Mommy Bloggers: Performance Anxiety

The following essay has been written especially for Mommybloggers by our featured blogger of the week, Mir. (At the request of her fans, we did let her out of time-out for crashing our server.)

I'm sure this comes as a huge shock to anyone who actually knows me or has read me for more than, say, 4 seconds, but I'm sort of a perfectionist. I hide it so well, don't I?

I've been told that my standards are impossibly high. I've been told that I have some internal barometer of RIGHTNESS that is prohibitive when dealing with the real world. I've been told to just CHILL OUT and have a cookie already.

It's all true. Especially because I can always use a cookie.

Me, I'm sort of a swirling package of lofty ideals, wrapped up in cynical paper, trimmed with a brightly-colored and highly neurotic ribbon. WHY more people don't rush to unwrap me is a MYSTERY FOR THE AGES.

The truth is that--to a greater or lesser extent--I've always been this way. I believe I'm more flexible and adaptive now than I used to be, but no one is going to accuse me of being easy-going. Really the only way someone is going to speak "mellow" in my general direction is if it is preceded by "marsh" and in the context of cocoa.

In many ways I've made my peace with the various demanding demons I channel. There are ways in which I am still struggling for greater balance, and ways in which I accept that awareness is the most control I'll be exerting. There's always room for improvement and at the rate I'm going I'm certain I'll attain my goals around age 183. No worries!

The most difficult challenge to my perfection-addled brain right now? Modeling healthy behavior for my children. Specifically, modeling healthy interpersonal interaction such that I can feel confident that they'll grow up to have as little emotional baggage as possible when it comes to relating to other humans.

It's not like I have the market cornered on worrying about this. I'm sure that all parents do. But as a single parent, I worry that I'm already behind the ball. I feel that I'm always on alert for the tacit and explicit messages my kids are receiving about what it means to be in a relationship; what behavior is acceptable and when commitment is healthy and when it is counterproductive. What are they learning? What are they learning from ME?

My kids are young; it's not like we're having in-depth discussions about a lot of this stuff. Maybe someday we will (and then I'll have a new set of worries to entertain, like how much do I tell them about the divorce?), but right now it's a constant state of juggling what they see and what they don't.

For example: I have introduced my children to exactly one man since I divorced. It was (I thought) a well-thought-out decision, after the relationship was fairly well along. I told the kids he was a friend. They immediately figured out that he was a boyfriend. They had questions. I tried my best to answer them appropriately. The meeting went off without a hitch; everyone got along famously. And then I was quite unexpectedly dumped, and my kids wanted to know what was up.

I think: Well, kids, some people are terrified of feelings.
I say: We decided not to see each other any more.

I think: I am fantasizing about performing an unmedicated castration because being angry is all that keeps me from succumbing to feeling completely unlovable.
I say: I am sad that we won't see each other again.

I think: This was a unilateral, unfair decision, born of issues having little to do with me.
I say: We can't control what other people decide to do.

I think: I never want to date again and fear that I will never find someone with whom to share my life as equals.
I say: After a while I'm sure I'll meet someone else, but if I don't, that's okay, too.

I think: I want you, my darling daughter, to grow up strong and confident and knowing how to give fully of yourself without compromising your own needs, without leaving yourself at risk for excessive hurt. I want you, my loving son, to grow up and stay that way--without buying into the idea that men don't or shouldn't feel, or that baubles or chest-beating declarations are a substitute for the work of building true bonds. I want you both to know that it's okay to be alone, it's okay to take a break to regroup, but eventually you try again if that's what you need... and someday, I want you to see a relationship that works, because my mate and I have made it a priority and are unafraid to weather the storms. I want to find a way to adjust my assholeometer not only for myself, but for you two. Because you are happiest when I am happy. Because I want you to know how to love and how to make yourselves happy.
I say: How about we make some cookies?

And I make smiley faces out of chocolate chips. And put some more money in the therapy fund. And pray that I can sometimes manage to set an example worth following.

Read more by Mir on her personal blog Woulda Coulda Shoulda.

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