Sunday, January 06, 2008

screw it all

Well Desperate Housewives wasn't much of problem, in case any of you are scared to watch. In fact, it was a quick finish in the drama area. All of Lynette's kids are safe and sound and completely okay. So is her husband, Tom. I was freaked out about it a while back because the tornado episode was a real shocker at the end. I thought the acting and writing really was off. Quite odd, usually the actress playing Lynnette kicks ass and I find the show itself to be good for a laugh. But the lack of reality in how a real woman would act upon discovering that her kids might be dead? Gahhhh. I sure as fuck wouldn't have been sitting there standing behind the yellow tape sipping tea. It would've taken 14 firefighters to hold me back from digging them out by hand. I mean, WTF?

For example, I've met a few people who show up to report on fires, and they tell me that whenever a fire happens, if the mother is rescued first and any other kids are still in there, she will rush back in to get them if there is even one breath left in her body, no question.
They actually assign cops and firefighters to hold her back because they know the adrenaline will rush through her body and regardless of size, she will become ten times stronger than she normally is. Becoming completely paralyzed due to shock is perfectly normal as well, it's just very very stark, and looks nothing like standing around.

It's human instinct. If it doesn't happen, it's unusual and you have to ask yourself, are they in physical shock, are they on drugs, are there mental health issues? Seriously, it's that odd. Which is why Lynette, IMO, did not look like a mother. She just looked like any other actress. Sort of ummm, standing there? ?

I thought for sure they would string this show out, emotional p0rn for sale, one commercial at a time. TV shows do this regularly, whether it's on soaps or on nightime, and most especially movies. They use the grief of bereaved parents and the terror we live with to pop their ratings, but never ever actually help the real grieving parents with our pain. We're just the used leftover crap they shun in real life.

But, no they ended it in moments. Like a big fat nothing. All those commercial promos, all those endless reverberating screams, (I'm convinced they juiced the audio on Lynette's scream after I complained about how fake it was.) and then, yayyy they're alive, and they disappear. Pffft. Over.

Now the other movie I watched this weekend, We Are Marshall, is incredible, unbelievable, a really good portrayal of how death and tragedy and grief are handled in real life and how it should be handled. It was in theatres in 2006, but being a football movie, I think it wasn't something on my radar. I could go on and on, but it is the kind of thing that you have to see for yourself. Sadness, anger, frozen denial, rage at innocent bystanders, a willingness to walk through fire to get to your loved ones, an unwillingness to move on with life, a desire to avoid the things you associated with the loved ones, people wondering how others can smile and move on when they are still so so sad, messy awful difficult human emotions in all their glory. All things I've witnessed in the nine odd years I've been dealing with this.

Reality is that people who have been through tragedy and grief aren't going to act as sweetly and as nicely as the public would like. We don't fit the mold that others want to see. We're supposed to crumple gently at their feet, looking like fallen angels, all sad and weeping. If we dare to speak up, we're shrill bitches, if we dare to demand justice, we're "not able to let go", if we keep asking WHY, we're told that we're suffering from an "adjustment disorder."

And hot damn, if we dare to raise our living kids as normally as possible, and refuse to treat them like delicate spoiled flowers, if we dare to bitch about the normal travails of life for even one second, one moment, one tiny slice of time, some of our readers might even unsubscribe from our blog feed, or stop talking to us in real life. I guess they'd prefer Lynette. Well, screw 'em if they'd prefer her current saccharine brand of bullshit mothering.

Even if I pay $100,000 for IVF to have my kids, or pay $100,000 from an unethical illegal adoption mill*, or even bury 14 kids before I get to raise them, my living kids still get to be little assholes who raise mayhem, and I still get to rip my hair out over it, because they owe me SHIT, no gratitude, no debt, no obligation, just normal kid lives. Sometimes the children we have after infertility and grief and loss are going to be less than perfect, sometimes they will be evil little hell-raisers, sometimes they will have learning disabilities, and speech disabilities, and emotional breakdowns, and maybe they will even be ugly and unattractive. (Gasp, horror, ack!)

I owe them the most normal parenting experience possible. Which includes all the bad sides of mothering, not just the sweet and pretty and cute ones that form the perfect Hollywood ending. They deserve to be parented, not treasured like little glass ornaments, and they deserve to know if they screw up, and not just to be lied to. If I tell them they are perfect and adorable all day, it will turn them into characterless little disney clones. And that would be wrong. If I tell them that their mother is perfect and always always right then that would be wrong.

And if I tell it like anything less than what it is, warts and all, then I will be lying to you my dear readers. I'm not going to pretend I live in a diaper commercial. Even if my pregnancies do involve Depends every time I cough, this is not the ideal life after infertility story you've been yearning for.

You need to watch TV for that.

*The point of the comment was to show extremes that we would go to in attaining parenting, and yes, although they are rare, unethical adoption mills do exist, and good potential adoptive parents are revolted by them and try to avoid them.

If any of you want more examples of this, read some birth mother and adoptee blogs, and you will see them discussed.

But really that isn't the point of this post. I actually know people in real life who have paid that much money for IVF, people who have lost that many children, and people who have adopted in less than ideal circumstances who have had to pay huge amounts to complete the adoption. And some of these people, not all, hold it over the kids heads, like "you owe me" for freaking forever.

It makes me sick when I see it, and as an adoptee, it reminds me of all the times I was told how "lucky" I was to have been saved from a supposed terrible fate of being raised by a single mother, etc. by my adoptive parents. Meanwhile, they were lousy parents themselves.

