MamaBlogga

I know that I, like a lot of other mothers, can’t wait until my children are older. When Hayden doesn’t have to bug me for every Goldfish and glass of water, when the baby doesn’t kick me all the time, when Hayden grows out of the “Drama King” stage (aka the terrible twos), etc., etc.—then I’ll be able to say “this was worth it.”

But y’know what? The reason I started this blog—and Making Mother’s Day Merry—is because I don’t want to look back and say “this was worth it.” I want to be able to look at them now (okay, well, look at Hayden for now) and say “This IS worth it.”

I know, perhaps all too well, that this won’t happen every day. But I can’t wait until they’re older to finally begin to think that I’ve made the right choice with my life.

Of course, I do hope and expect to have a day when my children are grown and off on their own, leading good, responsible lives when I will be able to say “This has been so worth it.”

But today, I’m not condescending from that lofty peak of experience to tell you that joy can be found when you finally make it up there. Frankly, I can’t promise that to myself or to anyone else.

Instead, I’m trying to gain at least a little of that mountain-top perspective where I am today. If I don’t start working toward enjoying motherhood today, I’m really not sure I’ll ever get to a point where I can look back and say, “Yeah, that was worth it, after all.” I’m not sure I’ll have anything to look back on with fondness if I don’t appreciate what motherhood is today.

Yes, motherhood entails work. But that is not what motherhood is. And if I don’t take time to enjoy motherhood now, I think that motherhood will never be anything more than just work to me.

So, no, I can’t wait until my children are older. I simply can’t wait that long to, as I said on Wednesday, recognize “that raising my children is important, and quite probably the most important thing I’ll ever do—to understand that it’s a task that’s worth doing.”

Yesterday, I asked:

Do you find it difficult to honor motherhood? I know I do! If so, why do you think that is? Is it the nature of the work? Pressures from others? Pressures and expectations from yourself?

For me, it’s a combination of the three, of course, but mostly expectations I have for myself, followed by the repetitive and even “drudgerous” nature of the “work” of motherhood.

But even as I pondered that, I realized that my underlying assumption here is misleading. Yes, motherhood is work. It’s hard work, even. But motherhood itself, motherhood as an institution, has very little to do with the maintenance- and housework that we commonly associate it.

As I’ve said before, motherhood isn’t about housework. It’s not about cleaning or cooking or organizing, though all those things are part-and-parcel of the tasks that come with having children. But “Motherhood is not, at its heart, about doing. Motherhood is about being. Because motherhood isn’t just something you do; it’s who you are.”

Granted, these tasks are important—and time consuming. But perhaps if we separate the day-to-day chores that accompany (or are simply magnified by) the arrival children, we’ll be able to slowly begin to see motherhood in a positive light.

What do you think? Can we mentally separate the maintenance of our children (and our own) from the meaning of motherhood?