Isn’t that what you are supposed to say when someone askes you how you are?
That is my stock answer.
I meet a friend I haven’t seen for a while in the grocery store, with my little man hanging precariously off the shopping cart and they say “How are you?”
“I’m fine…how are you?” and they proceed to tell me they are fine as well…however their child has a weird rash on their chin, they look a bit disheveled, both our kids are distracting us from having a proper conversation… but we are both “fine.”
How wonderful it would be to respond: “I’m not doing that great…I feel like a crappy mother, my house is a mess, I have a great SUV I can’t afford to drive very far because gas is $1.36 per litre, the cat threw up on the rug, I have a cold, my business is failing and I spent the weekend picking hotdog and orange popsicle puke out of the computer keyboard because my son got the Norwalk virus while looking at train videos on Youtube.”
I wish we as mothers could talk about all the crap we deal with day to day but it’s hard.
It’s hard not to feel guilty.
With all the “mother guilt” that is alive and well in our society it is no wonder we hide our feelings.
After all things could be worse.
Do we have the right to “complain” when there are so many other important things going on in the world?
But what about being a mom?
We are nurturing the next generation, after all.
But somehow, we don’t see our role or our health as being that important.
I’m very sick of being fine.
I would really just like to be real.
Real and honest and genuine.
That would be fine.
Bee By the Sea 