by Aimee Carson
Six years ago I tried to take control of my life (ha!). After eight years as a working mom in a busy pediatric clinic, I decided to go part-time. And not just a three-day workweek kind of thing. Nope. That would be too normal. Cue me traveling once a month from my house in the Black Hills of South Dakota to the Alaskan bush to work as a hospitalist. It was gonna be GREAT. One week on, three weeks at home being superdeeduper, June Cleaver, stay-at-home mom. *cough*
Delusional dreams are wonderful, aren’t they?
Now on paper all this sounds wonderfully exciting. And it is. Mostly. Well, sometimes anyway. But for those of you who are thinking “wow, I wish I had HER schedule” (and trust me, I KNOW it’s great), I thought I would post a 24 hour snippet from my diary (had I been ambitious enough to keep one).
6pm, Friday night: exhausted and irritable after eight days of almost nonstop work, check out to oncoming doc. Make sure they know to follow up on the kid in room 103. Cranky kid. Crankier mom. Me, the crankiest of all.
6:30 pm: rush back to apartment to pack and get to the airport on time. Ticket messed up again. Smile at Alaskan Airline attendant who knows me by name and how to fix my chronically screwed up travel. Thank her profusely and promise to send her wine, cuz—hey!—it’s a dry town. No damp, actually. But mostly just really, really cold.
7:30 pm: through airport security where I must unload my TWO laptops, my bag full of (supposedly) potentially lethal cosmetics, my shoes, my belt, my mongo-sized coat, oh . . . and my pillow. Everyone behind me in line is now complaining. Honestly, a not-so-friendly frisk or a we-can-see-all scanning machine sounds like heaven.
10 pm: arrive at Anchorage airport with three hours to kill. And I know JUST what to do. Whip out pillow and traveling alarm clock and sleeeeeeeeep!
1 am: feeling like one of many dazed and drugged farm animals, shuffle aboard plane bound for Salt Lake City. The airline staff is NOT as friendly. But who is friendly at one am? And why oh why, with my travel often made MONTHS in advance, do I wind up in the ninth circle of hell middle seat? Passenger to my left doesn’t smell so nice. Then again, I’m sure I don’t either. Passenger to my right is taking up her seat—and half of mine. Three hours later my neck hurts, my back aches, and I’m exhausted and too uncomfortable to sleep. With one more hour to go, enter into “I would sell my liver for a bed” phase.
7 am: two hour layover which is just long enough to wish I were dead.
9am: board last flight bound for home. Manage to catch fifteen minutes of sleep. Or maybe I simply slipped into unconsciousness.
11am: crawl out of last plane and into the arms of my waiting family!! Three teens talking at once while my husband and I are trying to hold a conversation. Nonstop chatter ensues on the forty-five minute ride home. My ears have NOT acclimated to the constant talking. Husband smiles at me, sensing my pain. “Welcome home,” he says. My beautiful house comes into sight, and I hear my bed calling to me like a siren. And as we all tumble out of the car, my twelve-year-old son turns to me with his trademark impish grin, happy I’m home (absence does make the heart grow fonder, you know) and says . . . “Mom, come jump on the trampoline with me!”
So what do I do? Well, I’ve been gone for eight days, so guilt prevents me from putting him off. So I spend the next hour pretending I’m not an over-the-hill mom in desperate need of nap. When play time is over, I gratefully drag myself to my glorious, glorious bed.
Now, I love being a mom and I enjoy my kids. But some days are harder than others. And although the above example is pretty extreme, every time I fake the joy, I feel guilty.
So how often do you pretend you’re having fun with your kids? Once a week? Once a day? Every thirty minutes? 
And what I really want to know is this: am I allowed a certain number of I’m-not-really-having-fun moments before I DON’T have to feel guilty about it?
Aimee Carson
Hi Amy!
Great first post! Faking it….I fake lots of things…but I promise to stay on topic! With my oldest out of the house (mostly) and my two younger ones addicted to Xbox and Facebook, there’s not much need for me to fake having fun. In the limited window of family time we spend together, I usually am having fun because I have great children and I enjoy them. But there are times when I’m deep into writing a book, when, and I can’t believe I’m about to leave a written statement admitting to this….but when I really don’t want to hear about my daughter’s day or look at her A on a math test, or discuss the latest episode of Glee. But, since parenting only when it suited me would make me a ‘bad mommy, I hit save, swivel my chair away from my computer screen and give my teen some attention.
