Together forever or Not.

Our whole family was together for the weekend and we had a great time, but two days with three kids made me feel like I lived and spoke to my husband but didn’t actually see him. Perhaps it is my obsession with perfection when my stepsons are with us. I want our time together as a complete family to be idyllic and the reality is closer to crazy. Our fourteen-year-old is obsessed with video games and, since he doesn’t get to play them at his Mom’s, he never wants to leave the house when he is with us. Ah, the thrill of the “Battle for Middle Earth.” Meanwhile our 18-year-old wants to go out, be active, and do things. The 5-year-old seems to get bratty the minute I want her to be the easy-going little sister. At these moments the question that haunts me is …”How do people with four or five kids do it? I get overwhelmed with three. Or do I?? Am I overwhelmed or actually obsessed because in my stepmom-dream-world I want our time together as a family to resemble a Norman Rockwell painting? Come to think of it, why is that too much to ask? Don’t blended families deserve a little bliss too? Perhaps we have found bliss and just don’t know it. Is it not blissful to have time away from the ones you love? One of the luxuries of my blended family is that we all have opportunities to get away from each other: the boys spend time with their Mom, my husband gets away to do things with them, and I have the ease of a single child without the parental guilt. Kahlil Gilbran wrote in his book The Prophet, “Stand together yet not too near together. For the pillars of the temple stand apart, And the oak tree and cypress grow not in each other’s shadow.” So instead of worrying about being a “perfect family” I am going to try and relax and enjoy our time together and then truly enjoy what a lot of families dream of… our time away from each other.

Working Mother’s Guilt

The hardest part of my job is spending time away from my family. Right now my husband and daughter are in New York and I am in Orlando. They need to be there because Charlotte has a month more of school and my husband has work. I have to continue to host iVillage Live, so we are spending the weekends together and the work weeks apart. It is like physical pain to be away from my family. That sounds so dramatic but it is really how I feel.

My daughter, on the other hand, seems to take my absences in stride. The phone calls are brutal. I hang on her every word and she says things like, “I can’t talk now, I am eating my peanut butter sandwich” or “Can you call back after Clifford is over?” I remind myself that this is a good sign. She is obviously fine with my husband and coping with our time apart. It is hard not to steer the conversation the wrong way; “Do you miss Mommy? Are you feeling teary??” The term “Leading the witness” comes to mind.

Truthfully, I am the one feeling teary. Part of it is my fear that the pursuit of my career will cause her some irreparable harm. My own mother was home with us every day and that haunts me when I miss a function at the school. My wise husband reminds me that it is good for her to see me working and that I will be a role model for her, not only as a loving Mom, but also as a woman with a career she loves. His words help, but I know my broken heart won’t feel whole until my family is living together again.

The Slacker Mom

The big divide amongst moms used to be working moms vs. stay at home moms, but now it’s Alphas vs. Slackers. In case you have been under a rock somewhere and haven’t heard these latest definitions, here goes. Alphas are the moms that do it all. They run the PTA, plan bake sales, organize the phone tree when something big happens and manage all the major school fundraisers. The slackers avoid the job of class mom like the plague, forget school events like Halloween costume day, and usually like to join the PTA but never attend a meeting.

If the slacker description sounds personal, it is. I did once forget it was Halloween-dress-up-day and had to run home to find my daughter a last minute costume. As a slacker mom I have one major issue… the name. I think “Beta mom” is much better because it implies a different choice, not a wrong choice. Speaking on behalf of slacker moms everywhere, I don’t participate because I want to spend my free time with my kids. I know my daughter’s teacher very well, I try to do some kind of project with the kids in her class, I bring snacks, donate money, but I honestly feel that all my extra time has to be spent with my family and that includes my husband.

Sometimes maintaining the role of slacker is hard for me. Walking through my daughter’s pre-school felt like a trip back to high school. What are all the cool mom’s doing? Who will run for class president? Who will get picked for honor society? Who will get the lead in the school play? At this point in my inner dialogue I usually say, “SNAP OUT OF IT”. Seriously, I did all that in high school and at this point I just don’t care.

