The Mommy Club |
Tales from two tribes: The "have birthed" and "have not birthed"
There’s a club that many mothers don’t want to admit to: a Phi Beta Placenta sorority complete with its own decoder ring (twist-tie) and secret handshake (sticky jam hand).If you herd 72 women into a room, they will, by nature, break off into small bands of the “Have Birthed” and the “Have Not Birthed” tribes. The Have Nots desperately trying to avoid being sucked into another conversation expounding on cracked nipples or how little Johnny will be the next brain surgeon because he can correctly sort shapes in his shape sorter.
The Haves will be smugly avoiding discussions centering on how “I went through the same thing with my dog,” and avoiding the raised-eyebrow-forced-smile-head-nod when they really want to say “Yes, I put Johnny on the porch in the winter while I clean up his pee on the floor, too!”
Every once in a while a stray breaks off from the Have Nots herd to venture in to the Haves. Usually she’s recently discovered that she’s pregnant and she wants to see how the other half really lives.
A side-effect of a first-time pregnancy seems to be the belief that you actually know what you are getting into. There’s a look that crosses a pregnant woman’s face when a mother starts to expound on what it’s like to have kids. It’s the “oh sure, that may be what it was like for you because you are a bad/unprepared/unrealistic/overbearing/uncontrolled mother. It will be different for me” look. This is why the first tenant of motherhood should be Never Give Advice To a Pregnant Woman.
The Haves would like to send a message to the Have Nots:
The number one priority spot is now eternally taken. It is something that we can’t explain to the non-moms. No matter what is happening and what is going on around you, your thoughts will be on how this will affect your children or on what they are doing. It isn’t possible to just forget that they exist, or put them out of your mind for a night out.
They are there. You can hear their voices, see their smiles. Running home to let the puppy out of the kennel is not the same as running to pick up Johnny from day care. It just isn’t.
We’ve all seen the looks in the supermarket, on the airplane, at the mall, when our child is crying or screaming, or flinging himself limply on the ground. And, really, we don’t much care that your shopping experience is being ruined, or that you think we should just “spank his butt”. Chances are that as frustrating as it is for you, it is exponentially more frustrating for us. This is after all, our child.
If you want peacefulness and calm, go to a spa. Or stay at home, where you can perfectly parent your puppy. The Mommy Club is only open to the imperfect.
About the Author
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Heather Cook
Heather Cook has been writing professionally since 1995 for regional, national and international publications. She currently writes on a regular basis for publications like the Western Horse Review, The Quarter... Learn more about Heather Cook
Carolyn E | March 30, 2008 at 5:35 pm - §
This article is so funny. I was that woman who "knew" it would be different for me. But I have to say, dog-training methods work pretty well on kids! (Um, things like repetition and instant rewards or consequences, not leashes and shock collars... lol.)
Carly | April 29, 2008 at 3:13 pm - §
I find this article to be somewhat derisive to moms who haven't 'birthed'. I am a stepmom, and I'm sure that other moms out there (adoptive moms, foster moms, etc.) would disagree with you that just because we haven't 'birthed' our kids means that we believe in perfection, peacefulness, calm -- and that our priority spots are up for grabs. You do not need to have given birth to experience eternal love for another person. As usual, canadianparents.com publishes articles that idolize women who are able to have 'natural' and 'normal' family lives, rather than the thousands of different experiences of each woman who becomes a parent.
Heather Cook | May 23, 2008 at 12:00 am - §
Carly,I'm so sorry, it wasn't my intention to be derisive to step moms or adoptive moms... I was jsut writing from my experience with single women. I would include any mother in the "birthed" category, no matter how you came to be a mother.