Skip to main content

The Guilt

It is entirely possible that I am the worst mother in the world.

Today I sent the Small(er) One to school with a runny nose, hacking cough, mild temperature and a 'hurty tummy'. And for what? Because I have a client meeting this morning, nobody else senior who knows anything about the account is around to stand in and I'm too scared of the fall-out if I call to say I can't make it into the office.

Alpha doesn't really understand why I feel so bad about this, plus the days when he could take time off for anything less than hospitalisation are stuck in an increasingly rosy past.

I totallly suck. This totally sucks. And I am getting madder and madder with both myself and the situation by the second.

Comments

Manhattan Mama said…
Hang tight. Hold on. It'll get better. You're not the worst mother. My own mother? Forgot me at school. More than once. Ok, it's not the way we imagined being mothers. But it's the best we can do. And the good will always outweigh the bad. She won't remember sniffling at school. Promise.
Kate B. said…
I would probably forget them if it wasn't for Wonder Nanny picking them up every day, so I'm not off the hook just yet!

I hope she won't remember. I really, really do.
Anonymous said…
She will grow up thinking that her Mother is a high-flying super woman who buys her incredibly gorgeous clothes, things, etc. instead of feeling ashamed of the drudge at home, baking crap cookies and wearing tacky home-made rags who everybody dumps on. Hang on in there and remember that they want you to look glam at all times. Worst thing in the world - kids who think you are a loser!

Popular posts from this blog

Apologies for being incommunicado this week and hope none of you out there are too distraught not to be receiving the usual almost-daily MotV missives. The reason for the silence is that I'm up to my neck, metaphorically-speaking, in research papers for my first grad course assessment. This experience has made me realise how rigorously un-academic I am in my thinking. It has also illuminated how reliant I am on red wine in order to get through endless evenings typing furiously on my laptop, not to mention the fueling of increasingly colorful curses that I feel obliged to aim at the University's online library system which consistently refuses to spit out any of the journals I'm desperate for (I refuse to believe this is 100% due to my technical incompetence...) Oh well, if this is the price one has to pay in order to realize a long-cherished dream then it's not all that bad... No one ever said a mid-life career change would be easy. Wish me luck!

A thought

Perhaps sometimes a gift can be delivered in the guise of a tragedy. It's just a matter of perception, after all. I suspect that the talent lies in looking beyond the surface to what lies beneath and beyond. And, of course, being able to make sense of it all and going on to apply that knowledge to building a productive way forward. Here's hoping.

It's my party and I'll cry if I want to

A friend recently emailed me to say that her big memory of her stay with us last year is that she had a great birthday, one of the few where she didn't 'act like a spoiled grumpy princess'. She tried to give me all the credit but as I explained to her, it was all down to having a fellow female organising the birthday fun rather than leaving it to her partner. Her email got me thinking about birthdays and how very different men and women are in their attitudes to celebrating special occasions. It also had me thinking about my birthday two years ago when I threw a major tantrum in the Carrefour car-park after being told that we were off to do the weekly shop, kids in tow, which was simply the final straw at the end of a very uninspiring day. In contrast, my birthday last year was rather lovely (a morning on my own in a spa with no mobile coverage, pure selfish bliss). This year - in a few short months, eek! - I'll be hitting the grand old age of 38. This will be my las...