Exposing the Myth of Motherhood

Published in The Broomfield Enterprise, 2/17/08

Me: “Time to go brush your teeth.”

My four-and-a-half-year-old daughter: “Huuuggghhhhhhh.”

Me: “Hey, what was that for?”

My four-and-a-half-year-old daughter: (rolling eyes and clucking her tongue) “Ugh.”

Me: “Hey–don’t talk to me like that!”

My four-and-a-half-year-old daughter: “I’M NOT!”

Me: “Do NOT speak to me that way!”

My four-and-a-half-year-old daughter: (As exasperated as a human can possibly be) “I! AM! NOT! YOU ARE THE WORST MOTHER IN THE WORLD!”

Me: “YOU HAD BETTER HEAD UP TO YOUR ROOM RIGHT THIS INSTANT!”

My four-and-a-half-year-old daughter: (deep breath) “I!” (deep breath) “HATE!” (deep breath) “THIS!” (deep breath) “HOUSE!”

Me: (deep breath) “GO!” (deep breath) “TO!” (deep breath) “YOUR!” (deep breath) “ROOM!”

I looked at my husband and innocently asked, “Am I crazy?”

Despite his valiant efforts to freeze time, he was stuck having no other choice but to answer honestly with a “did you just hear yourself?” expression.

Me? Crazy?

Maybe so.

But I have good news for myself and other like me, and it comes from Oprah’s latest book selection, “A New Earth; Awakening to Your Life’s Purpose” by Eckhart Tolle.

And if what Tolle says is true, then I’m doing just fine. It’s right there on page fourteen– “The greatest achievement of humanity is not it’s works of art, science, or technology, but the recognition of it’s own dysfunction, it’s own madness.” Tolle later adds, “To recognize one’s own insanity is, of course, the arising of sanity, the beginning of healing and transcendence.”

Here’s the thing: Mothers in America carry with them the idea—this ridiculous myth–that all the other mothers out there have got it all together. That the other moms live in a clean house with all the laundry folded, well-behaved kids, a glamorous, jet-setting job, and a daily “9 ½ Weeks” sex life.

It’s time to expose this myth, and to celebrate what Tolle claims—that giving voice to our dysfunction–to our own madness–is actually the route toward healing it, toward transcending the lines of pain, suffering and loneliness mothers often feel while they lie in the midst of believing they are the only one in the world who occasionally loses it and yells at her kid for not going upstairs to brush teeth when asked.

The myth of “having it all together” is right up there with catching a cold from the freezer, getting pregnant from kissing in a bathing suit, and the idea that there really exists a “Sixteen Candles” Jake Ryan in the world.

The myth is there because women show only what they want others to see. We put on our armor as we walk out the door, making sure to hide the cracks and chinks that would lead anyone to believe we might be something less than the strong, shining example of the Supermom we wish we were.

The reality is that those who look like they have it together the most are the ones with the greatest dysfunction of all. They are the ones who have not recognized their own insanity, who have not given voice to their own madness, and because of this, they’re foregoing their opportunity to heal, to achieve, to transcend to a higher level of consciousness.

Me? Crazy?

Yep. And proud of it.