Yes, I have a confession.
I have two beautiful girls but before I had them I had hoped I would never have girls. It isn't that I don't like girls, I mean, I am one. It's just that, well, I am one. I know how we work.
I find that girls are sweet, cute, cuddly, all those things they say. They are also competetive, judgemental, and ungrateful to their mothers. I know this because I have lived it.
I am one of four girls. When we were very young we generally played nicely together, outside of the occasional spat about whose toy was whom's. Being the oldest I felt the need to mother each of my sisters, a need that I still have not outgrown. Lucky for me they love me in spite of it.
However, as we grew older things became much more catty. We were each two years apart just like Hayley and Sam. We were all the same body frame more or less, which meant that we could all fit into each other's clothes for the most part. I mean, I didn't really want to wear my baby sister's Hugga-bunch underwear when I was twelve years old but I probably could have if I wanted to. We fought over things like a matching pair of socks, of which were rare in our home. We had lots of socks, it was just that we never took the time to match them together until we really needed them. So if someone would take the time to sit by the laundry basket and match up all the socks, well, that girl wanted to horde the matched pairs. It got so bad that whenever we bought new socks I would stitch a red stitch in the toe seam of the socks before they were washed so that I would always know which were "mine".
I think I experienced this more so than my sisters, who all seemed to get along better, but I also resented the fact that my sisters were friends with my friends. I needed them to be MY friends. Of course, this could come from the fact that I had a fair sized family, and not just because I was a girl, so I won't blame it on my gender.
And then we each hit our teens. At one point my mom and I were super close. Then I think I turned thirteen or fourteen. I was in high school and I knew it all. My mom wasn't cool. She didn't "get" me. I shut her out of my life, likely in a time that I needed her the most. I'm fortunate. My mom DID "get" me. And she let me do what I needed to do, even though she had to watch from a distance. She let me make mistakes. She consoled me, when I would allow her to. She stayed away when I wouldn't let her close. I treated her poorly.
It wasn't until I was about nineteen or twenty years old that I came back around. I had moved out and rarely made time to visit with my family who lived in the same town. They didn't judge me, and they didn't make me feel bad about it. They still called me (as they do to this day) to invite me for corned beef and cabbage on St. Patricks Day, even though I really don't eat cabbage now that I live on my own and even though green beer is usually a bigger priority for me.
I think because they were so patient with me I finally realized that I had been wrong all along. My mom and my sisters were not my competition, they were my cheerleaders. And I had lost years just trying to distance myself from them. But this isn't unique to just me. I see it happening over and over again. My nieces. My friends children. And once I realized that it is the cycle of life (at least for girls) I decided I did not want to repeat that cycle.
Not because I didn't love girls. Because I was afraid that my heart would get broken if my girls treated me the way I treated my mother, and I just don't think that my heart is as strong as my mothers. She is a pretty amazing woman with the patience level of a saint (for most things). Me? Not so much. And knowing my own shortfalls I was afraid that if I had girls I would not be able to handle the cycle.
I still don't know if I will be able to handle it with as much grace as my mother did. I know my own limitations. My mom's saying is "water wears away stone" and she is fantastic at being water. I am the stone. My mentality is more that "stone pounds away at anything it wants to". I have been praying for patience. I hope that during the next ten or so years that I learn to be water. Because I do know that some day I will need to be.
In the mean time? In the mean time I look around my house, I see a toy closet decorated with butterflies and flowers. I see pink blankets and tiny purple crocs. I see baby dolls (mostly undressed), and stuffed animals. I see frilly Christmas dresses waiting to be worn with patent leather shoes. I see smiling faces of beautiful children who DO love their Mommy and for now, right now, I know that I am meant to mother girls.
