|
De_Integro
|
read my profile
sign my guestbook
Name: Esther
Gender: Female
Interests: Being the best mum/wife/friend/sister/daughter/me that I can be, reading every night, writing every day, taking lots of photos, and of course, playing the piano!
Message: message me
Member Since:
3/1/2009
|
|
| When the most significant people in your life continually invalidate you, you start to question your reality.
“Maybe I’m not really sick?”
“Maybe I am unattractive?”
“Maybe I am over-sensitive?”
“Maybe I am a bad mother?”
- (Even though I’ve been told and proven otherwise on all those points! Rrr.) I went from living with my parents to, at the age of 17, living with my now husband. I never did the whole living by myself as an adult thing. I’ve never had the emotional space to figure out who I am, and what I really want to do with my life. (I know I made the decision to move out myself, but considering the circumstances under which that decision was made, I had no other option.) When you constantly get bombarded by everyone else’s opinions about your life, how do you hear your own voice over that noise, especially when your own voice is unrecognisable? I don’t really know who I am. Which is a scary thought as a parent. And it also makes combating personal attacks extremely hard. So how do you find out who you really are when you don’t have the time, financial ability, or emotional space to do so??? | | |
| The other day, in childlike naivety, my nephew said to someone “I can’t trust what you say, because you’re always optimistic.” And I thought, ‘finally, I’m not the only one who thinks like this!’ I know I know, being optimistic means you’re statistically likely to live 8 years longer...but when did being positive mean you don’t have to be realistic? As you can probably tell, I’m not an optimistic person. Don’t get me wrong, I do try. But it doesn’t come naturally to me at all. Blame it on my personality type, my childhood, or the amount of times I’ve been let down; but whatever the cause, being optimistic is hard for me. I’ve spend years observing positive people and being slightly jealous of the fact that they genuinely see the glass half full. But the more I talk to optimistic people, the less jealous I become. Because optimistic people are rarely realistic. And therefore, they are dishonest. Just because you’re an optimistic person, that doesn’t mean you have an excuse to lie. What’s wrong with being optimistic and realistic at the same time? “Yeah things aren’t going well at the moment, but next month looks much better thanks.” Is that really so hard? To me, optimism seems an excuse to not see the situation for what it really is. To put on those rose coloured glasses so you don’t have to deal with the facts as they are. Yes, agreeing with the thought processes of a 9 year old boy did make me question my perspective. But after a day of mulling, I came to the same conclusion. Optimistic people are rarely realistic. When faced with a ‘glass-half-full’ person, I have to decipher what they’re saying to try and find the truth behind it. And that’s disappointing because they’re not being honest. | | |
|  It surprises me that whenever faced with the question “what do you do?” I feel the need to apologise. With embarrassment I answer, “I’m just a mum.” It disappoints me that I feel I have to add the “just”. But the greater disappointment occurs in the split second after my answer – their reaction. The eyes glaze over and they mumble “that’s nice”, whilst scanning the room for someone more interesting to talk to. Why is it now socially unacceptable to choose to be a stay-at-home (SAH) mum? And since when did that choice mean that I suddenly have nothing of value to say? Today, even though women’s roles and rights have transformed drastically over the decades, I still feel immense social pressure to be something different than what I’ve chosen; to ‘do more’. Because our predecessors fought so hard for us to have the opportunities they did not, today there is the expectation to do everything we now rightfully can: study and work and have children and be financially independent and have a partner or even a husband (if we want one!). And because of this pressure, I continually find myself degrading the decision I made; “I’m JUST a stay-at-home mum.” People seem to question; since women faced such persecution to change the house wife role, why would anyone want to choose to go back to that? Fortunately, I’m in the position to even have the choice to be a SAH mum (for now!). Yet I still feel the weight of society’s expectations to juggle working or studying in addition to raising children. Personally I don’t want to juggle all those balls. Especially when one of them is my children. I only have until the age of 5 before my girls spend the majority of their time at school and out of this bubble of influential protection at home. I want to spend as much time as I can in those 5 years to help shape moral, independent, confident, compassionate, and courageous women. Yet because of this decision, I am often treated as someone with nothing of relevance or interest to say. I hope one day I can learn to not buckle under societal pressure and answer that question with “I’m a stay-at-home mum and proud of it.” Because honestly, I am. God forbid, but I agree with Oprah - being a SAH mum is one of the hardest jobs in the world. I want to teach my girls to be proud of whatever role they choose in life, and I hope that by then, society will support women’s freedom of choice without judgement. Yes, just like other mums, I can give you tips on removing poo stains, weening a baby off a bottle and dealing with a full blown public tantrum. But there is so much more to me than that. Since when did being a SAH mum and an interesting woman become mutually exclusive? | | |
| Hi everyone! I'm just getting started on Xanga... Drop me a comment if you've got some ideas on what to do first - or just to say, "Hi!"  | | |
|
