Some people are born with remarkably rose-tinted retinas. Others don rose-tinted glasses on an as-needs basis, kind of aware of what they’re doing. Through this rose tinting, life can appear, well, rosey, even perfect if it’s a strong prescription or a dominant genetic mutation. It serves a protective function – to filter out not-so-perfect thoughts, observations and experiences, so that the precious inner self is not bruised. But what of reality?

I’m lacking in the scented floral department. In fact, I have been accused of being a little pessimistic, and I certainly do feel the negative vibes at times, like when the school boy wakes us all up at 6am on the weekend to go to the toilet, or when the cake sinks in the middle or I slice my finger open on cardboard… But, I would argue that pessimism meets realism along the continuum, whilst optimism can meet delusion. And I’m backing myself up with Joe Forgas (psychologist from the University of NSW), who believes that “people who are a bit on the negative side see the world as it really is”. The others? Picture Tinkerbell in the 60′s.

So if being a little negative is just about being connected with the real world, why do people try to hide the fact that they’re feeling angry, frustrated or fed up? They desperately reach for the rose tinting, either to convince themselves that things are ‘just fine, thank you very much’, or to convince others that they are ‘just fine, thank you, and my life really is perfect – I swear it!’. I can see the value in being optimistic – it can keep you from feeling overwhelmed, helpless or hopeless;  from sinking into despair. It does play an extremely important role in keeping us moving forward, and so maybe it’s about degrees. Because in the absence of a bit of negativity or moments of feeling sad, self-reflection and a connection with the world around us struggle to exist. Pretense and optimism can only carry a person so far before things either implode or explode. The rose tinting acts as a plug to emotional expression and like a blocked drain, what is desperately trying to drain simply sits, festering, bubbling, threatening to erupt in your face.

Life doesn’t have to be perfect; we don’t have to be perfect. And, as Joe points out, “most people worth talking to are slightly depressed.” How far or deep can a conversation based on the perfect state of life go?

Yours florally,
The pessimist/realist

We were smacked by our father and whether it is because of this or just plain common sense and morality stepping in, I am not a smacker myself. We were ‘punished’/'taught a lesson’ with all kinds of implements, including a bat tennis bat and wooden spoon. We had red marks to prove it. It’s interesting that I don’t recall why (surely I never did anything wrong as a child), but can clearly recall the situations in which the smacking took place. More so, I recall the emotions - largely fear and resentment. I don’t recall thinking, ‘Gosh, Daddy is right. I really did the wrong thing and because I now know that it was the wrong thing (thanks to my pounding heart and stinging thigh), I won’t do it again.’

I didn’t learn right from wrong because I was smacked – I learned, somewhat, to shut my mouth and do the ‘right thing’ for fear of the painful consequences. I learned that a parent could inflict physical pain and no one would stand up for me. I learned that talking was more risky than constructive…at the time. As an adult I have responded by avoiding getting ‘physical’ with my kids (the fleeting satisfaction from the release of pent up frustration or anger slides swiftly into a sickening guilt) and being big on communication and fair treatment. I also teach my kids that adults don’t always do or say the right thing.

What are we teaching our kids when we ‘smack’ them? We implore them to use their words rather than to bite or hit out or scream, and yet we use our hands to gain control or communicate. And as Josh suggested on the show, what do you do when your 16 year old realises that he can ‘smack’ back and is big enough to do so? Is it okay to hit someone to get the response that you want or to communicate to our kids that adults are allowed to be rough with kids simply because they are adults?

‘Lazy parenting’, is what our dear Dicko suggested, and I tend to agree. Sure, talking to and desperately attempting to reason with a young or not so young child can be exceedingly frustrating and time consuming and a smack would sure as hell get the ‘message’ across more swiftly, but once again, I come back to what message? Let me suggest ‘hypocracy’ and ‘control’.

What harm is a little smack on the hand? Start at the top.

Clipped sentences and insincere conversational fillers are not uncommon, which sits uncomfortably with me. I am a person who demands the full attention of my listener and I have a severely acute ear and eye for the slightest distraction or inattention. Do it properly, or politely inform me that you’re not in the slightest bit interested/too busy/too tired/too rude to genuinely engage at that time. Don’t pretend to listen or care – you’re wasting my time. A high standard, perhaps, and a little unattainable for anyone who enters my conversational realm.  And now here I am, being that hopeless conversationalist, forever distracted by myself or my kids.

But can I let you in on a little secret? For a social hack like myself, this is where one of the benefits of having kids comes in. Desperate to escape an awkward moment or dead-boring conversation? Oops! There he goes! Better go rescue him (and me) before he throws himself over the edge! Too tired or simply reluctant to attend an event?  Sorry, the kids aren’t well and I really ought not to shower you in their sticky, highly contagious germs – only thinking of you! Keen to remove guests from your lounge as the clock ticks towards crazy hour? Just disappear into the kitchen and start banging pots and pans together, mumbling a little too loudly about getting dinner ready for the kids. Or disappear down the hallway and run the bath, throwing plastic toys under the stream of tepid water for extra effect. You get the point.

