No Experience Necessary!

Momfidence!: An Oreo Never Killed Anybody and Other Secrets of Happier Parenting
by Paula Spencer

(Page 2 of 3)

On Blind Optimism

Trust yourself. You know more than you think you do.

-first lines of Baby and Child Care by Dr. Benjamin Spock

Zinc stearate powder, warning against.

-last entry in index of Baby and Child Care, 647 pages later

Sometimes-while standing naked in the nursery at 3 a.m. with a crying baby who has just gotten sick all over my nightgown, or while interviewing some bigwig pediatrician and frantically motioning for a barking toddler in a dog costume to quit eating Goldfish crackers off the floor as her three older siblings use them to cajole her into fetching, begging, and rolling over-a question pops into my head. How did I get here?

How does a woman once afraid of babies become "expert" enough at motherhood to write about it for a living? More to the point, proficient enough to keep her own four children alive and swell?

It's easier than you'd think.

Reassuring Tale 1: My Maternal Instincts Backfire

I am eight months pregnant, taking my evening stroll, when I spy the tiny, squirming ball of fur, so fresh from the womb that his eyes are still fused shut. It looks like a squirrel without a tail, or a puppy with paddles for paws. I think of Mole, the main rodent from The Wind in the Willows, only smaller and cuter, as if drawn by Beatrix Potter. A baby mole!

How a baby mole wound up in the middle of my suburban street, I'll never know. I pick him up, wrap him in a Kleenex fished out of my pocket, and carry him home.

Deep inside, I begin to sense a strange, reassuring glow. I feel . . . nurturing! Maybe this means I'll wind up being a good mother after all.

Growing up, see, I'd seldom played house. Never babysat. Held a baby only once, for twenty polite and panicky seconds, before returning it to its rightful owner, my boss's wife. I called kids "rugrats," and not in the cute Nickelodeon sense of the word. I was a workaholic with a dry-clean-only wardrobe, the sort of person friends might vote Least Likely to Wear a Snugli. My only pets were a pair of newts and an albino African water frog named Hugo, the product of a Grow-a-Frog kit bought as a joke, who all lived in a glass aquarium and did not require much in the way of maternal attention.

Then I turned thirty. Walking down my driveway after retrieving birthday cards from the mailbox, I heard someone say, "I want to have a baby." I looked around. Nobody there but me. And since it couldn't have been me saying those words, I am pretty sure it was my hormones talking. Thanks to my husband, a man of action and enthusiasm, I was pregnant within a month.

Naturally, I was thrilled. When I wasn't petrified. Mothers, after all, are mysterious creatures with supernatural powers, from the wisdom of Solomon to eyes in the back of their heads. How this transformation was going to happen to me, of all people, mystified me even more than where my waistline had gone overnight. Solomon? I was the girl who couldn't even decide between two different sweater colors. (I'd end up buying both.) And as for paranormal vision, I often have trouble seeing the truth when it's staring me right in the face. What kind of mother would I make?

The Mother of My Dreams played catch and handcrafted prize-winning Halloween costumes. She served hot, balanced meals three times a day. She always knew the right answer. Her clean, obedient children slept through the night and never talked back. She had the carefree glow, European superstroller, and instant washboard abs as seen on the latest celebramom. My idyllic vision was a selfless souffle whipped up from equal parts InStyle, June Cleaver, Betty Crocker, Mary Poppins, highly selective memories of my own mom, and thin air.

The Mother of My Fears, on the other hand, was the one who achieved none of these descriptions.

How could I know that she'd be the one closer to my eventual reality? And that she would be a-okay?

If an unpromising specimen like me can cheerfully navigate motherhood, anybody can. This is how it went.

"Hey, little baby," I begin to croon to the baby mole in the same primordial singsong I sometimes use on the creature growing within me. "It's okay, little baby."

A few minutes earlier, I'd been lumbering along preoccupied by an overdue work project and the embarrassing problem of which of my maternity shirts still stretched across my midsection so I could wear it tomorrow. Then in an instant, everything changes. All my focus lasers onto the helpless bitty thing in my hands. Forget blazers that wouldn't button. Deadlines, who cares? All that matters now is that I help and protect this tiny fellow. I haven't held a tissue so tenderly since I was eight years old and using one to tuck in my Liddle Kiddle dolls at night.

Copyright © 2006 by Paula Spencer.

About the Author

Paula Spencer specializes in health and family subjects for Woman's Day, Glamour, Parenting, Baby Talk, USA Weekend, and other publications. She is the author of four books on pregnancy and parenting, including Everything ELSE You Need to Know When You're Expecting.