Tag Archives: parenting

On Mothering: Words from a non-Superwoman

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I’ve always loved my mother, always known that she is invaluable, but it wasn’t until I had my own child that I truly realized the work mothers put in.  Even now, I type this with one hand. (The other is on baby duty.) There is little in life that prepares you for the task of raising a tiny person.  No book can tell it; no class can teach it. It all has to be learned there on the spot, right in those moments when you’re tired and frustrated, angry and agitated, lost and confused. That is the job of a mother. Yet and still, it is the most rewarding job around.

 I don’t know what other mothers went through, but nowadays, it’s tough to be the Superwomen we’re expected to be.  “Have it all,” they say. And we sure do try, balancing parenting, careers, personal relationships and our social lives better than any juggler you’ve ever seen.  It all looks so easy—to the ill-informed observer. We, however, know better.

Anyone who is decent in math is already aware: A pie cannot be divided into “wholes.” The more shares there are to go around, the smaller each share is. That is an absolute, in math and in life. The harder we try to be Superwomen, capable of all things at all times, the farther we get away from the natural balance.

This is not to say that a mother must be that and only that. I am completely against losing yourself in the eye of motherhood. This is to say that sacrifices do have to be made. Somewhere between June Cleaver and GI Jane, some of us adopted the idea that mothering is just another notch on the belt, a blip on our life events radar. Being a parent takes a type of commitment that can’t be replicated. It takes a type of energy that can never be depleted, and it takes an understanding that it is okay human.

Mothers aren’t larger-than-life super beings. Attempting to be one only leads to disappointment you definitely don’t need.  Finding the balance between fading into nothing and reaching to be everything can be hard. Between the two lies a thick gray area that is rarely discussed in public forums. It sometimes seems that the only options are to lose yourself in motherhood or lose yourself in an attempt not to lose yourself in motherhood (if that makes any sense). I suggest another option, a middle road. Give yourself permission not to be that overworked woman with much worth enjoying and little time to enjoy it. Give yourself permission to wait, breathe, and experience wherever you are in your life right now.  Before you know it, your children will be grown and you will be wondering where the time went.

I have plenty of personal  goals I’d like to accomplish outside of motherhood, and some of them have had to be shelved for the time being. I’m okay with that. I had no problem bumping them down a spot on my priority list. My focus now is building a foundation for my daughter while still maintaining a semblance of my previous life. That alone is a handful. Everything else will be achieved in time.

~Nadirah Angail

If you’ve noticed, I haven’t posted in a while. That’s because I’ve been working on turning my blog into a book. Be on the look out for “On all the things that make me beautiful: Short inspirational essays on life, love and self.”

On Drops and Beams

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water dropExcluding my own personal hang-ups, I get discouraged for good reason. I’m trying ridiculously hard to put a drop in what seems to be a bottomless bucket; and people wonder why I constantly question my decision to be in the family therapy profession. As rewarding as it is to successfully shine a beam of hope into a far-off, dark tunnel, the many failed tries have their consequences too.

Like many new therapists, I came into this field with big, naïve dreams of helping people and changing the world with my keen insight, positive words of encouragement and discerning eye. I knew that there were tons of people in tough situations, dying to have some change injected into their lives. So there I stood, smile big as ever, therapeutic needle in hand. But little did I realize the army that I’d need to complete the tasks I’d set out to tackle on my own. One person certainly can affect change, but to step into such a static and expansive grid, teeming with obstacles, booby traps, and “flashing lights” (thanks Kanye) and think that you can be the one to turn it all around is unrealistic. And who should be more based in reality than a therapist? Or at least that’s how it seems.

But how it really is is something completely different. Daily, we go to the office or into the homes and discuss various things with various people. No need to go into depth. Just know that our job is to help individuals and, preferably, families to find better ways to get their needs met. That’s all therapy really comes down to. No matter what someone is doing, no matter how destructive, maladaptive, or counterintuitive it may be, know that it serves a purpose and meets some need that was previously unmet. Humans are just wired that way, to survive in the best and only way we know how.