So, in anticipation of our next interaction, this social hack sends her apologies…either way.

So how do we justify a decision to bear children?

I recall a discussion with my brother a couple of years ago, when we were in the decision-making phase of child number two, and wrestling justifications for either side of the to-have or not-to-have argument. He didn’t agree with some of my rationale, nor I with his…so who was right? Clearly, I was. I always am. I cited reasons such as having a sibling for child number one and wanting to see if I could cope better with those early days second time around.  Admittedly, the former justification weighed a little more heavily and probably sits more comfortably with most, but the latter is also truth.

And so I got to wondering about what justifications for having kids other people provide, either stated overtly or swimming silently through their minds. Is it a basic obligation to prop-up the population? An egotistical desire to see our genes laid before us? A desperate attempt to be needed, dependent upon and loved unconditionally? A mere excuse to escape paid employment for a period of time? A misguided decision to get enlarged breasts on the cheap or receive money from the government?

Parenting is full of dodgy decisions and even more appalling justifications. But the eased guilt or remedied indecision is justification enough. Right?

We went away recently. Up north, to the Daintree to spend five nights  in the rainforest. A stunning house amid spectacular scenery, surrounded by real wildlife and only a short trip to the (crocodile-infested) beach. It was luxury. It was time off work. It was warm… But this pause on the ‘real’, everyday life was what did it for me. No hurry. No chaos. No cleaning or packing school lunches. Just me and the boys, being a family.

I think what struck me most was that I found myself being a little more patient, more understanding, more engaged. I whinged less, raised my voice less often and smoothed out the constant crease on my brow. My jaw relaxed giving my back teeth a break, my shoulders inched their way down from up near my ears and the morning habits resumed their proper function (who knew that tension/stress/life, whatever you want to call it, can seriously block you up?).

I could connect with my kids in a real way, that wasn’t governed by routine or a necessity to hurry the hell up! I could be there to hold the Toddler’s hand while he navigated his way around (yes, now that he’s walking, I’ve heard that I should be calling him a ‘toddler’ ); I could listen to the School Boy’s bizarre stories, uninterrupted by my own nagging thoughts of tasks I really ought to be getting on with. I could cuddle more and argue less. And this change found a way into my wee mind, causing me to pause and reflect on what I believed was My Experience of parenting.

My experience of parenting is a construct of circumstance and mind set. When life is busy and there really are things that have to be done in order to function adequately and survive, the perfect parenting model cannot co-exist. I now recognise that it is not that I am an Impatient Person (though some would argue…I reason that I can be patient if I choose to be, such as when working with people who have dementia), a Grump or digestively challenged. I am a person – a working adult, a wife, a mum – who lives a real life that pulls me in many directions and I cannot do it all perfectly.

And so, back to the point of this post. Many of my posts so far have had a touch of the whinge about them. They have been an opportunity to de-brief, get things off my now non-existent breast, I mean chest, and this blog has served a brilliant therapeutic purpose. But somehow I find it harder (at present, anyhow) to get back into that mind set, that identity. So I am pausing, to think, to reflect, to deconstruct and then reconstruct. Stay with me – I’ll see you on the other side.

You have probably gathered that our parenting style is not of the gently, gently, cotton wool type approach. There is little sheltering from truths, shying away from awkward discussions or just plain lying about stuff to ‘protect’ them (within reason… I haven’t yet explained to the School Boy that his existence contributes to mummy’s insanity..a lie of omission I guess). We are honest, mostly. But I can’t help get all childish in my enthusiasm to play with their little minds when it comes to these fictional characters that we introduce them to.

The School Boy recently lost his first tooth in the most hilarious of situations. He showed me the bloody tooth, hanging on by a  thread of gum, to which I responded, ‘ew, it’s bleeding.’  His response was to suck hard to get rid of said blood, and dislodge and inhale his baby tooth in the process. He doubled over, struggling to take a breath, then coughed and heaved until this little piece of enamel flew across the kitchen floor. He wasn’t too traumatised, and so I indulged in a side-splitting, semi-subdued fit of laughter.

The conversation that ensued, lead by my husband, included reference to the Tooth Fairy and money. A pang of guilt hit – I’d forgotten all about the Tooth Fairy, followed a pang of ‘oh crap, another lie to sustain’. We told him that we’d contact her by phone or email to tell her the news, but he insisted that there is a team of mixed-gender fairies who provide this service - my politically correct little man strikes again.

I just had to scratch my itch and probe a little into his ’knowledge’ of the Tooth Fairy (none of which has come from us). I asked him where the fairies live (‘with Santa’) how he thought a little fairy could carry a tooth (‘Magic, I guess’), where the fairies stored these teeth (shrug of the shoulders), and how they could possibly afford to put a coin under the pillow of every child, every time a tooth fell out (another shrug of the shoulders)? His inquisitive, perceptive mind didn’t once question the validity of the whole Tooth Fairy thing. But he’s more than happy to question us on matters that make much more sense. Maybe these kids are smarter than we think and they are actually deceiving us..they know the truth but fear that if they let on, all gifts, chocolate and monetary donations will dry up.

