Recently, a dear friend asked me, "Who comes first, you or your kids?" To justify my hasty answer of "Me first, of course," I cited the old airplane safety example...
Everyone knows that in the event of an in-flight emergency you secure your own oxygen mask before assisting your child. It's common sense. Why then, do so many parents (mothers mostly) have the tendency to take care of their children before themselves, even if it sucks the life right out of them? I for one, consider my happiness an emergent situation. Which isn't to say that I don't see to it that my children's daily needs are met along with a reasonable amount of petty wants. It just means that I don't always make myself low man on the totem pole. Sometimes I take the biggest slice of pizza, the longest shower, the last chug of milk from the carton. It wouldn't be like a mediocre mother to be magnanimous ALL the time.
However, I did relinquish the better part of my adolescence to take a crack at teenage motherhood. (I'll tell you the whole story in due time.) Suffice it to say, that while "Juno" and "Teen Moms" have made unwed pregnancy as trendy and nauseatingly contagious as whatever Ke$ha song is currently climbing the charts, when I was in high school getting knocked up was still considered an unsavory thing to do. In fact, upon learning of my unfortunate condition I was summoned to the principal's office at Viewmont High and invited to attend school somewhere I might feel more "comfortable". Somewhere turned out to be The Young Parent's School in Farmington, Utah--a nondescript brick box of a building that housed between 30-40 pregnant girls. And I thought I was the only teen trollop in Utah!
A far cry from wise-cracking Juno, I was the sort of pregnant girl who--while waddling to the school bus--waved back at the teenagers from nearby Davis High who heckled me from their passing cars. "Slut!" They'd sneer from their open windows, sometimes tossing Big Gulps at me while on their way to Seminary class. "I know," I'd shout back apologetically, "Sorry about that." It was a different time, and a different me.
These days, you'll get no apologies from me for stealing a nap before sorting Legos with the boys or for shopping the clearance rack at my favorite thrift store before sitting through another flag football game. Why? Because this former harlot has learned the fundamental in-flight safety rules for life--when Mom's happy, and she has enough air to breath, even if she isn't riding first class, there's no such thing as a crash and burn. When I'm with my kids, whether it's waiting poolside or potty-side, I'm exactly where I want to be--there's nothing unsavory or obligatory about it. Nowadays nobody tells me where I'll feel more comfortable but me. So what if that means bath-time for me before bedtime for the boys? So long as I'm the one tucking them in, nobody seems to mind.