So, then the task of the therapist is to help them discover other options? “Simple enough. Case closed. Let’s all go home, because once I go in there with this long list of options and present them in an appropriate yet inoffensive manner, the job will be done,” thinks an eager and inexperienced therapist. And in a perfect world, every session would end ten minutes to the hour and there would be no such thing as “no shows.” But in the real world—the one we’re all forced to accept sooner or later— sessions can go on for three hours, clients will stand you up, and the problem that brought them into therapy can be just as present in the last session as it was in the first. Now, is that the sign of a bad therapist? I don’t know. (My answer changes with my confidence level). But, it seems to be a sign of an important fact: We’re up against giants, here.

So many families come from environments that scream to them, in surround sound, “How dare you think you’re anything more that what you see around you?!” From the moment they exit the womb, they have neighbors, friends, teachers, family members, complete strangers and even parents chipping away at their innate potential. (And that’s just on a micro level. I didn’t even mention the macro factors of social issues and government.) Needless to say, by the time they get to us, that beautiful potential has oftentimes been whittled down to a mere suggestion of its former self. Not only that, but they’re encased in communities that too have had the very nature carved out of them. And here I am, trying to put a drop in this bottomless bucket.

For some people, we are the only ones even trying to shine beams their way, the only ones trying to throw out a lifeline. That’s 1hr./week of therapy and 167hrs./wk of the indescribably strong magnetic-like pull of the streets. You do the math. I cannot do this alone. We cannot do this alone. The most successful client’s I’ve seen have had their own cheering sections made up of neighbors, friends, teachers, family members, complete strangers and, of course, parents. (Funny how the same people that pull you down can boost you up.) One of my teachers told me, in a perfect world, therapists wouldn’t exist. The families and communities would fill these shoes; but until then, we need all the help we can get. I wish communities would rally around their youth and infuse them with the tools they need to make it in this world. I wish our society would accept and reflect beautiful images of the people that need it. I wish parents would become competent enough to not set their children up for failure. And I wish people in general would care more and take an interest in the people around them, because one beam and one drop is just not enough.

~Nadirah Angail

 ~Nadirah Angail
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On Diaper Bags, Care Bears and Justmoms

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carebearsAs an almost-mom, I’d have to say that the hardest decision I’ve had to make so far has been choosing a diaper bag. It seemed like it’d be an easy and effortless task, as I love purses and diaper bags are nothing more than big purses, but my diaper bag search has proved to be much harder than I expected.

I don’t consider myself a diva, a fashionista, or any of those other trendy terms people like to throw around, but I do like to look nice and care about the way I present myself. So when I found myself standing in the diaper bag aisle, surrounded by Elmo, Care Bears and that hunny-addicted Pooh, I knew I had a problem. Does becoming a mother mean I all of a sudden have to revert to my childhood preferences? Because if I was still five or six, I would have been all over that pink and purple Care Bears bag with the matching changing pad; but now, twenty years later, I’m not as interested. My likes and interests have matured and evolved to now include looks that don’t scream “I’ve been watching PBS and Noggin all day.”

My issue with the character bags is more than just aesthetic. It also has to do with the fact that I do not want to become a Justmom. A Justmom is a wonderful, multidimensional woman who, after becoming a mother, puts her entire life on the back burner to focus exclusively on being a parent. These are good-intentioned women who end up deserting their friends, families, husbands, interests, hobbies and, themselves for motherhood. They spend all day cutting carrots, cleaning rooms, checking homework, washing clothes, joining mothers’ groups online, buying children’s clothes and items, taking trips to parks and zoos, and many other child-centered activities. There is nothing wrong with doing any of these things. In fact, they’re all signs of good parenting, but what pushes these moms into the ranks of Justmoms is that they do these types of things only, at the exclusion of the many other parts of themselves that also need to be engaged.

stressed momI don’t want to pathologize Justmoms. They’re very caring, nurturing, forgiving, and all around sweet women. My concern is that they don’t put nearly as much energy into their own maintenance as they do into their children’s. They become shells of their former selves as their marriages, social lives, self images, and mental states suffer. Consider the research. According to Ariel Gores’s The Mother Trip, mothers are more likely to be affected by depression that any other demographic group nationwide. I doubt that all of these depressed moms are Justmoms, but I’m sure being a Justmom increases the chances of being included in that group.

