This is another post about getting away
from the “sweet baby” page. A “sweet baby” page (as I call
them) is a pretty pages with a cute baby picture and a big title
reading “sweet baby.” I have nothing against them. Many of them
are really gorgeous, with a coordinating color scheme and heartfelt
journaling. And down the road, giving your kids a personally crafted
book is certainly much better than handing them a shoebox full of
pictures or, as I dread many of today's technology-driven young
parents will do, CD's and memory cards. I have many “sweet baby”
pages in my albums that I am quite proud of. Yet scrapbooking is
also a form of personal expression for me, which means that I have to
include the sad, infuriating, and downright scary aspects of
parenthood.
I think every parent has had some scary
moments. I find it therapeutic to write about them when they really
bother me. I certainly felt better after making this page. Maybe
some people would like to write about it, but not for their kids or
house guests to see. I've heard some scrapbookers suggest that you
make a personal album to store away. I don't have one right now, but
I have put away some pages that I wasn't comfortable displaying.
It's nothing “inappropriate” and I don't have any dark secrets,
but I wouldn't necessarily want everyone who visits my house to be
reading my thoughts and opinions about everything. I AM comfortable
putting this particular page on my coffee table (duh, it's on my
blog). I think that it's a pretty universal experience for us moms
and dads.
The journaling reads:
A friend of mine who has been
married for about 10 years says she is afraid to have kids. I
realize now that this is a perfectly rational feeling. I would be
wrong to tell her that her fears are ungrounded and that everything
turns out fine. Pregnancy and childbirth come and go rather quickly,
but motherhood is a lifetime of decision making that we will be held
accountable for. Success in other areas of life cannot make up for
bad parenting and one wrong move can destroy my life forever. Before
I had kids, I had only my own death to worry about. Yet in reality,
dying is not that scary. I won't suffer after my own death. But
having children means I have a far worse fate to fear – the death
of my own children, particularly if is caused by my own neglect.
There have been several recent
failures on my part to protect my kids. Last week, Sophia fell off
her bike without a helmet and probably got a mild concussion. Then
today, Thomas escaped from me at the zoo and I had to face the shame
and embarrassment of having someone else bring him back to me. These
are things that make me feel completely worthless as a mother and as
a human being. I get so depressed I just want to throw in the towel,
declaring myself incompetent and let some institution take over.
Yet on the positive side, it gives
me a wake-up call. Nothing serious happened to them, and I have the
opportunity to make sure it doesn't happen again. It also puts my
priorities in perspective. Staying home to care for children is not
a vacation. It needs to be taken seriously and should be my first
priority. I don't need to excel at hobbies or win footraces to prove
my worth. Even raising just one child would be all I need to be
important, and I am blessed with two! There should be no room for
boredom or self-absorbed anxiety. So, we're just going to make sure
we wear helmets and go slowly.
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