Silicon Valley Moms Blog

Quitting Ballet: Learning to Love Dropping Out

"Ballet is boring," my five year old daughter told me a few weeks ago. "Is it? But you love it!" I'd say in an overly peppy voice as I dragged her there each week. Maybe she didn't love it, but she did enjoy it once she got to class, the hard part was ripping her away from her friends after school to rush home, get changed and race back out to ballet. When she told me she wanted to quit, I tried to change her mind, hoping that she'd stick with it through the recital in June, which felt like a natural end point to me. She agreed to think about it for a few days before deciding, even though I knew her mind was set. The next week I called to quit, feeling a little embarrassed and like a huge failure. There would be no more recitals, tutus or soft pink ballet slippers.

I knew my problem with Clover's quitting was just that: my problem, not hers. I had no dream of Clover growing up to be a ballerina that I needed to get over, I simply hate quitting. I can understand ending early over myriad reasons like an injury or a bad instructor, but with ballet everything was fine other than Clover found it boring. She told me she hated the repetition. I tried to explain that becoming good at anything - ballet, music, skateboarding, whatever - requires repetition, but Clover rolled her eyes and moved on. I wasn't so ready to move on, but in a unique coincidence I happened to catch a few minutes of a Simpsons episode that helped me change my mind.

Our School Decision Has Nothing To Do With You

Back in the Fall my husband was working outside in our front yard and began talking to our neighbor. When he came in, Kevin reported that he told our neighbor we are sending Clover to private school and our neighbor made a face, said "really?" and ended the conversation. I practically shouted at Kevin "DO NOT TELL OUR NEIGHBORS WE ARE SENDING THE KIDS TO PRIVATE SCHOOL!" I was sure they'd see it as a criticism because I've gotten quite used to that response.

Everyone in my town knows our public schools are struggling, it is just that we differ in how we respond to that. I cast a large net, looking at the local public school, but also every private school within a reasonable driving distance. We ended up finding that perfect school for our kids and family and it happens to be private. Our decision is based on what works for OUR kids and OUR family and the program that we want to be apart of. This does not mean that every other school out there is bad or unworthy. I am not chanting "We're No. 1!" yet when I do tell people where my daughter goes to school, exposing us as a private school family, many people take offense, as if I added "because we think your kid's school sucks."

Sacrificing Our Babies

I listen to public radio at night and frequently - almost nightly - I hear a report about deaths in Iraq. It is usually just a quick note on an attack or shooting, and the news saddens me, but I always catch my breath when I hear the age of the deceased. Young soldiers barely out of high school, dying in this war and for this war, depresses me, especially when I think about their parents or even worse, their children and spouses and how they have to go on without this person. I'm also sad for the Iraqi parents and their children, who are surrounded by uncertainty and violence. Every innocent person who dies in Iraq was someone's baby.

(Don't get me wrong, I'm not shedding tears for people taking up arms aimed at killing our soldiers, but sadly, those are hardly the only people dying in Iraq.)

As a country we are shipping off young men and women despite reports of insufficient armor or protection to fight an insurgency that many argue we created as a result of our invasion based on flawed intelligence, a personal issue or both. I've wondered this past week after the Bush Administration acknowledged that there was no link between Saddam Hussein and al-Qaida, why the emphasis hasn't changed toward pulling out troops and fixing our mistakes, but that is not the point I want to make in this post. We are sending soldiers back to Iraq for multiple tours, only increasing the chances of harm, whether that be physical or psychological, and then once they do get back, we are not providing them the support they need to reenter society and heal their wounds. It seems as though we learned nothing from the Vietnam war and the psychological problems many of those returning soldiers faced. We have seen problems with soldiers returning home now, many of whom have mothers that stand up to say that their child has been negatively altered by the war, but we stay the course anyway.

Breaking the Guilt Cycle

I grew up in a largely Italian Catholic family, which means I am very familiar with guilt. I was immersed in it from birth. I've heard such things as "I thought I raised you better than that" or "How do you think that makes me feel?" used thousands of times, and almost always over small issues like not calling elderly relatives enough or wearing too much eye shadow in seventh grade. No issue was too small for guilt. If you've seen the show Everybody loves Raymond, you have an idea of of what my mother and grandmother could be like. In fact after one episode dealing with parental guilt, I called my mom during a commercial break, knowing that she was watching too, thinking that we would share a laugh, but her response was "What? I don't use guilt! Don't you think it hurts me when you say I use guilt?" Sigh...

Something happened after I had kids which changed my response to my mom. I knew I did not want to do that with my kids and by having kids, I was suddenly much more busy that I didn't have the time or energy to deal with my mom's issues. After my first child, I felt guilt in anything I could be denying her or doing wrong. Would skipped rice cereal have lifelong consequences? Would dropping out of gymnastics screw her up? The list went on and on. Once I had my second child, the guilt I felt with my first child, also diminished because I had even less time and energy than I did before. I made decisions based on what worked best for our family and stopped spending needless time mulling over what I could be doing wrong or what I should be doing instead.

Don't Look Up: They're Spraying Us to Kill the Moths

Pesticides don't know when to stop killing. That was one of about 30 bumper stickers plastered all over our Silicon Valley neighborhood and the back of the car in front of me, making it easy for me to roll my eyes in response, even though I agreed with the message. Still, I thought about the line a lot afterward, especially when assessing how many ants I would have to struggle with before I let my husband spray around the perimeter of our house. Every year it is the same dance: I try every nontoxic method to keep the ants out of our house, but at some point, the ants take over anyway and I give my husband the okay.