So what now?  I figure that if it is our job to sustain these parental lies, then we are entitled to a little fun along the way…

Recent discussions about baby-proofing our future have caused me to reflect on and rant about the lack of physical contribution that the male body makes when it comes to reproductive matters (despite the rather essential  tadpole offering that facilitates baby-making). It’s not their fault, but someone has to be held accountable.

We (women, that is – I am assuming that the majority of you are female) assume at least part of, sometimes sole, responsibility for contraception, before we succumb to ‘instincts’ (or insanity). We ride the waves of nausea, dizziness and erractic eating during pregnancy. We lug a bowling ball on our front (and around our sides if the ball is female….kidding) and then pass this ball through our most delicate orifice in the most primal and undignifying way. We donate our breasts to milk production, inflamed and infected ducts, stretching and then drooping. And then we start back at artificial hormones.

The men? The only transformation that their bodies undergo around the years of reproduction is the loss of some strands of hair, the greying of others and a little more spread around the gut. So, can we return to sender? Or do we just need to accept that women have been chosen for these roles because we are simply braver, stronger and, well, more superior?

There was a 6:20 thump and bump, a blinding bedroom light switched on followed by a School Boy howl. There was a Baby who heard this and woke before he was ready. There was a last minute dash to the shops for breakfast ingredients. There was hollandaise that didn’t quite make it and poached eggs that dispersed freely in the water, unable to be rescued.

There were many reminders directed the School Boy’s way about the significance of this day and the importance of ‘being nice to mum’…please (fallen on profoundly deaf ears). There was a walk beside a river to the tune of whinging, whining and deliberate sloshing in puddles in new sneakers. There was chaos, mayhem, madness. It was just another day really.

To be fair, there were a couple of lovely little gifts from the boys. The School Boy had taken a gold coin from his own wallet to purchase a fridge magnet at the stall for me. He had written that “I love mum because she macs dina”. And the Baby had smudged some green hand prints below a cute poem for me to reflect on.

But really, Mother’s Day? One day in the entire year that our grueling work is acknowledged formally – cheers. Has anyone dared suggest that the best gift a mother could get is to spend a few precious hours in solitary confinement?

Mother’s Day five years on. Reality bites.

My body weakens, my mind resembles an icecream, clumsily dropped on the pavement, succumbing to the warmth of the sun – my capacity to make decisions, to plan, melts away. The pendulum of emotion begins to swing less wildly, rather hanging limply with barely perceptible movement. I am nearing Point Break.

It’s not one thing or another. If I could decompartmentalise my life and experience each aspect in isolation, I would be fine.

If all I had to deal with was one task or one challenge or one crisis at a time, there would be no blog post.

If all I had to do was deal with a clingy baby, with no need for doing the washing or vacuuming…

If all I had to do was come home from work and make dinner with no thought for bathing or lunch preparation…

If I had an entire day to devote soley to being enthusiastic, energetic and loving towards my volatile school boy with no thought for making beds, doing the shopping or dealing with a clingy baby…done.Well, done better, anyway.

But the reality is that life is not so neat or manageable.

Point Break is the snapping of ligaments as a consequence of being pulled in multiple directions, simultaneously. It is failing to re-fuel when the red light indicates a near-empty tank. It is wading through deep, murky water, unsure of your footing and what lies ahead.

But I sit, reassured in the knowledge that Point Break is not to be confused with The Point of No Return. All I need is a map, clear directions and a full tank*. That’s all.

*A house cleaner, cook, live-in nanny for the middle of the night wakenings, daily massages and hot baths wouldn’t be wasted either.

I have recently finished using your product ‘Liquid Gold’ (scientifically known as ‘breastmilk’), and so am writing to provide some feedback.

What I love about Liquid Gold is its portability. In my experience it has been readily on tap – at the right temperature and in the right amount. Both its incredible cost effectiveness and its ease of use makes it a stand out product in its category.

There are however, a few frustrating aspects of Liquid Gold that I would like to draw to your attention:
1. Whilst it can, with much time, effort and mess, be provided to the baby by a man, its great dependence on mothers can be burdensome. Is it possible that you could look into somehow making it ‘on tap’ by men as well?
2. No where on the packaging does it state the potential for addiction. I am convinced that my youngest child developed an addiction of sorts, perhaps to Liquid Gold itself, but also to the method by which it is delivered (even more reason to look into the issue above)
3. The well advertised benefits of increased protection against all things nasty (germs, allergies etc) have eluded my youngest. He has seen very few days in his 11 months of ‘good health’ – coughs, snuffles, tummy upsets – and has shown signs of eczema from early on. Are the benefits supposed to be immediate and for the duration of the product’s use, or is this ‘protection’ only evident in later years? Do the benefits cease to apply if the child has an older sibling who attends child care or school, or the child himself attends child care with all of its festering ill health?
4. When a decsion has been made to stop using Liquid Gold, I have had issues with pipe blockages. Is there an inbuilt mechanism within the product that makes it difficult to stop using it, or is there a fault somewhere along the tubes?

Thank you for your time.

Regards,
P. Runes

And that’s the end of that chapter.