To Blog It or Not To Blog It

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Blogging about the dark side of parenting…

Not too long after I had my daughter I received a comment from a reader of my blog who asked me to write about the “dark” side of parenting. At the time I was blessed with an amazing infant; no colic, she slept well, and she hardly ever cried. And since I’d spent thousands of dollars on infertility treatments and waited over four years for her arrival, I was in complete bliss mode and said, “Dark side? What dark side?”

Now my daughter is two. The dark side has arrived, I tell you, and in force. I find myself frustrated with her to the point of yelling on a daily basis. I don’t love her any less, but when she insists on asserting her independence–just like her mom, damn it all–say, when we’re crossing the street and she doesn’t want to hold my hand, sometimes I just lose it. I realize most of that is based in fear–I’m terrified she’ll get away from me in the street–but still, two-year-olds are kind of a complete frickin’ nightmare. Sure, they can be cuddly and adorable at times, but mostly? They are a whopping pain in the ass.

But I find myself reluctant to get deep into the “terribleness of the twos” on my blog. Part of it is not wanting to admit on a public level how ashamed I am for yelling at my daughter, or for forcefully grabbing her arm when she runs toward the street, or for ignoring her when she’s thrown something at the dog. Again. But the larger part of it is from reading other blogs by moms when their kids were my daughter’s age.

I remember reading Dooce , Heather Armstrong’s blog, when her daughter Leta was in what Heather referred to as “the screaming years.” I used to cringe when I read her blog, thinking to myself, man–what an awful bunch of things to say about your child (of course, my daughter hadn’t been born yet at that point, although I was pregnant). Now? Dude, I totally get it. My daughter–amazing, fantastic, spectacular gift that she is–sometimes is kind of a jerk. Sometimes. See, even now I have trouble being honest about her at this level.

The stupid thing, of course, is that I cut my own foot off when I don’t blog honestly about my frustrations with parenting. Because guess what? EVERY OTHER PARENT IN THE WORLD IS DRIVEN INSANE BY THEIR TWO-YEAR-OLD. If I posted openly about that on my blog, well, then, I’d get a bunch of comments from other mothers saying, “Dude–I totally know what you mean.”

But I worry, of course, about what my daughter will read about herself when she’s older, or what her friends may find and read. And of course I worry about what other mothers will think of me–not the mention that as a Mommy Blogger who used to be an Infertile Blogger, I worry that those who are still in the infertility trenches reading about my parenting frustrations and will think I’m ungrateful. Because I’m not–I wouldn’t trade a single infuriating second with my kid. But I still hold back, and it’s stupid–because by keeping my thoughts to myself, I deprive myself of one of the greatest tools I have at hand–the insight of other mothers who have tread this path before me.

THIS again is why blogs written by other parents are so wonderful. It soothes our isolation and stops us from feeling so helpless and alone in the struggle. Now when I think about the fact that I might get to finally meet Heather of Dooce when I attend the BlogHer convention in July, I’ll be able to say, “Thank you for being honest about what an asshole your kid was sometimes in your blog. I am so happy to know I’m not alone, and I am so grateful to be at this convention this weekend without her.”

Because truthfully? Although I’ll miss my daughter something awful those three days I’ll be away, it’s going to be TOTALLY AWESOME. So there you go–finally, some truth from me about my recent parenting experiences. It feels so good to tell the truth. Now, I just have to go do it in my blog…

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