I made an appointment for 1:15 p.m. today.

I took The Boy to the doctor on my own today, which may have been a mistake.  (See superior politeness powers of my darling spouse.)  The Boy and I arrived in the exam room and among the questions asked of me by one of the very nurses who attended to us yesterday was, "And what is the purpose of your visit today?"  Really?  That's not in your notes on your little computer screen there from yesterday?  But I just said, "Recheck because of the RSV," flatly.

Not-Our-Regular-Pediatrician came in to check The Boy.  Among the things she said was that she had heard that I had gotten mad yesterday about the nose suctioning and so she wanted to apologize that the incident was so upsetting.  I wasn't planning to say anything about it, but since she brought it up, I explained to her that it was not the nose suctioning itself, but the unhelpful commentary by the, to my observation, superfluous nurse.  She didn't seem to understand the distinction.  For all I know Not-Our-Regular-Pediatrician also believes in the miracle cure that is nose suctioning.  I sort of let it drop, though.  No sense beating a dead horse.  We were there to get The Boy medical attention, not belabor a trivial personality dust up.  And besides, we are suctioning his nose, not every two hours, but several times a day.  And it comes right back.

The Boy's oxygen level was down and he was showing signs of labored breathing, so the doctor recommended that we do breathing treatments.  We did the first one in the doctor's office, me and a nurse (not the offending nurse).  The nurse commented several times about how strong The Boy is and how difficult it is to control him.  Yes, try to suction that nose all by yourself without two other adults to hold him down.


The doctor came back to check him again after the treatment and he was, sort of, instantly better.  His oxygen level went up a little and his breathing was not as labored.  She told me that she was sending us home with a nebulizer and that the nurse would give me the breathing treatment schedule.

So the same nurse who did the breathing treatment with me came back to give me the schedule.  Twelve days:  four treatments on the first three days, then three treatments for three days, then two treatments for three days, then one treatment for three days.

I somehow feel that it is necessary at this juncture to make crystal clear that I will do anything and everything to make The Boy well again.  Anything.  Everything.  Name it.  I'll do it.

After being given that treatment schedule I muttered (which I am want to do when stressed, I am given to understand) that the schedule might pose a bit of a logistical challenge, especially in the early days with so many treatments a day.  She said, sort of surprised, "Do you work?"

!

She never would have asked a dad that question.  Never.

I snapped back, "Yes, I work."  I went on to say (mutter) that I barely have any leave because I was on bedrest before The Boy was born, and that this will be hard, but we will figure something out.  It is not a question of whether or not to do it, but managing it.

Still, I was so angered by that remark that I really couldn't think of anything else.  Do I work?  Do I work?  Shit, lady, do you?  Look, some girls actually have fulltime jobs that are just as important as boys' jobs and stuff, golly!

I know I over-reacted.  I wanted to cry.  I just left the office and did not make a follow up appointment. I just could not stay and burst into tears and make a fool of myself.  (And the follow up appointment that I will make when I call back tomorrow is going to be with Our-Regular-Pediatrician.)  I was already stressed about the work that I am missing, deadlines that I have to meet somehow while not actually being in the office, and even more stressed about my very sick little boy.  Do I work?  I have two fulltime jobs, lady!

I called my aforementioned working mommy friend as I was walking out of the doctor's office.  And while talking to her, I did cry.  (And, she also rightly suggested that I was overreacting a bit, and very patiently listened to me and calmed me down.  Yay, friend!)

But this question that nurse asked carried with it all sorts of assumptions that just would not be made of a man.  To assume that I don't work, that I do not have other obligations that need juggling, just floored me.  I haven't asked him, but I suspect that when my brother, just last year, was staying home with his daughter while his wife worked, no one ever asked such a question of him or made any such assumptions about him.  You just wouldn't do that to man.

Who knew that I would face gender inequality at the pediatrician's office?  Certainly not me.

Man.  Wo-man.

The Boy and The Dude

One of the consequences of becoming parents for the first time in our early 40s is that my husband and I have very few friends with kids who could be our son's immediate peers.  Most of our friends' kids are older, in some cases already in college.  So we do not have a lot of ready-made friends for our boy.

This is an added benefit of daycare:  The Boy has the opportunity to make friends.

I know what "they" say:  that kids The Boy's age don't really play with other kids, they play near other kids.  Parallel play, they call it.  So I had always assumed that parallel play meant that babies don't really make friends.

Enter:  The Dude.

The Dude is just 10 days younger than The Boy.  In fact, he and The Boy look so similar that on The Dude's first day at School, The Boy's dad momentarily mistook The Dude for The Boy (until he saw their faces).

They've developed at different rates.  The Boy is quite analytical and has a pretty long attention span for a baby.  The Dude seems pretty social.  (At least, he always smiles at me!)  The Boy sits well, if you set him on his bottom, but he hasn't actually ever gotten into a seated position by himself yet.  The Boy also army crawls.  The Dude has already figured out how to sit up by himself and, this week, The Dude started crawling.  (I was so excited for him!  Go, little Dude!)  The Dude is also a tad bit bigger than The Boy.  But, generally, The Boy and The Dude are as close to each other developmentally as they can be.

The Dude is The Boy's best friend.

I know, I know . . .  how can I know this for sure?  And is that even possible?

Well, here's what I know:  When we bring The Boy to School, The Dude lights up.  The ladies who care for their class say that these two always want to play together.  The other day, I dropped The Boy off at School and The Dude squealed with delight, smiled, and banged his hand on the play mat until I put The Boy down next to him.  I have come to pick The Boy up from School to find him and The Dude awake in their cribs "talking" to each other.  And there was one day when I arrived, sat The Boy in front of The Dude on a play mat, and the two of them sat facing each other, laughing, clearly thrilled to be in each other's presence.  It was so darned cute.

Who says babies don't have friends?  My baby does.  And his friend is one cool little Dude.