At the risk of sounding like I copy and paste the beginnings of all my posts, I’ve been meaning to make time to write this post for the last few weeks – inbetween the incessant juggle of work commitments and, well, life – and every day I haven’t written anything down has added to the pile of low-level guilt sitting in my tummy, like that extra piece of pizza that you definitely shouldn’t have eaten but crammed in anyway. This pizza-tummy guilt is a feeling that has become so synonymous with being a parent that leaves (read: ABANDONS) their child every day to go to work, I barely acknowledge it anymore. When people ask how being back at work feels, I scoff loudly as if they asked me how I manage to dress myself in the mornings. I’ve been back at work since January! I’m a motherfucking pro, yo! But as with every parenting lesson smacked rudely in your face, the general rule is not to get too complacent. Things change. Babies who love something one day often conveniently forget that the next. Why would you serve them delicious blueberries, that are a treat because they’re so fiendishly expensive (so much for trying to wangle a cheap-as-chips diet of bananas and frozen peas), and not realise that blueberries are YESTERDAY’S NEWS and they actually want to lob them across the room and watch them ping off the picture frames. Idiot. Preferred books, nursery rhymes, silly noises, games and teddies all rotate in a maddeningly undefinable fashion; so just like scraping last week’s favourite off the walls, I know the pleasantly familiar day-to-day that’s emerged over the year will undoubtedly change too.
Last week was a really, really good reminder of this.
As I said, Edie has been going to nursery for months now. I’ve got scooping her out of the pushchair, hurrying her through the doors, flinging her into one of the staff’s arms and then bolting to the train station down to a fine art. Usually, Edie doesn’t even bat an eyelid when I leave. (This actually used to bum me out a bit, but when I hear friends’ stories of their children bawling their eyes out as soon as they leave, I’ve realised I’m really, really lucky that Edie feels Weetabix is a decent enough trade-off.) But the other day, she clung to me like a limpet. As I peeled her off me, one eye on my watch, she burst into noisy tears. Adopting the sing-song voice (you know, the absurdly high one you use when you’re about five minutes away from a meltdown of your own; side note: the higher the voice, the closer to self-destruct you tend to be) I gave her a useless shoulder pat, told her she was fine and then legged it so I wouldn’t miss the train; her cries following me down the street. Sandwiched between a smelly armpit and an aggressive rucksack, the pizza-tummy guilt doubled; tripled; quadrupled; until I felt like a gaggle of boozed up bridesmaids who’d just raided Pizza Hut on a wild, post-hen binge. Going to work – leaving her – is easy when she’s happy and gurgling and playing with her friends. But it’s a completely different story when she’s miserable. The reality is she probably stopped crying five minutes later, but there’s not much worse than an over-active parent’s imagination.
Since Edie turned a year old she’s been flexing her tantrum muscles. (I know. I also thought it was called ‘Terrible Twos’. THANKS FOR THE HEADS UP, EVERYONE.) For a generally sunny and happy soul, it’s amazing how efficiently she’ll crumple into a raging ball of fury. I’ve tried telling her that a fuck-off big mortgage, train delays and the patriarchy are all far more legitimate things to get upset about compared to, say, not letting her play with the manky food bin under the sink or drink bleach, but she’s having none of it. I know that she’s starting to develop a strong sense of self and, with that, comes a whole load of overwhelming new emotions that she doesn’t understand how to control. I know she’s also teetering on the brink of talking; baby babbling and pointing but not really articulate enough to get exactly what she wants. Physically, she’s also able to do a lot more than a few months ago, but still gets frustrated by her limitations. I’ve read about all of this, but when I had to gently karate chop her rigid, furious body so she would sit in her pushchair and when she burst into tears as I picked her up and took her away from one of the nursery staff (um, wrong way round?), it’s hard not to take it personally. The inherent guilt that comes with the territory makes me wonder if she’d be acting up quite so much if I was around a bit more; if I could actually parent my child. And with that guilt, the little voice creeps in; every internalised comment, judgmental glance, newspaper article and dither of self-doubt, telling you you’re not doing a good job.
Because, really, that’s what we all strive for most: to do a good job. To make our children happy and keep them safe. It sounds so simple when you put it like that, but those small, yet enormous demands are what the rest of our, and their, lives revolve around. Every decision we’ll ever make will filter back into them, which is why the haunting sense of guilt will always follow us. Some days it’s a low-level hum, some days you don’t even notice it and other days it threatens to consume you. But that guilt; sickening and heart-thumping as it is, is an important reminder that we give a shit and that we’re all just trying our best.