Identity Crisis

I have been struggling with some issues of identity lately.  Who am I?  Am I who I want to be?   Who do others need me to be?  And does that get in the way of who I want to be?  I began this blog in part to have something that was mine, something for just me me ME!

I have so many roles to fill and so often lately they seem in conflict.  Being a mom gets in the way of blogging (well duh!) OR having a social life or a clean house.  And all too often the role of wife seems completely forgotten.  When the kids go to bed my husband and I are so emotionally spent sometimes that we retreat to separate parts of the house.  We rarely have dates.  When we do have dates it is because I initiate them.  Honestly my husband just doesn’t think of it.  He is happy to stay at home and hang out as a family.  We do get a lot of family time together and it is WONDERFUL, but I know we also need time together without the children.  Otherwise we become strangers to each other.

I miss my husband.  He know this.  He misses me.  I planned a date for tonight but it was not confirmed until today (free sitter!).  When I emailed my husband about it his response was that he thinks maybe he should stay home tonight to be with the boys since he will be out late for work tomorrow night.

Now you see my crisis.  Two roles in direct competition with one another.   Who should win tonight?  Parent or wife?  How can I be mad when I have a husband who is such a loving, involved father and is conscientious enough to plan regular quality time with his children?  And yet I am mad.  Or injured, mostly.  I wept from the feeling of disappointment and rejection.  I am not sure how to proceed.  Part of me wants to tell him that he gets to spend evenings with the children the majority of the time, but how often does he get time alone with me?   The other part of me doesn’t even want to bother because I feel like he has missed the point and has ruined the idea of the evening.  I don’t even want to go if he doesn’t get how important time alone with me should be, if he doesn’t miss me the way I miss him. (passive agressive much? I get feisty when I feel rejected!)  And this is the man who recently complained to me, “I feel like I am just one more thing you fit in between everything else you have to do!”   My response, by the way, was, “Well YEAH!”  Since then I have been trying more to make sure he does NOT feel like that.  Ironically I am now the one with those feelings.  I guess I just need to feel again, if only for one evening, that I am the most important thing in the world to him. 

Mother, maid, cook, nurse, chauffer…I am so exhausted and frustrated!  What about wife, friend, dreamer, musician, writer, gardener, minister, movie buff… ??  So many roles they don’t all fit into one life sometimes!  Any advice for someone who longs to be more than just “Mommy“? 

 

Related link:

 http://lifeasaplatypus.wordpress.com/2008/04/05/the-platypus-who-are-you/