This week, we welcome the brilliant Jane Clare as our guest blogger. She’s one funny mummy over at the brilliant blog, The Postmodern Mammy.
I say mommy, but I am a mammy. My ‘good scissors’ is stashed away in a secret location, and I make buns, not cupcakes. My son since starting school is now calling me mummy – that I am adjusting too. It was very much a conscious decision to be a mammy, and part of me really resents the Americanisation of parenting culture. And, subsequently the portrayal of moms in the media, here are my two main mommy myths that I would like to debunk.
Mommy guilt
When I had my son five years ago, I managed to get a part-time job for two days a week. The holy grail. So rare, that I have seen more juggling monkeys. So I did what all good social scientists do when a change is coming. I did some research. I was puzzled. Most of the return to work guidelines that Google threw up were about managing mommy guilt. I had already left a job, successfully had, and subsequently not, poisoned a baby, and now it was assumed that I was going to feel guilty about leaving the tiny screaming baby for two days and a tea break. Why am I supposed to be feeling guilty? An actual fifteen minutes of sitting, quietly, and having an entire cup of tea. I will never forget that first cup of tea in work post baby. I felt like I had won the lotto.
It turns out I ended up feeling guilt over not feeling guilt…and a bit worried about the mammy-shaped dust cloud I left as I raced past my mother-in-law on the first day.
The real issue at the heart of this problem is the lack of well-paid, flexible part-time jobs – have you ever mentioned in a job interview that you were looking for flexibility? There’s normally a gap of a thousand years before they smile that smile that never reaches their eyes as they nod and say yes. Of course, they are flexible. You can start at 8.30pm instead of 9pm, but you will have to finish at the same time. Great! Where do I sign!
Mommy wars
This is an issue for some geographical areas more than others. Living in South County Dublin, I am in prime mommy wars territory. Mommy wars have been widely misunderstood by those trying to prove that it exists. It does exist; it is a right royal pain in the proverbial, but it is not a parenting thing. It’s a southside thing. People don’t suddenly become insufferably perfect when they become parents; that’s a lifetime thing. It’s just presented in the media as unique to moms. The endless competition, the comparing, the pushiness…. anyone who has queued for the bar in club 92 on a busy night knows that the southside jostle for supremacy runs deep under the dart line, and transcends life stages. The Mommy wars are just misunderstood life wars….
Jane is a freelance writer based in Dublin; she recently left the NGO sector to pursue a career in writing. She has two children and runs the Postmodern Mammy blog when not mammying. She has also been published and may one day get around to a book. Catch up with her on Twitter or Facebook.
