Convincing Ourselves We're Mom Enough, Or What is Really Undermining Women

As a relatively new mother, I'm still figuring out my role – in the house, in the family, in the workplace, in the business world, in the mothering world and in my own sense of self.

It's a nuanced, complex and challenging place to be. But, it's my place to be. And in this place, I'd like to think I am fully thinking, and feeling, my way through it all -- my own way through it all.

But the last few weeks, a debate has been building online and off that insinuates otherwise – that seems to claim that in fact, my decisions as a mother are made from a place of influence, or fear, or insecurity.

So, I'll say this as eloquently as I can right now: Hooey. Pure, freaking, hooey.

Let me just go ahead and save you the trouble of answering the rhetorical questions raised by this firestorm of pre-Mother's Day media, by these so-called “mom wars.” (Really? Inflame much? “Wars?”)

First to the most recent question – the one posited on the cover of Time Magazine: “Are You Mom Enough?”

The answer is: Yes. No matter if you're an “attached parent” or not, the answer is yes. You are mom enough. 

Ok, that's done.

Secondly, to the question raised by the debate over Elisabeth Badinter's book – the question of “Has Modern Motherhood Undermined Women?”

The answer is: No. Absolutely not.

But you know what is undermining women?  This crap.

All of it.

This crap. And this crap. And this crap.

And what's worse – women participating in this crap -- women spitting at each other from across imaginary boundaries between the right way and the wrong way to be a mother, or a woman.

It's an old tactic, you know, making women think that the real enemy is each other.

And, we're so quick to take the bait, aren't we? (You need to look no further than that Time cover to see the evidence of "bait." See what they're doing there with that cover? To use “war” terminology, it's a blatant attempt to incite violence. And, I've been so disappointed to see, all over, that it's working.)

It's either:

Oh, so you make all your own baby food? You're probably totally be judging me for the Goldfish cracker I just fed my kid, but you know what? Screw off, you're the one doing it wrong.

Or:

So, your kid sleeps through the night? In his own crib? And, I bet you think I'm totally enabling my kid by sleeping with her, don't you? But, you know what? Screw off, you're the one doing it wrong.

You've all heard some versions of these conversations, right? I have. Both of them. Both in my own head.

But here's a little secret: that piously “attached” mom you think you see? The one so comically portrayed in these discussions? (The one chasing her kid around the playground with the homemade marmalade?) Or, the similarly ridiculously-crafted depiction of the BabyWise-reading mom who reportedly lets her 6-week-old cry for 3 hours straight to teach the baby to to self soothe?

They're just snippets of women made into caricatures -- caricatures that make for convenient news stories about "wars." Caricatures that are easy to use -- either to make blanket judgements against other women or to create imaginary judges of ourselves.

Are we that insecure about our own mothering? That we have to tear each other down to validate our own choices? That we see judgement in every parenting decision that is not the one we've chosen?

Why have we evolved to celebrate all manners of diversity within our gender except within motherhood?

Well, that's where it gets really sticky. Motherhood is a complex thing. Perhaps our most complex thing.

It's at once intensely personal and communal. Instinctual, but also intellectual.

It ties into our deepest, deepest sense of self. It's our womanhood. It's our legacy. We have a little life in our hands. It is the most important thing we will ever do. 

But, it's also something with which we can never truly measure our success. That makes us vulnerable. We want a right and a wrong way. We want measurement. We want studies. We want labels. We want something that can take this big, sticky, uncomfortable thing and make it nice and neat and black and white.

That is why we are so quick to buy into the belief that there are “sides” to mothering. Camps to join. Gurus to follow.

But we're destroying each other, our children and ourselves by thinking that.

Because when it comes right down to it, parenting is really about feeling your way in the dark, even in this modern, intellectualized, information-overloaded world. The true trick to parenting is that there are no tricks. If at first, you do no harm (and protect your children from harm), then you are Mom enough. The rest -- and how you do it -- is purely personal.

And, certainly, what we read or hear or listen to is bound to influence how we approach parenting, but just how we approach it.  We all need information and we have it and use it. But, to insinuate that outside information – outside influence -- is the pure reason we mother the way we mother, is to tell us that we aren't thinking for ourselves. (Talk about an idea that undermines women.)

