A few days from now, my firstborn son will be turning eight. EIGHT! How did this happen? I mean, one minute I’m trying to figure out what I’m actually supposed to do with this brand-new tiny scrap of a human being, and the next minute I’m chasing around this long, lanky eight-year-old who keeps growing out of his clothes and eating everything he can see.
When I was a little kid, I was a tomboy. I was not the kind of girly girl who people look at and say, “Oh, she will be a wonderful mother someday.”
In fact, people probably looked at me and worried that if I ever had a baby, I’d accidentally break off its arm. And who can blame them? Whenever I tried to play with dolls, I somehow ended up breaking them. If I couldn’t keep a doll alive, how could I be expected to take care of a real baby?
I was not what you might call a domestic goddess, although my girls-only Catholic school education tried valiantly to turn me into one. From fifth grade right through to ninth grade, we were given mandatory home ec projects, and the few that I actually managed to complete were unmitigated disasters.
The first of these was simple enough: a knitted scarf. I mean, you’d think it wouldn’t be that hard to knit a scarf.
HA!
While the other girls were tying the tassels onto their completed scarves, I was still working away with the dreaded knitting needles, trying to come up with something that would go around a ketchup bottle, never mind a human neck. In the end I gave up and tried – without success – to stretch out my efforts with the aid of the back yard and a pair of croquet hoops. I was quite resourceful for a ten-year-old, especially when it came to cheating on my home ec assignments.
Two years later, we had to make aprons. By some miracle, I succeeded in handing in my apron on time, along with the other girls in my class. After what seemed like an interminable wait, the day came for the home ec teacher to give us our grades for our creations.
One by one, she would call up the girls to the front of the class, offer them an encouraging remark about their apron, and announce their grade. My peers were getting grades of 80% and more, along with comments like “Well done!” or “Beautiful straight stitching!” When I was called up, the teacher stared at me in silence for a long time. Finally, she said, “There is nothing I can say about this alleged apron.” After another long pause, she delivered the grade: 12%.
We will not discuss The Great Custard Fiasco Of 1983, or any of other disasters that were supposed to teach me all I would need to know about being a wife and mother. At the end of Grade 9, I flew out of the home ec room fast enough to leave an astonished cloud of dust in my wake, and I never returned. The home ec teacher, who clearly did not hold out much hope for my future as a homemaker, was glad to see the back of me.
On a cool September morning twenty years later, I suddenly started nesting. I was nine months pregnant and my belly was out to here. I woke up on the day in question with an inexplicable need for action. I vacuumed up a storm, did all of the laundry, and even cleaned the windows.
I went grocery shopping and then attacked the kitchen with a vengeance, cooking all kinds of meals that could be frozen and reheated. In a move that horrified my husband, I even pulled up the bedroom carpet and cleaned up the hardwood floor underneath.
If my home ec teacher could have seen me flitting around like Martha Stewart on steroids, she would have keeled over and died of shock.
To my complete surprise, and probably that of the people who had known me as a child, the birth of my first child revealed that I do have a reasonably reliable maternal (and semi-domesticated) instinct. That’s not to say that I always know what I’m doing – I wing it a lot with this whole parenting thing. But my kids are healthy and happy, and they are never short of a giant hug for their Mommy.
And that’s good enough for me.
When you were a child, did you just know that you were going to grow up to be a good parent? Or did you worry that parenting just wouldn’t come naturally to you? Have your experiences lived up to your childhood expectations?
This is an original post for World Moms Blog by Kirsten Doyle of Toronto, Canada. Kirsten can also be found on her blog, Running for Autism, or on Twitter @Running4autism. You can also connect with her on Facebook.
Photo credit to the author.
Kirsten Doyle (Canada)
Kirsten Doyle was born in South Africa. After completing university, she drifted for a while and finally washed up in Canada in 2000. She is Mom to two boys who have reached the stage of eating everything in sight (but still remaining skinny). Kirsten was a computer programmer for a while before migrating into I.T. project management. Eventually she tossed in the corporate life entirely in order to be a self-employed writer and editor. She is now living her best life writing about mental health and addictions, and posting videos to two YouTube channels. When Kirsten is not wrestling with her kids or writing up a storm, she can be seen on Toronto's streets putting many miles onto her running shoes. Every year, she runs a half-marathon to benefit children with autism, inspired by her older son who lives life on the autism spectrum. Final piece of information: Kirsten is lucky enough to be married to the funniest guy in the world. Connect with her on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. Be sure to check out her YouTube channels at My Gen X Life and Word Salad With Coffee!
