The Cloud of Resentment

A friend sent me this article the other day. It's a little old, well, two months old. But that's an eternity when you are talking about controversies over magazines and breast feeding! The main idea is, as a mom, if you hate doing something don't do it. It sounds so simple but nothing is simple when it comes to parenting. You may hate baby wearing or breastfeeding (or any other parenting trend) but we feel compelled or almost forced to do it because, well, giant pointer fingers seem to always be jammed in our faces at any moment. The list is endless: breastfeeding, extended breastfeeding, cloth diapers, swaddling, co-sleeping, baby wearing, stay at home, go back to work, attachment parenting, making our own baby food, Ferberizing, look out! BPA is going to kill us! , sleep training, cry it out, oh no-- don't do cry it out it will damage your child forever. It's enough to make you crazy and add it with some good old fashioned stress and sleep deprivation and there you have it. Nuts. Totally nutso mama. So not doing something because you hate it is a little more complicated when you are a parent because you are responsible for another human.  Plus if they fail in any way,  the pointing begins even if it's not physical or real, we feel it. Maybe we are just pointing at ourselves but the pressure is real.

So it got me thinking what do I hate about parenting. My first thought is my two year old but that's not totally true. She has moments of real sweetness and hilarity mixed in with her particular brand of crazy. I hate bedtime. Can't really get rid of that though...I did get to a point where I just had to let some of it go so we put up a gate in her room. I hated doing cloth diapers with Callie once she turned two so I stopped. But I felt compelled to have someone else tell me it was ok. The cloth diaper thing is so hard for me because I feel strongly about the fact that we should try to help our planet as much as we can and diapers last forever in those landfills! So I feel sometimes that I have to do it because there are so many other people not doing it. But it got to the point with Callie that it was just making things so much harder. I texted a couple people as I struggled with it and  they gave me the permission I was craving. And then I thought to myself, I made it two years with only a disposable diaper at night. That's pretty darn good. You know what else I hated? Reusable baby wipes. What a mess. Loved the idea but damn Gina, I already have mountains of laundry! I will admit, I buy into most of the parenting trends but I don't feel that I go overboard. It works for us. But when I have let things go, like Callie's cloth diapers, the wave of relief was palpable. What a relief! And there is the value of letting things go. I love when the author says "A woman cannot live a life or raise a child in a cloud of resentment. Resentment is life-threatening. It's enfeebling. And it's everywhere." It is so true! Resentment is a destructive force especially when coupled when the enormous amounts of pressure, guilt and finger pointing that comes our way. So let's do ourselves and our kids a favor. Let's ease up a little bit and try to remember why we had kids. For the fun, for the love and to redisover some of what we have lost as we have become responsible adults. Because let's face it, every morning is more fun when you start it with your pants on your head or wearing a strainer for a hat,  like my girl here.