SWOOP, Unmasked

"Superheroes" is the theme of this month's Blogging for Books competition, and here goes because we are Superhero Central at Casa de Gladly.  I cannot walk to the front door without dodging the detritus of discarded identities:  the Batman cape, Luke Skywalker's lightsaber, Spiderman's mask.  (On our recent trip Joe and I took turns wearing the sling.  Such a good robe it makes, said Yoda.)  Our costume bin also includes knight's armor (blast-from-the-past superheroes, with added rivets), and Stupendous Girl's skirt.

(You may ask what a house with four boys is doing with a Stupendous Girl.  The answer: I don't know but I think she came from Calvin and Hobbes.  The boys found a flippy yellow skirt at the thrift store and begged piteously for it, so Joe could stop wearing a pajama top with the neck stretched around his waist when he wanted to be SG.  After a brief consideration of the torments his brothers will inflict on him in later life as a consequence ("You! You wore a flippy yellow skirt and called yourself a girl!"), I bought the skirt.  Stupendous Girl is always more interested in donning all her pajama tops at once than in fighting crime.  [sexist comment deleted.])

Anyway, you probably guessed I was up to my neck in superheroes.  But I have a secret:  I want to be a superhero too.  I want to be Super- Wonder- Outstanding Optimalicious Parent.  Y'all mere mortals can call me SWOOP, 'cause that's what I'll do in my deluxe cape.  (Purple, I think.  With handy nursing zippers.)  SWOOP is wiser than Yoda (not to mention less syntactically fractured), more patient than Job, and juster than the entire Justice League mashed into one and served à la mode.

Lately I have been worrying that my style is less a SWOOP than a LIMP (that would be Loud Inconsistent Mediocre Parent).  I've been thinking a lot about whether my approach is part of the problems I've been having with discipline, or if problems with discipline are just part of the landscape.  (Interruption to help Joe, who is simultaneously Captain Underpants and Spiderman but is unable to get his pajamas on without assistance.)

I have been kicking around the idea of a post on parenting gurus -- I was going to call it "Crackpots and Cracked Pots."  The crackpots bit is obvious:  there are some alarming people out there eager to tell you how you ought to be raising your child.  I nominate the Pearls as Exhibit A on the authoritarian end of the spectrum. (May I say again how much it disturbs me that they advocate physical punishment of three-month-old babies? who are probably doing what they're doing because they're teething?)  In the far corner of the ring, I would put Marshall Rosenberg, who sings folksy songs like, "When you use a voice that's mad, I feel awfully awfully sad," and who says one shouldn't make demands of a child, only requests, and who would probably be dismayed at the very idea of entering a boxing ring, no matter how metaphorical.

In between the extremes, though, there's a minefield of well-intentioned and frequently conflicting advice.  Some days it makes me want to put my hands over my ears and say, "La la la la I'm just going to sit here and eat peanut butter cookies until these kids stop fighting on their own."  (My husband made peanut butter cookies, the kind with crisscross fork marks on top that speak to me of my childhood, and no one else in this house likes them.  I have been trying to pretend to myself that peanuts are a vegetable but alas the evidence to the contrary is mounting.  Want to come over and have peanut butter cookies speak to you about your childhood?  Because what they are beginning to say to me is, Hey, Jamie, remember childhood? when your pants zipped?)

This is the "cracked pots" part of the post that never made it out of my head: the part about the uncertainty and the intermittent helplessness that go along with being a mother.  I think my favorite chapter of the New Testament is 2 Corinthians 4, which says in part, "We hold this treasure in earthen vessels, that the surpassing power may be of God and not from us."  But see, I would like the surpassing power to be from me.  I would rather be a treasure than a pot.

I have always been self-critical (sometime I will tell you my story of coordinating music for a retreat, during which a priest friend told me, "Of all the people I've ever known, Jamie, I've never known anyone as hard on herself as you are") but just recently I've been thinking that I ought to be a little gentler with myself.  I wrote an article for a newsletter put together by a good friend, and helped her with editing a few weeks later.  There was a sentence in my article that struck me as awkward, and I went off about it in the margins.  What a stupid sentence! I can't believe I wrote that! Yuck! 

I was really embarrassed to discover that my friend wrote that sentence, filling in a gap I had asked for help to close.

And it made me think:  if I wouldn't speak that way to a friend, why am I speaking that way to myself? And when I do, what message am I sending my kids about having shortcomings?  Am I teaching them to be afraid of their limitations?  Am I teaching them they can't be honest about their imperfections?

I want my kids to know that God will equip them to do the work he calls them to do:  that the purpose of life is to receive the treasure and not just to pretty up the pot in hopes that no one notices it's made of clay.

More practically, pressuring myself to Do It Right All The Time is stressful.  It obscures, I think, my ability to see a situation clearly and make wise decisions.

As always, even though I loathe the letting go, it brings freedom.  I'm in the middle of seeing what Barbara Coloroso and Greg Popcak have to say about outbursts in 8yo boys.  Will that be what we need to weather this recent round of storms?  Maybe.  Will we need to get professional input on why these difficult spots seem to pop up regularly?  Maybe.  I don't know right now.  I'm okay with that.  For now, at least.