I parent the way I parent not because of some book or some guru or because of my "situation in life" or because of something I fear or something I have to prove, or some trend I'm following -- as if making the world-shaking day-to-day decisions of parenting is somehow akin to picking out shoes.

I parent by the heart, not by the book.

And I can honestly say that every other mother I know does the same – whether we bottle feed or breastfeed, co-sleep or use a crib, cloth diaper or disposables, make our own baby food or buy it -- we're all doing what we feel is best, and what works for our children, our families and ourselves.

No one is allowed to put us into camps for any of those choices, individual or combined. No one is allowed to label us for them. And no one is allowed to define the value of our motherhood based upon them and them alone. Not experts, not doctors, not magazine articles, not authors, not grandmothers, aunts or uncles. 

Not other mothers and certainly, most importantly, not ourselves.

Happy Mother's Day.

A 5th Generation Farmer, In the Making

This kid looks cuter in overalls and a sun hat than any farmer I know.

I mean, if for nothing else, the farming thing is worth it just to pose my kid in clothes like this against a background like this. Right?

I don't expect her to farm when she grows up. But, until then, she has no choice. In fact, she's already picking grass.

(Kid, I will tell you this now: This is an exercise in futility. Grass grows where you don't want it to grow and dies where you do want it to grow. This is the life you will know -- you might as well get used to it.)

From Jr. High Crush to Father of My Daughter

It's impossible to explain the swell of emotion that comes over a mother when she sees her partner and her child together.

In watching Jacob fall in love with Willa, I've fallen in love with him, all over again.

From the first moment I saw her in his arms, through a haze of pain and exhaustion, I knew, this father was going to be nothing short of incredible.

He comes by it honestly. Fathers teach fathers and my husband has an amazing teacher.

Willa's entrance into the world was tough on me -- an emergency c-section after more than 24 hours of labor.

After a transfer from the birth center I was planning on birthing in, they wheeled me into an operating room where I watched nurses buzz around me. I felt pulling and pressure and asked Jacob to hold my hand. Then, they brought her out. Things suddenly got busier. Jacob was gone and I heard her cry. It was like a hazy video on fast forward, blue and green clad people walking too fast across a linoleum floor as a newborn baby wailed for the first time. I was terrified.

But then I heard his voice -- Jacob's voice -- telling me that she was a girl, that she was beautiful, that her fingernails were long and that he thought we had a Willa on our hands.

And at once, I knew she was OK, she was perfect, and most importantly, that she was in the only other hands I would want her to be in at that moment -- his.

He knew to bring her to me to nurse immediately, even though we had never talked about what do in this situation. He entered the recovery room, stepping in gingerly, slowly, with a quiet, overwhelming joy, pride and respect in his eyes.

I see the same look all the time now and every time I see it, I know that in him, Willa will always have someone to protect her, to challenge her, to coddle her, to make her giggle, to make her trust and to help her know unconditional love.

I've watched this man grow from my junior high crush to the love of my life to the father of my children. It's been an incredible thing to witness.  

He is an incredible thing to witness.

Happy Father's day. I love you more than I will ever be able to explain.

Slipknot With A Side of Bananas

I had some work to bang out on Sunday, so feeding Willa breakfast (normally my job) fell to Jacob while I planned to take a circular saw to some plywood (normally his job).

I showed him where the banana masher is, handed him her bib and scooted out the door, with just a twinge of nervousness (I'm sure the same twinge he felt with me out there with a circular saw.)

"Oh, and," I said. "She likes to listen to Natalie Merchant during breakfast."

I just barely heard him as I stepped out.

"No she doesn't," he said. "You do.

She likes Slipknot.  Don't you Willa."

Sometimes, you just have to hand them off and hold your breath, you know?

Six Months

Six months seems but a blip. And never have six months gone by as fast as they just did.

But my God, how a life can change in six months.

This little bean, buttercream breath and all, goes from this:

To this:

When little ones are so little, dew still on them, people keep telling you it gets better. The first months are so very sweet, but also so very tough. They're hard to understand, they're hard to hold, they're hard to feed and even hard to snuggle. Everything is careful and hushed.

You're just getting to know each other and that dance can be a delicate -- and sometimes lonely -- one.