Oh yeah, Wendy. I know exactly what you mean. Most of my ‘faking it’ moments have gone by the wayside as my daughters have outgrown their princess dress-up phase. Mostly I just really enjoy my kids, but when I’m tired it’s always a lot harder to muster that enthusiasm.
I love this post – it reflects my life!!! When I desperately squeeze a little bit of “me” time to write, it is guaranteed to make a child magically appear at my right with a joyous grin and a pleading face and a book in one hand and the question, “Mommy will you read to me?” You can input this question into many other formualaic ones such as “Will you play Star Wars with me?” “Will you watch a movie with me?” and the WORSt “Will you jump me on the bed?” Half the time I say No. The other half the guilt surfaces and the faces are so cute and I say, “Ok.” I fake it a lot. In my secret heart, I found a lot of things quite boring with my children, even though I loved watching their reactions. So, my confession is, last week when they begged me to jump on the bed, I literally said, “Mommy hates jumping on the bed – it’s boring!” Silence ensued. I felt terrible. Then they looked at each other and said, “It’s not boring, mommy. Come on.” Made not a blip on their radar. Sigh. I fake it all the time. You know what they say – fake it till you make it!!!!
Hey Jennifer! So the kids didn’t CARE that you hate jumping on the bed, eh? LOL! Gotta love their enthusiasm!!
Great post, Aimee! I think it captures the reality of being a working parent. Many mums work becuase they… want to work. because work provides them with intelectual challenges, social interactions, sense of accomplishment staying at home with kids will not.
Jumping on the bed is boring. Reading the same books over and over again is boring. But knowing it doesn’t help me feel any less guilty about I’m-not-really-having-fun moments.
ps. the Twitter button on the top of the page does not point to your accont. I guess it’s the developper’s account.
LOL! JMJast, my kids are all preteen/teens now, so I had almost forgotten about the “reading the same book over and over (and over) again” phase! Yes, NOT my favorite thing. Though I must admit I DO love to jump on a bed or a trampoline. But my fun is directionally proportionally to whether or not I’m feeling rested, the chores are done, and dinner is cooked . . . you get my drift.
And my apologies re twitter button. This site is still a work in progress!
Thanks for stopping by!
Aimee
Hi JM!
I can’t recall ever jumping on the bed with my children. Okay, maybe at a hotel, but I’m the: “Don’t do that you’re going to get hurt” kind of mom. I’ve worked for as long as my children have been alive, except for a stint when my oldest was a baby. I am much happier when I work. Yes, it’s crazy sometimes, but I enjoy interaction with adults and feeling a sense of accomplishment in a job well done. (And the money helps pay bills.) Occasionally I talk to my children about my working and I guess, since they don’t know any different, they don’t seem to have a problem with it. I made it a point to make their school parties when I could. I stayed home with them when they were sick. I got them to their practices and playdates. They love me…most of the time…and I love them. All in all, so far, it seems to have worked out!!! And they each have a college savings account they’re happy about!
Hi, I’m Regina and I’m a faker. I’ve certainly faked interest I didn’t feel in activities I knew were important to my kids. Sometimes I’ve faked anger at their mistakes to drive home to them the importance of not repeating those behaviors while in truth my attitude toward those missteps was a pretty bland, “Oh well, I did worse when I was their age.”
A few times as a child I faked sick to stay home from school and read books. Once or twice (a year) as an adult I’ve actually faked ‘sicker than I was’ to call off homeschool for the day and loll in bed and read books. (Bad Mommy!)
Yep, faking is wrong but I’ve done it.
I love the “2 drive-thrus for one meal”. I am a repeat offender for that one. So bad in fact that my children grew up to ATE fast food and refuse to eat if there is any other choice. They’ll do PB&J at home first. Of course that could be a good thing…
I meant hate, not ate. Freudian slip?