I am trying to think of one more acronym since neither SWOOP nor LIMP will fit.  Perhaps you could call me HOP (for Humbled Optimistic Parent).  The Energizer Bunny of mothering, you think? -- still going, even when she's not quite sure where.

Better acronyms welcomed.  Tonight instead of sitting here trying to figure one out, I'm going to wash the dishes and go to bed.  Gentler with myself, and all that.

Comments

[Linda]

I seriously love you. If you read my latest rant, you'll see why. Thanks for this post.

[Tracy]

Put your right foot forward Then your left foot out
Do the Bunny Hop
Hop, hop, hop!

Dance this new creation
It's the new sensation
Do the Bunny Hop
Hop, hop, hop!

Let's all join in the fun
Father, mother, son
Do the Bunny Hop
Hop, hop, hop!

Somehow the lyrics seemed appropriate :-)

And yes, please be gentler. I know that I'm too hard on myself too, and we're both doing a good job. Well, at least you're doing a good job. I'm doing a fair job. Or an okay job. Or.... am I being too hard on myself again?

[Sarah]

Well, I'm always interested to read about your approach to parenting and discipline. My son is nearly two and I have no idea what I'm supposed to be doing, apart from monitoring my own attitude. Simplistic, I know, and I dare say an incomplete method.

I'll tell you one thing, though. I started reading Between Parent and Child (before I lost my copy, coincidentally enough) and by the end of chapter 2 I was afraid to open my mouth again, lest something obtuse and insensitive unwittingly fly from it. Earthen vessels, indeed!

[Maggie]

Jamie. Three points.

1. Keep trying to be nice to yourself. As a rabid perfectionist, I commiserate, and I want to share with you the thought that has helped me the most. I was beating myself up for something once, and a really close friend said "Nobody should ever say anything like that about a child of God." Think about it.

2. I'm sure that you don't give yourself enough credit for the kind of parent you are, but I will pray that you, and all parents, will always grow closer to the examples set for them by the saints. As Mrs. OIncredible always said, "Do you have any idea how much evil would fail to take root if more people were just good parents?"

3. Also from the Incredibles, in Elizabeth's amazing Edna Mold voice: "No Capes!"

God bless--

[Vicki]

Excellent- I loved reading this entry! Well done! Thank you.

[Sarah]

Swoop! Limp? Hop!
Inspired!
Sarah

[ro]

Mmm... peanut butter cookies. Alas, I'm nursing and there is a fairly dubious "history of food allergy" in my family (but not nut allergy.) I didn't know it was recommended till 4 years into this pregnancy and nursing thing. I'm guessing either you have no food allergies in your family or I am following advice not everyone thinks is simple ordinary prudence.

And I think I relate to the actual point of your article, but I'm still not sure I put enough pressure on myself to Do It Right, let alone too much. What happens most with me is that I derail the possibility of even doing things decently well by striving for perfection -- e.g., the idea of trying to make spaghetti squash for dinner plus my level of culinary skill = decision for Boston Market when the time comes and rotten squash eventually. But if I *had* actually made it, it would have been organic and from fresh, not some box mix dinner with refined grains in it or something! Nosirree, not gonna buy anything like that, just gonna get pizza for dinner... again.

[Moxie]

In college our rallying cry was "Done is good." It was meant to reinforce to a group of largely perfectionist women that it was better to finish something than to work to make it perfect so it never got done or we made ourselves sick about it.

I never thought about an acronym for it before, but you'll notice that the acronym is DIG. Which could mean that adopting the "Done is good" attitude will help you just dig in and get things done.

El Chico started preschool this week. They're still easing into the full lengths of the sessions so he's only been there for 2 1/2 hours this week so far. I am simply amazed at how much emotional space that time has created for me. Knowing that he's with two other capable and engaging adults who will be working on the same things I work on at home with him ("If you want him to stop talking, just say, 'Please be quiet.' Pushing him won't make him stop talking.")has quite literally shifted the burden off my shoulders for those brief periods of time.

I think that part of your perfectionism in parenting might be a result of the fact that you're homeschooling and don't get that break of a few hours to let someone else do the reminding and nudging and breaking up of squabbles (let alone scrubbing off of paint and honey and snot). So you're really holding yourself to a much higher standard than the rest of us who don't homeschool are held to. If you're going to start treating yourself the way you'd treat your friends, remember to give yourself a huge handicap for being the only adult in charge all day long.

If it helps you any, know that I didn't wash the dishes last night at all. I was too busy watching last year's season of "Lost" on DVD.

[Mom of little women]

and Dr. Sears' advice on biting is the best I've seen/heard! just push inward so they let go! counterintuitive, but gets the job done, which is to say, gets your breast out of a tight spot, and a little baby is not doing something "bad" anyway! Why look for a way to make mothering harder than it really is? Making it a joy, or finding the joy that is already in it, placed there by God in his infinite wisdom, has to start with a basic grasp of reality.