Mothers seem to carry the weight of the world on their shoulders, and not having healthy outlets to help shoulder that load is nothing more than a recipe for disaster. We all want to be good moms. We want to give our children the best, protect them from harm, prepare them for the future and reassure them of their value. That’s great and admirable. (No wonder Prophet Muhammed (pbuh) said “paradise lies at the foot of the mother.”) But, in our haste to feed and protect our children, we often forget that one of the best gifts we can give a child is an honest image of a healthy, balanced mother, one that is so much more than a bodyguard/servant. Healthy and whole moms teach their children the benefits of helping self along with those of helping others. They laugh more, handle frustration better, become angered less easily and are pleasant to be around.

For me, the idea of being a Justmom is scary, but I understand that, for some women, the idea of not being one is even scarier. Many of us have a romanticized image of the perfect mom in our heads. We grow up either wanting to be just like our own mothers, who some of us feel were perfect, or the exact opposite of our mothers, who some of us feel were neglectful. The truth is that most moms fall somewhere between perfect and neglectful. Either way, the image of the Justmom becomes glorified and normalized. So once the children start to arrive, your date nights with the husband disappear, your biweekly girls’ nights vanish, the salsa lessons you loved are discontinued, your paint dries up and your brushes harden, the instrument you used to play begins to collect dust, your sense of style somehow gets lost, and your overall personality dulls. Basically, you lose your zest and unique qualities. These are some of the affects of becoming a Justmom.

There was a time in my life when I thought being a Justmom was inevitable. I thought being a good mother meant sacrificing all else. Lucky for me my understanding has changed. I now know that it’s not a bad thing to continue to have a life outside of my child. I know that my husband can continue to be my husband instead of just being my co parent. And if nothing else, I know that it’s ok to hate the Care Bears diaper bag.

Nadirah Angail

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On Carefully-Crafted Bad Kids

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bad kidConsidering that I’m not officially a parent yet, part of me feels like I don’t have the right to speak on this topic. The other part of me feels that I’ve been around enough children to know what I’m talking about. I’ll let the latter part be the bigger influence today. Children are a lot of work, period. I doubt many would dispute that statement. Even the best behaved children can make you wish they had an “Off” switch. It’s not their fault. They have to be busy, inquisitive, adventurous, and sometimes rebellious. These are the normal stages they go through so that they can develop into well adjusted adults.    

So, it bothers me to see normal children, doing nothing more than what they’re supposed to at their age, being berated by their parents and called “bad.” When you’re 2 year old won’t sit down and adopts “no!” as his favorite response to anything you say, he’s not being bad. He’s exercising his newfound independence and ability to choose for himself. Of course this is frustrating, but it shouldn’t be characterized as bad. This only agitates the child and harms his budding self esteem.

If children’s behaviors aren’t viewed within the context of their developmental stages, bad behaviors are likely to be inadvertently encouraged and prolonged. Like the 5 year old that reassured me that “I’m is bad,” children begin to internalize the messages that they are exposed to the most. Have you ever met a child that said something about herself that you were certain she didn’t come up with on her own? (“I’m Julie. I’m 4 years old and I’m just destined for success.”) Though she clearly didn’t think this up on her own, she’s likely heard it enough that she now believes it and has no problem delivering the statement believably. The same thing happens with negative statements.  That same girl could have said “I’m Julie. I’m 4 years old and I’m a bad little girl who never listens.” Which one of these seems more likely to have bad behavior?

It is absolutely crucial that children are praised and encouraged as well as disciplined. When we put our children down and only highlight their bad behaviors, the take away message becomes “I am bad. Bad is all I am capable off.”And if this is what they think of themselves, this is what they’ll display. Some children go their entire childhoods without receiving a compliment.  Yet and still, their parents are always shocked at their uncontrollable conduct. They don’t see that these behaviors are the fruits of the seeds they planted and cultivated. Children are smart and very capable, but they aren’t able to form a solid, positive self image if their parents don’t teach them how.

P.S. Want more on parenting? Try my parenting blog www.momaandbaby.blogspot.com

Nadirah Angail
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