Who I Want to Be

When it comes down to it, as far as popular American culture is concerned, stay-at-home-moms are pretty much at the bottom of the barrel. Before I was a mom, I knew this intellectually, and felt bad for people like my own mom who seemed to get a bad rap. Now that I am in my 8th month of being a mom, I feel it myself, and I see it everywhere. And OW it stings. I’ll share 2 recent examples:

…on NPR* the other day , a collection of women were being interviewed regarding the election – and the radio announcer made a point of assigning these women credibility by saying that each of them was a “professional” woman…which would imply that there is such a thing as a “non-professional woman”…which I would assume means someone like me who stays at home… (if you can think of anything else that that might mean, please enlighten me, because I can’t!).

…today on Rachael Ray**, Maria Shriver was being interviewed — and much to my horror began describing her recent revelation that even her kids don’t see “just being a mom” as a job, and would look up to her more if she “had a real job”, because then she would “be who she wanted to be”, or some such nonsense! Yeah, thanks, Maria.

I’m really not trying to play the martyr here. This job is a TON of work, but it does have a ton of perks…snuggles, a measured degree of freedom to run errands, take walks, meet friends for lunch, etc. (this will only decrease as my baby becomes mobile, and eventually, as my family increases in size), the ability to listen to the TV with one ear during the day (if you call that a perk)….many other things, too.

I think what bothers me more is that it’s just proof that we live in a selfish culture. A culture that tells us incessantly that in order to have any worth, we have to have a “real career”, and that pushes us to put ourselves first, because “we deserve it”. (I hate that phraseology, by the way, and it’s everywhere. I even heard a TV ad that says “You deserve a beautiful new bathroom.”. What the heck. I don’t deserve anything except hell! But I digress…). But shouldn’t things run the opposite way? Shouldn’t women who choose to sacrifice their careers and statuses in order to focus on raising godly children be given the highest honor and set as the model of a truly successful woman?

I suppose that in God’s eyes they are, and I suppose that’s what Proverbs 31 is saying.

But here in America no one seems to think so. They seem to think anyone who stays at home with their little ones just sits around watching TV all day, loads of free time on their hands…(oh how wrong they are!)

Well, regardless of what Mrs. Schwarzenegger says, I’m pretty much “who I want to be”: Mark’s wife & Will’s mommy. 🙂

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*not a station I normally listen to, by the way, but I was in the new car & couldn’t figure out how to change the channel, so I left it!

**NO, I don’t sit around at home watching Rachael Ray all day! I had it on the kitchen TV while I was doing the dishes, cleaning the kitchen, and feeding my son. Not that I’m trying to defend myself… 🙂