It just hit me the other day.
I am a mom.
I got a phone call from our church nursery asking for "parent volunteers" to take turns once every two months working a shift in the nursery. For a minute, I thought they had the wrong number. "Parent Volunteers" drive minivans. "Parent volunteers" do their kids' fundraisers for them. "Parent volunteers" make cookies for bake sales. "Parent volunteers" arrange "holiday parties" for their kid's classrooms. Parents were way, way, older than me. How can I be a parent when my own parents are still older than me? I haven't caught up to them, how could I be in the same club? Hmm?
I'm not a parent. Can't be! I'm 25. I haven't finished college, for goodness sake. Yes, I have a son, but I'm not a parent. Am I?
When did this change take place?
When I think of what a mom is, I think of my own mom. So grown up, so adult and mature. I'd come home from school and she'd be sewing, or getting dinner ready, or doing some kind of housework. Adults were boring. When they had parties, all they did was sit around and talk. No fun!!
Wait a minute. When I hang out with my friends, we... sit around and talk.
I spend my days taking care of the house.
But I don't feel like a mom! I still feel like a college kid. I'm just me, I'm who I always was, but now with a baby.
This is very weird.
I don't mean to disparage motherhood. I love being a mother! It just hadn't hit me yet that along with being a mother comes...being a mother. Does that make sense?
I am a mom.
I got a phone call from our church nursery asking for "parent volunteers" to take turns once every two months working a shift in the nursery. For a minute, I thought they had the wrong number. "Parent Volunteers" drive minivans. "Parent volunteers" do their kids' fundraisers for them. "Parent volunteers" make cookies for bake sales. "Parent volunteers" arrange "holiday parties" for their kid's classrooms. Parents were way, way, older than me. How can I be a parent when my own parents are still older than me? I haven't caught up to them, how could I be in the same club? Hmm?
I'm not a parent. Can't be! I'm 25. I haven't finished college, for goodness sake. Yes, I have a son, but I'm not a parent. Am I?
When did this change take place?
When I think of what a mom is, I think of my own mom. So grown up, so adult and mature. I'd come home from school and she'd be sewing, or getting dinner ready, or doing some kind of housework. Adults were boring. When they had parties, all they did was sit around and talk. No fun!!
Wait a minute. When I hang out with my friends, we... sit around and talk.
I spend my days taking care of the house.
But I don't feel like a mom! I still feel like a college kid. I'm just me, I'm who I always was, but now with a baby.
This is very weird.
I don't mean to disparage motherhood. I love being a mother! It just hadn't hit me yet that along with being a mother comes...being a mother. Does that make sense?
4 comments:
Yup. And I also keep thinking that if I AM a mom after all, that for sure I'm a young cool one. Until kids call me ma'am and say that grownups don't put blue highlights in their hair. When did I become a grownup?
I am three years into being a mom and there are still moments when I wonder who the heck though it would be a good idea to give me a child.
That realization that you're suddenly a MOTHER is pretty off-putting. I spent A YEAR unsure of what I should wear anymore - my old clothes no longer seemed appropriate. I was pretty frumpy until I found a comfortable middle ground.
Hahaha! Proving once again you are more mature than I am because nobody called and asked me to volunteer! ("Don't let her around the kiddies, she'll subvert them!")
Er, maybe it's because my phone is broken?
BTW, I won't tell anyone you're a parent if you don't want me to. ;)
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