I’m a new mom. I’m lucky enough that I can stay at home this first year, if not longer, and see my baby boy grow older and learn and be excited about the diggy* monster for the first time. As a first-time stay at home mom, though, after being a full time wage earner and professional in my field, it’s been a hard slog. The kind of ambition and drive that I had to do the best work and be on the ball all the time and go-go-go-go-go doesn’t translate happily into my new life and how it’s oriented.
Take, for example, my desire to cloth diaper. It wasn’t enough to try it and be happy with the process I found that worked for me, I had to immerse myself in it, eat it, breathe it, grok it. Forum haunting? Check. Obsessive need to try things based on other mom’s experiences and raves? Check. Increasing concern about the “right” thing, the “perfect diaper” and being the best and on the ball? Check, check, and check.
The thing is, I wish I could say this is an isolated thing. I used t scoff at “alpha moms” and the networks and websites that aided and abetted that behavior, but I think know for a fact I am just a shade or two away from that. How far under the surface of the sea do you have to go before it goes from light to dark? There’s no hard line, just a gradual shading until the light is gone.
This tendency has been part of the reason I have been a tense, unhappy mess. Why isn’t Jack sleeping? Consult 5 books and numerous articles to know every detail or different methods, and then go insane trying to figure out what to do. Solids at four months? Same thing–the kiddo loves eating and gets excited every time he is strapped into his highschair and has his bib tucked around him, but yet I worry.
I know, I know! Worrying shows you’re a good mom, but there’s a time when that worry just saps your strength and lessens the joys of what you see every day. I don’t want to have the joy of being with my son and husband every day lessened. It doesn’t mean I’m not going to push to get th ehouse clean or unpacked (yeah, we’re the bright bulbs that moed 2 weeks post partume), but the other stuff? Well, to quote H. I. McDunnough, “Nathan Jr accepts me for what I am! And I think you better had, too! You know I’m okay, you’re okay! That there’s what it is!”
Yeah.
*”diggy” is derived from “tickle”. Think about it… what do you say when you’re tickling the wee one? “tickle tickle tickle!” OK, now say “Ticky, ticky, ticky” really fast… thus the Diggy Monster was born. Also known as Mr. Diggy.