On Motherhood

A few weeks back I went to the local park with my two kids. Nothing out of the ordinary here. What was exceptional was how I felt. Sitting on the park bench, I had what seemed like an epiphany: I realised how amazingly easy it was. That I was a 'good enough mother' to have two preschoolers playing happily.

Usually co-parenting my two youngsters, despite its highest of highs, can feel like being stuck in a Dr Who episode, narrowly averting one catastrophe after another. You know, the simplest things: 'Look for cars', 'You'll fall off your chair', 'No, don't stuff walnuts in your ears.'

Of course, my husband and I fail as often as we succeed in this parenting gig. Minor disasters occur, there are tears, and guilt. The only way to deal with the latter being humour. We cast the terms 'Bad Mother' and Bad Father' around ('BF' & 'BM', for short), as a way to lighten the mood, to show how trivial such lapses really are.

But not on this sunny winter's afternoon. No, on this afternoon it was a 'breeze', a 'cinch', it was 'a piece of cake'. I was that ghostly apparition of advertising that haunts parents everywhere. I was the 'Good Mother'.

Now it felt wonderful, but moments of such comfortable ease are rare. That's not to say that parenting is all slog and burden - it's not. It's wonderful. That's why we have two kids, by choice. But understating the hard yakka involved doesn't help anyone.

This is my long way of saying that Jo Case's piece 'Motherhood: a piece of cake?' in today's Age is a good read. Jo's defending the need to whinge about the parenting gig from the oppressive 'mustn't grumble' ethos.

A whinge, every now and then, helps us put the things that trouble us into words. It brings them to consciousness, although this isn't necessarily transformative. At it's most simple, a whinge relieves the pressure. At its most transforming, it's the first step to trying another way, looking for a solution, whether this be big or small.

(Image: Stilfehler.)