I am not trying to slam adoptive parents, the phrase was meant to show extremes in all parenting, and I certainly didn't single out adoptive parents only.


13 comments:

  1. (applause).

    You are, of course, absolutely right.

    ReplyDelete
  2. How true. After 8 years of infertility and finally adopting our first son, I was made to feel like an ungrateful bitch if I even uttered so much as a whine about anything related to parenting. Somehow we are expected to enjoy EVERYTHING associated with parenting and sometimes the kids are normal little shits. I actually had one lady call me out when I complained that S1 ws going through a stage where he required literally no sleep. At that moment I realized that being a parent after trying hard meant that I wasn't allowed to bitch about anything that all the other moms that didn't struggle bitch about. Sort of a "well you got what you were wanting" attitude. It sucked.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I am so behind on my TV. I completely believe a team needs to be assigned to hold back the moms from running back into the fire. I could not believe no one was assigned to me in the NICU bc so many times I wondered if I should just take the kid and run.

    I hate to bring up Oprah but her show on We Are Marshall really gave me the impression you write about here; the complexity of different people's reactions to grief.

    I'm gently easing myself into complaining about Julia.

    ReplyDelete
  4. $100,000 from an unethical illegal adoption mill. egad. I'm not even going to touch this. As an adoptive parent I hate this kind of talk, but I'm hoping that you are the intelligent person that realizes it's a hurtful comment.

    On another note, we too were made to feel like we are suppossed to love every minute of parenting. We do, but not always in the moment it's happening. Our son is 2, adopted quite ethically, and is the joy of our days. However sometimes, like this morning, things are not so nice, and sunshine and roses was not a way to describe our day.

    We also thought that we would be way lenient on our son. We waited so long, suffered through about a year of infertility, and then spent our money on the adoption rather than IUI's and IVF, but we aren't. I think we're actually harder on him to avoid him becoming a little brat. He is expected to behave, and even though it doesn't happen all the time, he knows when he does osmething he isn't that there is a consequence.

    Most people know by now, (a year home with our son) that we aren't the type of people that let or son run our lives, and that he is going to behave, and that we don't find every moment enjoyable. I think it takes time, and sometimes a bit of knock you up side the head talk for people to realize taht no matter how you came to parenthood, it is the same and hosts the same feelings across the board.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Resplendequetzel,

    The point of the comment was to show extremes that we would go to in attaining parenting, and yes, although they are rare, unethical adoption mills do exist, and good potential adoptive parents are revolted by them and try to avoid them.

    If you want more examples of this, read some birth mother and adoptee blogs, and you will see them discussed.

    But really that isn't the point of this post. I actually know people in real life who have paid that much money for IVF, people who have lost that many children, and people who have adopted in less than ideal circumstances who have had to pay huge amounts to complete the adoption. And some of these people, not all, hold it over the kids heads, like "you owe me" for freaking forever.

    It makes me sick when I see it, and as an adoptee, it reminds me of all the times I was told how "lucky" I was to have been saved from a supposed terrible fate of being raised by a single mother, etc. by my adoptive parents. Meanwhile, they were lousy parents themselves.

    I am sure you are a good parent, but really, the comment was meant to show extremes in all parenting, and I certainly didn't single out adoptive parents only.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Want to just say: AMEN. Especially loved the para re: how we're allegedly supposed to act. Maybe that's why family treats us so poorly -- they watch too many of these damn tv shows. The women either go certifiably batshit ("Damages") or they coo and weep until they meet some orphan and/or hot guy on vacation. Bleh. I'm trying to asuage my guilt over my parenting skills this last year, and will come back to this post. Sometimes I really think seeing mom cry and express sadness and outrage (within reason, of course) is not a bad thing. I can only hope to raise a compassionate child at the end of this.

    ReplyDelete
  7. The absolute best portrayal of grief and loss I have ever seen was The Body on Buffy : The Vampire Slayer. I dare someone to watch that without having tears just run down their eyes - man or woman.

    Every character reacts in a very real way. (Joss Whedon is an awesome writer, and his casting coach is awesome.)

    As someone who is still waiting, I never thought parenting was going to be anything but a mix of heaven and hell. Maybe I'm different than most people? I dunno.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Someone else I know (also a bereaved parent) recently saw "We Are Marshall" & recommended it. I will definitely have to find it now!

    ReplyDelete
  9. Gotta say, yay buffy.

    okay, totale get what your are saying about how moms are supposed to act. When I was a pregnant sixteen year old, I got a lot of people trying to tell me that anyone rich enough to afford an adoptiong would be better parents then I could be. Thank god that my mom helped me see through all that crap.

    ReplyDelete
  10. People do seem to have fixed and unshakeable ideas about how others should act and are shocked or angry when people don't conform to those ideas.

    ReplyDelete
  11. I actually am more concerned by the mothers who make *themselves* feel as though they must be Supermom after finally bringing home a living child. I have never had anyone else imply that I should behave as anything but a normal mother, but I have sure made myself feel that way sometimes! But, if someone else were to imply that to me, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't be able to keep quiet.

    Hang in there, Aurelia. I know that's all you can do right now...

    ReplyDelete
  12. Amen on our children don't owe us shit! This is one of the things that drives me batty about MIL-- she is convinced husband owes her for her "selfless" sacrifices in raising him. Excuse me while I throw up, ok?
    So right, they owe us nothing, but we owe them at the very least to not make our issues theirs. Yes, we had to fight long and hard to get these kids home. But that's not on them. They are just here, and we owe them an upbringing that will make them people we could be proud of. Pretty simple, no?
    And the double standard about not complaining? Beh!

    ReplyDelete