Mommies Who Drink
“Mommies who drink: Sex, Drugs and other Distant Memories of an Ordinary Mom” reveals just how judgmental we can be can be when it comes to motherhood, how deeply the expectations run that women transform overnight when they become mothers, losing not only half their brains but all their previous adult tastes, becoming wholesome and somewhat childlike themselves.
I found this Observer article on Brett Paesel’s book Mommies who drink: Sex, Drugs and other Distant Memories of an Ordinary Mom quite fascinating. The book has caused a scandal in the US, and will probably go on to do so here. It reveals just how judgmental we can be when it comes to motherhood, how deeply the expectations run that women transform overnight when they become mothers, losing not only half their brains but all their previous adult tastes, becoming wholesome and somewhat childlike themselves. As Paesel with humour and riveting honesty attests — this is not the case.
Of course we all know that addictions are not good for anyone’s health and happiness and do not create good conditions for children to grow up in. The valuable point that the article/interview and book extract make (I have not read the whole book yet) is that there is a range of stereotypes of mothers, which mothers themselves tend to reinforce — “Earth Mother” and “Yummy Mummy” are a couple which spring to mind — along with the wars between the Stay At Home and Working Moms in the States. What they have in common is the loss or ’sublimation’ for those women of practically all the idiosyncratic personality traits they had before. It’s as if we all pretend that we have become perfect. It is as if in the shock of loss of previous freedoms, the exercising of which made up our identity, we suddenly became more judgmental of others as a way of making ourselves feel better, like animals cooped up in a pen starting to claw at each other.
When asked if she had suffered from post natal depression Paesel replied:
Hmm…Yes. Except I don’t know what that means, either. People want to label it, of course, but I think if you take someone who has been an autonomous being for 38 years, and suddenly they have to stay home with this person they have to take care of, this person that’s screaming all the time, and they’ve had a C-section, they’re bloated and somewhat helpless…I didn’t know much about children. Um — so, depression…Wouldn’t depression just be a natural response? It seems natural to me.
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This article was last reviewed by on Monday, 12th November 2007. You can leave a response below.
The URL of this page is:
http://counsellingresource.com/features/2007/11/12/mothers-stereotypes/
26th January 2008
This book is correct. What Paesel said is correct. I am a mother of two (had 2 c-sections( and it’s all about kids now. I used to ride horses which was my passion but that is gone. I feel like I can’t take the risk of breaking a leg now. Second, I don’t have the time. Third, lets not talk about the expensive hobby!!
My husband only tells me he loves me when I work out or if he sees me work out. I am not fat but I don’t have my six pack I used to have. Everybody else ask me how I lost the weight and I don’t even look like I have kids! My husband was married before and his last wife got fat. My husband told me he will leave me if I got fat. Well, guess what, I don’t want to get fat! I rather be dead.