Book #19: Things I Wish I'd Known Sooner: Personal Discoveries of a Mother of Twelve

This book looked kind of old and maybe like it would be out of date, but I took it from my parents' bookshelf anyways, because who isn't curious about how a mom of 12 kids did/does it? I thought it would be interesting, if maybe not all that good--maybe this lady had twelve kids, but did she really know how to write? But it turned out that it was beautifully written and that the author wrote five or six novels before writing this book, which made it even more compelling to read from start to finish. I read a lot of it while exercising at the gym yesterday, and it was such an affirming, strengthening read for someone in my stage of life and being a mother. One of the most powerful parts of the book was at the beginning when she talked about how it was like to decide to be a stay-at-home mom with lots of kids in the seventies when the women's rights movement was going on, and how she felt so strongly that she was supposed to be a mom and be there raising her kids. People talked about how women shouldn't be restricted to only "dirty diapers and dirty dishes"--which she says is the lowest common denominator of what being a mom is really like, and they made it seem like that's all it was. But she then thought a lot about it and how changing diapers really is a huge part of a mom's job, because that's one time when the mom and baby bond and spend time looking at each other and the mom sings to or entertains the baby, so it is really important for moms (or dads) to be the one doing that instead of leaving it for someone else. I really liked that idea and I tend to agree--I think it is really, really important for the mom to be home and to be the one bonding with and raising and doing even those seemingly menial tasks with her kids.

One other thing she said really stuck out to me: "My present life as a mother has three profound purposes. (This aside from the relationship with my husband, which is my dearest and consistent preoccupation.) The first is to fulfill all my obligations of love, as I understand them. The second is to educate my children--educate in the broadest sense, not just by helping them achieve skill and success in school, but by giving them a sense of awareness, responsibility, and joy. By far, the greatest amount of my time is spent in this endeavor. Third is my responsibility to give the best possible physical care to children and home. If any of these three purposes is neglected, the balance and richness of our family is impaired" (25). I think those three/four purposes are so important. But many people put so much more emphasis on the third purpose than on the other two. I also think I have spent a lot of time just "killing time" with my kids, going to parks and trying to get through the day, instead of really trying to spend it doing constructive things--or even not constructive things, but truly enjoying my time with them. In the next paragraph she described how she picks up things throughout the day and does beds and dishes, and they all do chores once a week to fully clean the house, but the rest of the time, no real cleaning is done because "the center of the day is too important to spend on unenduring things" so she can spend that time with her little kids reading, doing projects, visiting friends, gardening, or singing. I loved that. And I want to change my attitude that I've had of just trying to get through the day and make it more enjoyable (which I think is easier now that I have a kid old enough to actually learn things and interact with me on a more obvious basis).

I feel like there wasn't probably a realistic representation of how stressful or crazy twelve kids probably really was--it sounded like just a ton of fun and like piling twelve kids in the van to go to the beach took no time at all. It almost made me feel worried that I wasn't doing enough and there was more I could do to be a better mom, since this woman was apparently Super Mom. But I know that it's not really possible to compare her life with 12 kids with mine with 2, and hers probably looked a lot like mine with two kids. And in all, that didn't really detract from my enjoyment of the book. This is something that I will want to read again and again, I think.

Also, I realized after reading it that the author, Jaroldeen Edwards, wrote a note in the front to my mom talking about how she loved my dad as a kid and how they had such beautiful children. And apparently she was my dad's seminary teacher in Connecticut and he was friends with one of her sons. That made it even more interesting and personal to read.