Douglas Susan Jeanne - The mommy myth : the idealization of motherhood and how it has undermined all women

Its 5:22 P.M. Youre in the grocery checkout line. Your three-year-old is writhing on the floor, screaming, because you have refused to buy her a Teletubby pinwheel. Your six-year-old is whining, repeatedly, in a voice that could saw through cement, But mommy, puleeze, puleeze because you have not bought him the latest Lunchables, which features, as the four food groups, Cheetos, a Snickers, Cheez Whiz, and Twizzlers. Your teenager, who has not spoken a single word in the past four days except, Youve ruined my life, followed by Everyone else has one, is out in the car, sulking, with the new rap-metal band Piss on the Parentals blasting through the headphones of a Discman.

To distract yourself, and to avoid the glares of other shoppers who have already deemed you the worst mother in America, you leaf through People magazine. Inside, Uma Thurman gushes Motherhood Is Sexy. Brought back to reality by stereophonic whining, you indeed feel as sexy as Rush Limbaugh in a thong.

You drag your sorry ass home. Now, if you were a good mom, youd joyfully empty the shopping bags and transform the process of putting the groceries away into a fun game your kids love to play (upbeat Raffi songs would provide a lilting soundtrack). Then, while you steamed the broccoli and poached the chicken breasts in Vouvray and Evian water, you and the kids would also be doing jigsaw puzzles in the shape of the United Arab Emirates so they learned some geography. Your cheerful teenager would say, Gee, Mom, you gave me the best advice on that last homework assignment. When your husband arrives, he is so overcome with admiration for how well you do it all that he looks lovingly into your eyes, kisses you, and presents you with a diamond anniversary bracelet. He then announces that he has gone on flex time for the next two years so that he can split childcare duties with you fifty-fifty. The children, chattering away happily, help set the table, and then eat their broccoli. After dinner, you all go out and stencil the driveway with autumn leaves.

But maybe this sounds slightly more familiar. I wont unpack the groceries! You cant make me, bellows your child as he runs to his room, knocking down a lamp on the way. Eeweegross out! he yells and you discover that the cat has barfed on his bed. You have fifteen minutes to make dinner because theres a school play in half an hour. While the children fight over whether to watch Hot Couples or people eating larvae on Fear Factor, you zap some Prego spaghetti sauce in the microwave and boil some pasta. You set the table. Mommy, Mommy, Sam losted my hamster, your daughter wails. Your ex-husband calls to say he wont be taking the kids this weekend after all because his new wife, Buffy, twenty-three, has to go on a modeling shoot in Virgin Gorda for the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue, and she really needs me with her. You go to the TV room to discover the kids watching transvestites punching each other out on Jerry Springer. The pasta boils over and scalds the hamster, now lying prostrate on the floor with its legs twitching in the air. Get your butts in here this instant or Ill murder you immediately, you shriek, by way of inviting your children to dinner. I hate this pastaI only like the kind shaped like wagon wheels! Mommy, you killded my hamster!

If youre like usmothers with an attitude problemyou may be getting increasingly irritable about this chasm between the ridiculous, honey-hued ideals of perfect motherhood in the mass media and the reality of mothers everyday lives. And you may also be worn down by media images that suggest that however much you do for and love your kids, it is never enough. The love we feel for our kids, the joyful times we have with them, are repackaged into unattainable images of infinite patience and constant adoration so that we fear, as Kristin van Ogtrop put it movingly in The Bitch in the House, I will love my children, but my love for them will always be imperfect.

From the moment we get up until the moment we collapse in bed at night, the media are out there, calling to us, yelling, Hey you! Yeah, you! Are you really raising your kids right? Whether its the cover of Redbook or Parents demanding Are You a Sensitive Mother? Is Your Child Eating Enough? Is Your Baby Normal? (and exhorting us to enter its pages and have great sex at 25, 35, or 85), the nightly news warning us about missing children, a movie trailer hyping a film about a cross-dressing dad whos way more fun than his stinky, careerist wife ( Mrs. Doubtfire ), or Dr. Laura telling some poor mother who works four hours a week that shes neglectful, the siren song blending seduction and accusation is there all the time. Mothers are subjected to an onslaught of beatific imagery, romantic fantasies, self-righteous sermons, psychological warnings, terrifying movies about losing their children, even more terrifying news stories about abducted and abused children, and totally unrealistic advice about how to be the most perfect and revered mom in the neighborhood, maybe even in the whole country. (Even Working Mother which should have known betterhad a Working Mother of the Year Contest. When Jill Kirschenbaum became the editor in 2001, one of the first things she did was dump this feature, noting that motherhood should not be a competitive sport.) We are urged to be fun-loving, spontaneous, and relaxed, yet, at the same time, scared out of our minds that our kids could be killed at any moment. No wonder 81 percent of women in a recent poll said its harder to be a mother now than it was twenty or thirty years ago, and 56 percent felt mothers were doing a worse job today than mothers back then. Even mothers who deliberately avoid TV and magazines, or who pride themselves on seeing through them, have trouble escaping the standards of perfection, and the sense of threat, that the media ceaselessly atomize into the air we breathe.