Week 19: I Don't Know How She Does It

This week's book:
I Don't Know How She Does It
By Allison Pearson

This past weekend, one of my best friends since the age of twelve came to visit. Being wives and mothers in different cities and growing up having to do all of that has forced us not to be able to get together as often as we both would like, but so it goes.
My Bestie surprised me a few months ago by telling me she was going to a mom. I was over the moon and have already created a Pinterest board for the ridiculous baby shower I will throw soon for the little guy or girl.

When we had lunch together this past weekend, she confessed her first bit of mom shaming or at least questioning a choice she had made. I had to tell her that this was only the first of a lifetime of questioning the choices she will make as a mom. But it got me thinking, I'm sure I'm not the only mother who questions everything I do with my children. Or could I be?

Between losing my own mother when our first born was only four months old, living in a town where, after eight years, we still don't know many people, or being a first time mom, I'm lost a lot of the time. Even when our little guy started kindergarten, which should have been a happy time, his teacher made the whole family feel like failures. I will admit, that has put me into a real tailspin. I don't know any mothers that half-butt their job. We are all trying our best and I know that we are feeling like we are failing sometimes.

I have been lucky and have been able to stay home with both of our kids. Some people have to work out of the home and have their children in daycare or have a nanny. Some women want to work and can't imagine being a stay at home mom. They say they’d be bored they were home all day with their little ones. And there are moms that have dreamt of staying home with their kids. But it seems like no matter what path that we take, there is always some sort of shame or guilt or what have you. This week's book is all about this topic; moms who want it all and are being pulled in too many different directions.

I will be honest it took me awhile to get through this book. I vaguely remember watching the movie adaptation a million years ago. (cable, maybe?) The novel is based in London and sometimes I didn't know some of the things she was talking about. The book was also quite repetitive. She never asked for help or accepted it if someone offered. She would redo everything her husband had just done and was constantly jumping on the company jet and leaving her children with their nanny. While I do know women like this do exist I had a hard time with not even liking the main character of the book. I read this book because it fulfilled one of the last remaining books on my book challenge and a book I like earlier this year referenced it. The ending of the book doesn't seem realistic with how the rest of the book is put together.
Sometimes as a mom or woman, there are sacrifices we make; there are choices that have to me made. I had our son before I started nursing school because I wanted to be a mom so much. When I was eyeball deep in clinicals and tests and literally five hundred pages a week to read and part of the campus was in a completely different time zone, I was becoming a person I didn't know or like. I was failing on all fronts. I wasn't being a good student because I wanted to tuck my little one in at night and I wasn't being good mom because when I was able to make it home I was never fully there, I could never turn my brain off. The tipping point was when I failed one of my courses and we found out by total surprise we were expecting our second kiddo. I snapped and decided I would give up becoming a nurse. My children were only going to be little once and I didn't want to miss any more. I didn't want to being crying all the time, and I didn't want to feel like a total failure.

I don't recommend the book. If you are a struggling working mom you don't have time to read it anyway. We all know we are stressed, there is no need to read about it.