I feel guilty about it, but at the same time, I know we are trying to be responsible by limiting use and exposure, especially our children's exposure. That is why I was in disbelief a few weeks ago when I heard on KQED that the state was going to begin aerial spraying to eradicate the light brown apple moth. Actually, I kind of freaked out. Despite weak official insistences that it is safe, it seems like a giant step backwards, making us all a test case, particularly children, who along with the elderly, are considered a sensitive population with potential unknown impacts. Why bother paying extra for organic when the state is going to spray my kids directly?

Homemade...With Love?

We started in January with excitement and energy, but the toll of making 27 (kindergarten classmates and all the teachers from music to math) homemade Valentine's Day cards soon wore us down and by the end, well, I am just glad to say we finished. I always believed homemade cards were made with love and attention, but ours came together in slap-dash chaos.

I expected the cards had to be homemade. It wasn't a requirement by any means, but my daughter goes to what we lovingly call the hippie school, which means homemade cards are expected. Her teacher recommended in mid-January that the kids get started on their cards and this confirmed my homemade suspicion because I didn't think she was advising us to get to Target while the card selection was still good.

My Domestic Spying Failure

Before my daughter was born, I was told (or maybe I read it, I can't remember) never to take the baby monitor out of her room because as she grows, she'll forget the monitor is there and someday when she is older, I will be able to eavesdrop on potentially troublesome conversations between her and her friends. I knew that when my daughter was a teenager the monitor would not be in her room, that she would have remembered that it was there somewhere along the way and demand that it be taken out. Yet still I kept it in her room well past the baby stage.  I'm anxious and she goes through stages of night wakings, so I kept it in her room without giving it a second thought despite the fact that she is now five.

During a dinner with some mom friends, one shared that late one night her son had walked in on her and her husband while they were (literally) in an awkward position. The other moms jumped in with stories of similar close calls or precautions they take, then I asked if any of them have monitors in their children's rooms. Apparently I was the only one still using monitors and they all looked at me like I was nuts. I defended myself by pointing out that neither of my kids had every surprised me in my bedroom, but even so, I knew the monitoring could not go on forever. What did catch me by surprise was that my daughter was having similar thoughts about the monitor too.

Quiet before the California storms of 2008

I read the news and jumped into action. Several storms are headed our way and if I have to spend the last few days of Winter Break trapped inside, I wanted to be ready. Also, we live on a hill, which means we can be especially vulnerable to heavy winds, not to mention it is a pain in the ass to carry up grocery bags and kids in the rain, so it pays to prepare.

The pirate flag on the play structure was lowered and taken inside, backyard toys were moved in, garbage cans were safely stowed and dry rain boots are waiting by the door. I bundled up the kids and headed to Whole Foods first thing this morning where we stocked up on everything, which I hadn't really thought through because if the power goes out, we are screwed. Now as I sit here waiting for the first storm to show, I feel ridiculous. I am fighting off a migraine I created by stressing out over some rain when the weather is actually kind of nice out. Where are you huge storm clouds? I feel like a West Coast wimp.

Bracing for Off the Mark Christmas Gifts

Two wrapped Christmas gifts arrived early in the mail from a relative and as I put them under the tree, I could hear the plastic crinkle under the wrapping paper which made me wonder what was in there, but not in the excited way my kids would respond. I was dreading the likelihood of it being a gift I probably would not want my kids to have and I don't know how to handle it or the other similar gifts that may be headed our way soon.

When my daughter was young, my husband or I could easily remove an opened gift we didn't like (for instance, my kids received those magnet toys months after they were recalled), but now our oldest is mature enough to remember what she got and put up a fight to keep those toys we hate. A recalled item is easy to justify taking away, even if my daughter flips out, but how do I explain my hate for Bratz? Or electronic toys that lack a volume control? I still regret allowing my daughter to keep a Dora cash register she received last year because it is so damn loud it feels like an ice pick is being stabbed into my brain while it asks over and over again, "Wanna shop some more?"

The Breastfeeding High Horse

Breastfeeding is great, really, if it works for you, then you should by all means breastfeed away. What you should not do, however, is judge another mother giving her child a bottle for two very valid reasons: one, it may be pumped breast milk; and two, even if it is not breast milk, you have no idea what has gone on behind the decision to use formula. My children both had to be supplemented with formula from a very young age because I could not produce enough breast milk to sustain them. I am incredibly thankful for formula because without it, my children would have been in bad shape.

Along the way, I found myself facing heaps of judgment from breastfeeding moms which was particularly painful with my first child, especially during the early weeks when I was struggling to stay afloat with very little sleep as I adjusted to life with a newborn. I remember my first real trip out to run errands with my daughter. My sister joined us for lunch at a restaurant and at some point I mixed up a bottle to give to my little squirming bundle. A woman across the room very loudly said to her friend that she only breastfed her children because that was what was best and that formula was akin to poison. The restaurant was crowded, but the announcement was clearly meant for me and the diners at the table next to us even looked over at me. My sister looked down at her plate while I tried not to cry. If only this woman knew what I had been through, I thought. I am much more confident as a mother now - five years later - and if it happened to me at this stage, I would have immediately confronted the woman, but even then, I don't think it would have helped. This woman was one of the dogmatical breastfeeders who seem to believe that formula feeding mothers are either ignorant, lazy or don't care about what is best for their children.