I bah humbug your miracle of life
Yesterday I got an email from some new friends of ours with the exciting announcement that they're expecting their first baby. Then today I get an email from a formerly very pregnant workmate that she just had her baby this morning. It's been a week of exciting baby news all around!
For some reason, this has made me very crabby.
It must be because I am evil incarnate that I cringe at the thought of other people's happiness. No, that's not it. Dial it back a few notches and it is revealed that I'm just jealous. Jealous that someone else is getting all the attention that comes when you're pregnant with your first baby, the caring nurturing spotlight you bask in before you actually become a mother and your identity drops off the face of the earth. Or jealous that someone else is leaving on maternity leave, and it means more mornings and evenings away from my own baby because I now have to work harder.
So much for the good sorority of motherhood.
I've long believed that becoming a mother does not make you a better more compassionate or empathetic person. Ha ha, no. If that were the case, then mothers would be better drivers, less gossipy at the bus stop, less rude to the baristas in Starbucks. It's a constant battle to ensure that motherhood does not turn me into a judgmental self-protective she-wolf, clawing others to the death for the protection of her own family. Although, as I look at that list of examples, (and imagining the huge SUVs in front of Starbucks) it might just be living in the suburbs that makes you a mean person.