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Kirsten,
Thank you for sharing this! I remember dropping an egg on the floor in my home ec (Home Economics) class in middle school. I thought I was doomed!
I often imagined having babies when I was little and saw myself as a mom. As for parenting — everything is soooo much more difficult than I ever imagined. But wow. Having kids has been so rewarding. And, on top of it all — I found all of you — my online motherhood community to help me feel that I’m not so alone!
I love this post!!
Jen 🙂
You are right – parenting is a lot harder than it looks from the outside! The online support is great, isn’t it? Honestly, I wonder how people managed to be parents without becoming completely unhinged before the Internet came along!
Jen,
My egg rolled off my desk during class. You heard every roll and then a crack! I can’t remember that teacher’s name, but she would always talk in her softest voice when she wanted us to be quiet (8th grade). Of course this was when my egg rolled and broke! I tried to get it before it fell, but it happened so fast and in slow motion at the same time. I just remember looking at my little egg, that I thought I would have no problem keeping safe. Yoke was on the floor and the teacher kept talking. I couldn’t do anything, but look at it. Eventually, she walked over to me and told me to get a janitor. 🙁
My 2nd egg made it the rest of the week, though! I did better with my parenting!
I always wanted to be a mom. It was my goal in life. I was going to be a stay-at-home with my 2-3 kids and life was going to be amazing. It didn’t matter that I couldn’t cook or bake without burning something and making the biggest mess in the world, or that I couldn’t learn to sew to save my life. The domestic stuff would kick in when I became a grown up.
Then I found out I’m not really cut out for that sort of life. My one little boy is perfect for me, and I like working outside of the home. I don’t enjoy cooking or baking or sewing. I am not domestic. My house is often a mess. But I wouldn’t have it any other way.
Once my first son was born, I had this picture of myself having three kids and working part-time. As it happened, we decided to stop at two and I have to work full-time. Things don’t always turn out the way we plan, but what we end up with is just what we need. My two kids are perfect for me. And like you, I find that being undomestic doesn’t really matter.
I didn’t have home ec until the 6th grade, and the following year we moved, so I started in a new school which did not offer home ec. The one year that I had – I loved! Interestingly enough, I never really thought about having children, I just knew I would. I had always been very maternal (my teammates in college called me ‘mother hen’). When I was in college my mother tried to convince me to have a breast reduction surgery (I am very large in that dept), and told her no since I wanted to breastfeed. It wasn’t until that very moment that it hit me that I actually thought about it. Now that I am a mother, my house is always a mess, and admittedly not the cleanest house that I have ever been to (after all, I do have a full time job), but my kids are well taken care of and happy and that’s all I can ask for!
LOL I’m glad you were able to stand up to your mother! You raise an interesting point – there seems to be an increase in young women having cosmetic surgery on their breasts. I wonder if they ever consider what this could mean for breastfeeding in the future.
From one undomestic goddess to another: I hear you, sister! I relate so much to your post. For me, I always wanted to be a mom, but I am just all thumbs in the domestic department. In fact, my husband is much more skilled than I am. But I am muddling my way through. I wrote a post about it awhile back: http://worldmomsblog.com/2011/03/15/washington-state-usa-searching-for-my-inner-domestic-goddess/. As for the picture in my post – if you and I ever get to meet, maybe we can both lie on the kitchen floor with some wine and toast our undomestic sensibilities but awesome motherly instincts! 😉
I *love* that idea! In fact, I love it so much that we should plan to meet just for the sake of drinking wine together on the kitchen floor!
Hi always wanted to be a Mum, and I firmly believe that being one DOESN’T mean I am a slave to the house or any other Domestic Goddess type activities!! With three very active boys there isn’t much hope anyway…In the end I’d rather be remembered for my hugs than my shiny floor.
My son once had a playdate in a house that was so clean and sterile that it barely looked lived in. His energetic running around was frowned upon by the mother of the other child, while the other child sat on the couch with his hands folded demurely in his lap. The kid did not have a scrap of animation in him, and I think he had been strongly conditioned to be “good” at the expense of fun and affection. It was actually very sad. You hit it right on the head: the love and affection we show our kids is more important than whether the vacuuming has been done.
i loved reading this 🙂 I enjoy your sense of humor and writing style, and love learning more about you!