So people tell you it will get better -- that there will come a day when this little bean becomes a friend, a tiny pal, a person you want to talk to, sing with, do anything for a giggle. I didn't know what they meant until now.


Giggly Willa from conradcowgills on Vimeo.

The Pregnant Farmer Turns Into The Mama Farmer

When J was first offered his fantastic job, we'd just come off of our first season farming and had somehow managed to survive on my modest and then quite sporadic pay. It was harrowing, to say the very least, to figure out how to live on so very little and with so few guarantees that -- small or not -- the next check would come at all, or ever again.

We were trying to get pregnant at the time -- for like the 14th month -- and I started to convince myself that baby wasn't coming because somehow the universe knew we didn't have the capacity to handle a baby, either financially or otherwise.

And, I wasn't sure how I could be a Mom and work the way I was working. I'd almost always been the breadwinner in the family and that pressure was immense when I considered that on top of caring for a wee one.

So, at the word "benefits" we jumped at J's job offer, and fast.

But, what about the farm? At the time, I told him that if he was working full time, I would go part time with my off-farm job and become the primary farmer the next season.

Then, I got pregnant.

Fooled him, didn't I?

I was some help on the farm last year and even spent the day before I went into labor on my hands and knees weeding the parsley, but largely (ha!) I couldn't cut it.

There was so much that went undone, so many opportunities we may have lost, so many ventures tossed aside -- all because we were short handed and of the hands we did have, one set was swollen from all the water retention.

So, as I look at pictures of the farm from last fall, weeds overgrown and turnips and carrots left in the beds to rot, I'm terrified that we'll do it all over again, or maybe even fall shorter.

See those large masses to the right of the high tunnel? Yeah. Those are supposedly beds of carrots.

I'm trying to imagine how we're going to manage a full-time off-farm job for J, a part-time one for me and my more than full-time Mama role and so far, I'm coming up blank.

But for now, the seeds need to be started to I'm learning to work around nap schedules. I take the baby monitor into the greenhouse and start seeding, as fast as I can, hoping that she'll sleep long enough to get a few flats going. Other times, I strap her into the front carrier, hook her onto "life support" as my friend Steph calls it, and away we go.

So, far, we're all keeping up, but the ground will thaw soon and then we'll see just how feasible a family and a farm can be.

Finding Some Balance

When it's this cold and windy, it's hard not to go just a little bit nuts.

Last week, while having one of those hanging-by-a-thread-so-thin-it-would-break-in-a-soft-breeze sort of days, I decided to stop for a moment and do a little yoga while Willa napped.

Nap time is so very precious, and I know I should be taking time for myself, but inevitably, I end up working or planting, cleaning or prepping dinner.

So, I've been trying to prioritize time for my mind and my body.

That means yoga. In the course of the last 10 years, I've gone in and out of practice, needing yoga more during some times and less during others. But it's been a constant in my life -- something I've always seemed to find my way back to. I can't (or won't) run and I don't have any other major physical tendencies other than work so yoga is my exercise of choice.

It's helped keep me centered and relatively sane through bouts of depression, loneliness, intense stress and transition, cancer and a few years of infertility. You could say it's been good to me.

Doing Ourselves a Solid

The day of Willa's first meal started like this:

The book says winter squash at 6 months. She's five and a half. Maybe we should start with sweet potatoes.

But we can't grow sweet potatoes. We have our own winter squash and wouldn't it be better to start her on something we grew?

How do we make sure the spoon is fully sanitized?

What's that spot on the sweet potato, is it rotten?

What if I got the wrong kind of water? Did the book say spring water or purified water?

How long do I have to boil the water?

Why does she have to have water again?

And, really? I need to watch her water intake because too much could make her *what* fail?

Are you sure the cup is BPA free?

Are we sure this is the right time? One study says 4 months, another says 6 months. What if she develops allergies because of this?

All these questions I hadn't thought of before started popping up and just like that, just when I thought I had things figured out, I didn't.

But, after a minor panic attack, Jacob assured me that for centuries, mothers and fathers had figured out how to feed their children and we could too.

So, I mixed stirred and breathed and then fed my baby. Smooth as sweet potato puree.

A few days and we had the food thing down pat.

With sweet potatoes at least.