My job is often my excuse, but a lot of Alpha mom’s have full-time jobs. They work all day then run the PTA at night. I truly don’t know how they do it. When do they have time to play cards with their kids, read the paper, have sex with their hubby or watch “American Idol”? They are probably just a lot more organized than I am.

The musical Oklahoma has a song that says, “Oh the farmer and the cowman should be friends” and maybe that applies to Alphas and Slackers. When you think about it, we need each other. Leaders need followers and some of us need someone to tell us where to bring the cupcakes and when to dress up our kids for Halloween.

Connections

I am on a plane with my family heading to New York City to spend a week seeing friends and my stepsons. We loved living in Manhattan and we all felt the need for a city fix. My daughter wants some Matzo Ball soup and my husband and I can’t wait to order in Chinese, Thai and sushi. I don’t intend to cook anything all week. Getting organized to travel is always hectic and as usual we brought way too much stuff.

We have already had a busy weekend; Charlotte had her first ballet recital this morning. I have worked on Broadway, sung in front of thousands of people and I think I was the most nervous I have ever been. The power our children have over us is truly extraordinary. After a false start, my daughter and her fellow swans spun, pointed, and curtsied their way through the dance. My husband and I held hands and loved every minute of it.

Moments like these remind me how our children connect us. My oldest stepson is graduating from high school next month and on these huge occasions my heart breaks for the children of divorce. There has to be some part of my husband and his ex-wife that wants to hold hands and acknowledge that together they created this amazing person and that they still have their intense love for him in common. Honestly, I am guessing they won’t hold hands, but hopefully they will take a moment to reflect on what a special day it is and what a wonderful job they have done.

We are about to land and the flight attendant’s eyes just sent me daggers because I still have my computer out. I see the lights of New York in the distance and I smile inside knowing I am coming home.

Kindergarten Supermodel

I was sitting in the park today and I overheard some women chatting. Alright, I was listening to their conversation, but what else can one do when you are alone in the park watching your child play? Anyway I digress, I “overheard” a woman say to her three-year-old daughter, “You look just like a model.” It is so easy to say these sorts of things to our children and I am sure she meant it as a compliment, but it got me thinking about how we talk to our girls. As a society, we are very critical of the rail-thin models that dominate the magazines and advertisements in this country, but without thinking, we are often quick to use them as examples of beauty.

I often wonder about the whole princess/dress-up thing with little girls. (Let me say I am completely guilty of this one.) My daughter has at least 20 costumes, complete with crowns and sparkly shoes. She dresses up all the time and we ‘oohh’ and ‘aahh’ about how beautiful she looks, but is that good parenting?? My husband and I have talked about this brains vs. beauty issue since she was very young. We remind each other to try and praise her for being smart and brave and kind to people, but it is unbelievable how often our first instinct is to say, “Oh Charlotte, you are so cute.”

One of my good friends in New York had a nanny that often kept my daughter during play dates. She was honest and reliable and the kids loved her. Perfect, right? Well sort of. I found out later, ok I was listening in again, that her favorite topic of conversation was which boys our 4-year-old girls liked. Every male child on the playground was greeted with, “Is this your boyfriend???” Giggle giggle. I hated it. We women spend most of our time on Earth worried about what the “boys” in our lives think and it would be nice if we didn’t have to start as preschoolers.

When I read reports on how many young women struggle with anorexia, or how our daughters are having sex earlier and earlier, or how many girls dream of plastic surgery to look more like this or that supermodel, I wonder. Do we subconsciously help seed these obsessions? Is every princess and model comparison just setting them up to someday feel inadequate? I don’t know, but tonight when my daughter reads a book to me at bedtime, I am going to tell her how smart she is and try not to mention how adorable she looks in her “Sleeping Beauty” nightgown.