I have been lying to myself…

and to everyone else for the past 8 years.  I am not a Stay at home mom.  I work.  This is very hard for me to admit especially to myself.  Let me try to explain.

My father who I love very much raised me to be a housewife and a mother.  He was born in 1931 and his mother was the typical housewife with three young boys, until my grandfather died of a heart attack when my father was 14 ( he was the oldest and the youngest was around 3, I think).  When I was a young child it was not very apparent this was the life my father wanted for me, he would just always say their would be enough money that when I was an adult I could do what ever I wanted and not worry about it.  Fast forward to my preteen and teenage years after my parents were divorced, he could no longer afford a housekeeper and had a lot of work to do at the family business.  He decided that I should become a housewife (maybe he thought the downfall of my parents marriage was that my mother worked – I will never know). 

He taught me to wash the laundry and iron, how to grocery shop and budget the finances.  He taught me to keep a check book and pay bills and how to use a credit card when needed.  I was taught more intensely in the garden how to sharpen a garden knife, use a hula hoe, when to plant and when to harvest.  I learned the secret family pancake recipe by heart as well as a few others (like grandma’s chili).  I was taught how to drive a diesel and how to change a tire, how to clip coupons and take the animals to the vet.  Pretty much everything he could teach me about how to run a household successfully.  At the same time he taught me about the family business, I reported to “work” each day after school to organize files, pay the bills, order supplies, throw parties, etc.  At this point I was fully trained, when asked what I wanted to be when I grew up I replied a mother and a wife, when asked what I wanted to do after high school I replied to get married and have a large family.  I could cook a thanksgiving dinner like no one else completely from scratch,  make Saturday pancakes, balance the budget and mend socks and reattach buttons.

Well, then something happened, I was well on my way to living this life (in a few years time), and my father passed away.  He died of a sudden heart attack just like his father, when I was 19.   I had to leave San Diego and return home, this was just after Aba and I started seeing each other.   Aba came with me back to LA.  I grew up overnight, i took over the family business and finalized my fathers estate.  As Aba and I become more serious I was always upfront that I wished to be a housewife, that I wished to have many children, and he wanted the same things for himself and his future wife.  We decided to get married, to move back to San Diego, and start a family right away.  My fathers plan and my dreams were coming true I would be a housewife and mother.  But…

I owned a business, and Aba soon owned a business as well.  I was rarely home.  I was driving to LA weekly, I was working in Aba’s fish store as well.  Just before N was born I decided to close the families business, I didn’t want it, I didn’t want to live in LA and the commute was to hard.  I began working in Aba’s fish store every day, stocking shelves, helping customers, paying bills…  N came to work with me, but I called myself a stay at home mom ( one of our friends joked that I couldn’t be a stay at home mom because I was never at home!)   He spent his time in the back room, playing with the feeder fish , and tearing up the planted tanks.  Soon Miss B was born and she to came to the fish store as well.  The economy was suffering, we had not recovered sufficiently from what 9/11 did to our business, and many of our customers were military who were either over sees or didn’t have the money to spend on fancy fish.  We closed the store, Aba found other work, and I still worked.  Every weekend I loaded up a u-haul van and took what we had not manged to sell to the swap meet.  I was there every Saturday and Sunday for months.  During the week I posted items for sale online.  I still said I was a stay ot home mom to all who asked.

When we moved to Colorado I no longer did this, but I began to sell Melaleuca products over the phone, I started working in the family business again (this time for my mom), I became the relocation director, I designed and managed her web page, I made post cards and flyers and did all kinds of research.  Yet I still called myself a stay at home mom.  I longed to join the PTA, a local mommy group, to sign up for stroller striders, but for some reason I didn’t have the time the other Stay at home moms had.  I quit selling melaleuca (it seemed to cost more money than I made)  I up and quit working for my mom when I was 7 months pregnant with baby B.  For the first time ever I was actually a stay at home mom.  after many years of lying to myself and everyone around me I had finally managed to do what I wanted.  However, my mom was upset, she needed my help.  I knew what I was doing and she didn’t have the time to do it herself, or the resources to hire anyone with my knowledge locally (in LA).  Eventually I started “helping” her again, but still refused to admit I was no longer a stay at home mom. 

 We now own the farm and I work everyday along with Aba; planting, weeding, moving rocks, feeding and watering the animals, working on the website, handling phone calls, etc.etc.etc.  and I still work for my mom. 

Yesterday I finally realized I am not a stay at home mom.  As much as I want to be, and even though I am physically at home, I am working.  I am designing postcards, flyers and brochures:, I am calling clients, agents, and customers; I am working in the field and taking care of the livestock. While I am happy with my life, I don’t mind working for my mom, I like working in the fields and caring for the animals. I need to finally admit to myself (and accept the fact) that I am not a stay at home mom.

I do not have the luxury of sleeping in or taking a nap, I can not decide not to cook because I am pregnant (even when I was pregnant with j and couldn’t stand the thought of eating an egg, I still made 5 of them daily for my families breakfast).  I can not go shopping for the day with the girls, have dinner parties at night, and look perfect at all times.  My house does not look like something out of the pages of a magazine; my gardens could not grace the cover of sunset, and my dinners are not as elegant as Martha Stewart’s.  I can not continue to compete with the stay at home moms of the world.  I need to accept who I am, and what I am.  I am a working mother, and it is okay.

Please someone remind me of this when I get upset and frustrated my house is not beautiful, my meals are simple, and the laundry is piled higher than my head.  Remind me it is okay that my sink is full of dishes, my car is full of shoes and my kids faces are smudged.  Tell me it is fine that I am not freshly pressed and showered when Aba comes in from the field and dinner will ba an hour late.  Let me know that it is okay that I donn’t have time to talk on the phone or make fancy snacks for snack day. That with all I am doing it is no wonder I am tired and buying new socks instead of fixing the oId, making cake from a box, and skipping bath night is not the end of the world. I am not a stay at home mom, and I need to stop pretending that I am.  I am not fooling any one, only making life harder than it needs to be.

~ by Robin on June 28, 2008.