I’m part of a somewhat quirky demographic these days. When four counts as pretty many children, and a twelve year-spread between eldest and youngest counts as a pretty big age span, I’ve started to see how—as is the case for every parent at every stage—this straddling from teen to tot has altered my perspective on the whole enterprise.
And I’ll confess, I have to work hard not to say to a fellow tot mama all worked up about say, potty training, eh, don’t worry, s/he will figure it out, so don’t push it. I mean I have been there. I have pushed it (no diapers preschool entrance requirement, nearly a dozen years ago, infant brother, sluggish vestibular system, the little round ring you put on the toilet seat, vacation in Vermont all elements that could otherwise be termed “hell.”). So, don’t get me started on why preschools should not require underpants, one. And do understand how after that awful two weeks, I vowed never to foist the potty upon anyone ever again. And haven’t. My ‘tween and my first grader miraculously know how to use the toilet. The little two year-old is demanding to go there—she’s tiny but we never dredged that ring for the seat up again, either—and she pees when she thinks she has to. It’s so friggin’ great. We’re totally delighted and proud and we never remember to ask her. I am pretty certain she’ll beat the rest to the task (whether because she’s female or the fourth, let’s not even hazard a guess—how about both?).
I’ll also confess that given my aversion to driving much and my general distractedness with three other kids and my work, I’m not the most attentive to things like offering rides. I went to my eldest’s (completely awesome) dance concert last night and our neighbor, also classmate, was working backstage, so I could give a ride home. It’s so rare that I’m the ride giver and it was so delightful to hear the eldest brothers (three in his family) rag on their younger siblings. I have to bite my tongue when parents of teens are willing to do so much more chauffeuring than I’d ever dream of (in fact, I bit it waiting for the concert to start, thinking why would you keep your kid at the drive-to high school when you live three blocks from a very good high school your kid could walk to?). Okay, I un-bit the tongue. Whoops.
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There is, when caring solely for very small children, even if something like the potty seems a gargantuan task a bit more out of your parental control than you’d like (or substitute here naptime, bedtime, hitting peers, or biting) a sense that you can control their environment and your interactions with the child, and generally will situations to work as you see fit.
I often think about how before my first child was born I so lovingly and carefully placed objects on a shelf in my study-turned-his-nursery, how we chose gorgeous sheets and bumpers (thanks to the very eager grandparents-to-be) and set up what seemed a perfect space. We didn’t get it about the room darkening shades, of course (those came later). Fast forward to child number three: we had to kick our housemate upstairs to a different bedroom to free up a room for the imminent arrival and we never got around to the room darkening shades (yet once his reflux was cured by some hands-on work by the fabulous physical therapist, he napped) and barely set up the room.
By the time the fourth arrived, we booted number three to his brother’s room (and bed, which they share), were gifted a crib that wasn’t falling apart (ours had endured thirty years of constant use between the people we bought it from and us and some friends) and put those beautiful sheets and bumpers to use again (now, they are in my nephew’s nursery: good investment, it turned out). Her room isn’t lovely or organized. She is equally if differently loved. In some ways, she’s more loved, only because our universe of family is so much larger and our willingness to share her with our friends (including the kids’ friends) is so much greater. If you want to know why she’s going to be a wicked good soccer player or ball catcher or hoop shooter, the answer is simple: older kids throw balls to her, have her kick and have her shoot a lot.
Raising toddlers it’s also easy to think that along with being able to control the big-ticket stuff, that you’ll be able—and want to—keep the child-raising as your undivided focus (and maybe you will and maybe you’ll be able to) for nearly two decades or more. You really don’t know what life is going to throw at you. And those children, who they turn out to be, will determine more than you can imagine, too.
Yesterday, I was reading to Saskia, Tony Ross’ hysterical I Want My Potty and it dawned on me (again) as everyone raced to praise and appease the princess about her prowess on the chamber pot how much of a big deal this is, how possibly overblown, yet how first or only children so often experience royal treatment (indeed, we always admitted that our first was a little prince and as my stepfather would say, “Why should his feet touch the ground when we could carry him?”). I mean, I’d read about benign neglect and very consciously tried to practice it. Want to see benign neglect? With four children, I am, I have to say, a master. Why? Because I can’t help it, or more honestly, I don’t choose to help it; my priorities have shifted, not away from the children, rather away from the laser focus of only the children and toward some different priorities with and for them.
Put another way, I see now, as I could not see when my first was tiny and I was so completely infatuated with his every movement and determined to attend to his every need immediately (my prince, mine) how the trajectory was like this: his job is to grow up and my task to help him have the tools for independence so that as he moves further from my constant gaze he’s equipped. Who can hold that idea with their one true love, their first baby? You really cannot. That’s why mothers of teens standing on playgrounds with mothers of tots should (mostly) hold their tongues.
Put one more way, fourteen (and a half) years in, I now know that pretty much every kid will have some challenges not instantly fixable (if at all) and that some hard things will happen to us parents and that life will be very life-y and that there isn’t really hindsight, there’s kind of only middle-sight.
