Cheating

We homekeepers are very quick to judge both ourselves and others, especially, especially when it comes to how we keep house.  And for us, it all boils down, really, to one basic principle.

Cheating.

Cheating on your housework, the sin no Proverbs 31 woman wannabe or simple suburban mom about town wants to be accused of.  It doesn't matter where you live, what you do or how you choose to raise your family, be it in a mansion or a mini home, you've more than likely been judged on how you've cheated!

It takes many faces, this cheating.  I doubt very many of us even consider it cheating, frankly; we don't even think to justify our actions because to us they are so very normal.  Perhaps you are a mom who washes her dishes in a dishwasher instead of by hand.  Someone out there, somewhere, will be thinking "Harumph.  The only way to get them really clean is by hand.  That's cheating."  Or the family that relies on frozen food several times a week to cut down on cooking.  "Ha!  That's soooo bad for you!  All those preservatives!  That's cheating, not cooking everything organically by scratch."  Or maybe, just before a big visit from your in-laws, you hire a cleaning lady to come in and clean your house, saving you the stress of doing it yourself.  "Oh, that's awful!  Is your house that dirty?  That's just cheating, not doing it yourself."

Oh, ladies, mamas..we need to cut this out right now!  Isn't it tough enough being a mom, and a wife, and sometimes an employee, and a sister and a daughter and a million other things, without knowing that all of those women out there who could be your support in tough times are judging you?  The truth of the matter is that not one single one of us is perfect.  Not a mom out there is growing her own organic, heirloom vegetables on a piece of land that was purchased debt-free by selling her own hand-woven vegan shoes at a farmer's market and canning all of the produce to see her family (who naturally live in a wind and solar powered houseboat and yet are completely accepted by all of the neighbourhood kids and volunteer 60 hours a week at the senior's home) through the winter.

Oh, please let us let that image go!  It isn't real, friends.  It isn't true.  That woman is a fictional character, made up in our own minds and passed around as an ideal for us to live up to!  And we can't, we can't live up to this fictional woman because she can always one-up us.  Did you sew your children's entire wardrobe?  She did one better, her children wear only organic natural materials.  Do you do all of your family's cooking?  Well, she spends hours designing bento box lunches with strawberries cut like orchids for her daughter to take to school.  Did you hire a clown and a pony and a bouncy castle for your son's birthday?  Don't be too excited; she had a four-tiered gluten free cake in the shape of cinderella's castle shipped in and her children make all their own wrapping paper.

And when it comes to how we keep house, we're no better.  We scoff at those New York City moms who register their children for private preschools in utero, but secretly we're just as bad with our homes.  We buy into it, the idea that you can be that perfect housekeeper, and not only that but if you aren't, in some way, that perfect housekeeper then it's YOU that's failing.  It's YOUR fault that your carpets look that way and that there's no ice water in the fridge and your kitchen perpetually looks like you just brought home a newborn and can't make toast on your own right now.  BAD MAMA!  BAD!  How could you do this to your family?  How could you justify buying disposable diapers when clearly your baby should be in special silk ones woven by hand?  How can you buy a dishwasher?  You slacker.  How can you feed your child that baby food out of a jar?  You slob.  And if you feel fine about the dishwasher and you feel great about the baby food...what is it?  There's something in each of us - that button that can be pushed that brings out our inner judgemental mom.

This sort of behaviour is not just hurtful and counterproductive, it's un-Biblical.  And if you don't believe in the Bible, then it's un-true.  The truth is that Motherhood is hard, hard work.  It's hard to smile the fourth time an infant vomits on you and some gets in your mouth.  It's hard to spend three hours fighting traffic and crowds and crying, hungry children to buy groceries only to get home and discover you forgot the bread, milk, eggs, and despite having spent more than your first car was worth you have nothing to serve for supper.  I have read blogs about women who live in a family of six in an apartment the size of my parent's basement.  That isn't easy.  You know what makes it harder?  Feeling ashamed at the 'short cuts' you take, like ordering a pizza or refusing to make your own baby wipes or buying gravy in a powder or washing whites with colours or....

That perfect woman image never takes one very important thing into account.  It never talks about trying hard.  For that perfect woman, trying never enters the equation.  She just is perfect.  And we, we are not, friends.

May I humbly suggest an alternative?  Decide, after prayer and consultation with the ones it will affect the most, what things are of paramount importance to you.  Perhaps, like many of us, you want your family to eat organically.  Or you want to breastfeed until your children ask to stop on their own.  Whatever your choice is, embrace it.  Embrace that part of you that is striving to make your family's lives better and healthier and calmer.  And then, this is the hard part, let the rest go.