posted
Ok this was on a totally different thread and it just struck a chord and I felt like ranting.
People keep telling me I have "maternal instinct" I *know* don't have a maternal bone in my body, even though as far as I know, I do have are 2 X chromosomes. I don't gush and coo over babies, I drop them on their heads, (it was accidental though!) I can't stand children under the age of seven (though I'll be civil to your child if I meet you, I promise)
There is a giant HUGE difference between common sense and maternal instinct. This whole subject got to me, when I took a friend to a dog show a month or so ago. On the way back her stomach was upset. We had basically the same things to eat and mine was fine so I don't think it was food poisoning. I had her lay back in the seat in my mini-van. (I have a mini-van because it is practical gas mileage while still good for Dog Shows, and not having anything to do with maternal instinct either, only common sense since for the distances I drive SUV's would be stupid. We have an Eclipse Spyder GTS too, so it isn't like we are totally practical.)
Anyway, she was still feeling pretty crappy, and eventually she threw up in my car. While I admit I'm not fond of the smell of puke, I rolled down all the windows and pulled off after a toll plaza and used the toll plaza bathroom, which is normally for employees only but they realized it was a minor emergency, to clean her up and mop up the car. Fortunately I had a can of Lysol disenfectant/air freshener in the car (I had a lot of random things in that van before I cleaned it out) that went a long way towards the cleanup and de-tox.
Was I mad about her puking in my car? No, why should I be? It wasn't her fault. Yet she was totally totally freaked that I would be furious at her for puking in my car. I was more concerned that she had a bad time at the dog show with an upset stomach. And when I got her cleaned up and back into the car, she kept saying what a wonderful mother I would be, she'd said this a couple of times before the whole puking incident too.
Why, oh why, would treating the whole incident matter of factly, and using common sense to get it taken care of make somone more "motherly"? Do normal people actually lose their heads that much in minor emergencies? I don't think so. I think more people would have behaved as I did than not.
The same thing with the "bring a sweater to Kama Con". I guess I'm following the Golden Rule because I don't do well in cold weather, but you know, alerting people about the weather before they travel to someplace new is once again common sense.
How the heck can either be construed as motherly is beyond me. It is just logic and common sense.
/end rant
AJ (Oh yeah and if I had maternal instinct I'm sure Steve wouldn't be hanging onto the Oh S*t handles every time I drive my mini-van, and hollering at me that I'm not driving a sports car. I can't help it the mini-van has a huge engine in it and great torque...)
posted
Hmm good distinction Bob. I think Maternal Instinct, involves compassion that I don't have. I don't think people realize how cold-bloodedly I'm looking at a given scenario, and attribute compassionate motivations that don't exist.
i.e. My friend puking in my car. The motivation to get it cleaned up was partially selfish: get her cleaned up so that the smell doesn't nauseate me and I start puking cause then we will never make it home.
posted
Right Banana - but you're not evaluating the distance and arc of her projectile vomiting, nor are you telling her "you will clean that up later, right?"
You are concerned for a sick friend and taking logical, reasoned steps to care for the sick friend.
The point is - not everyone would give a damn about a sick person, certainly not enough to render aid and assistance. That's what makes it maternal.
Which, to be fair, kinda puts a bad spin on fathers and their parental attentions, but oh well.
posted
My father was always the one who woke up when we were sick at night as kids. He'd eventually get my mother up to start doing the laundry with all the puke in it.
I did make her wait. You see the part of the toll road we were on was in South Chicago and areas that were Not Nice for two white girls to be in, and I have a healthy sense of self-preservation. If the toll plaza hadn't appeared she would have had to wait until we got back to her apartment we were only like 15 minutes away. The windows would have been down and hopefully I wouldn't have turned green in the mean time.
posted
AJ, if I may, why does it bother you so much when people think you're being maternal? Does it seem like they are (and likely, some ARE) trying to convince you to have kids?
*shrug* I would call your reaction maternal in both the cases you cited. But that doesn't mean I think you should therefore go out and have kids if you don't want any!
Heck, when a certain online friend of mine (not a Hatracker -- yet, at least ) "mothers" me on occasion, I always tease her and say, "Yes, Mom!" (And since she's 50, gay, and emphatically "not a kid-person," I'm pretty sure she ain't gonna be a mom any time soon. )
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posted
rivka because to me "maternal" like I said before, is a compassionate motivation coming from a nurturing instinct.
My motivations don't come from there. I told people to bring sweaters to Kama Con cause I don't want to hear whining and moaning the entire time and (indirectly) associating me as co-ordinator with their misery. Basically the exact same reason I asked people their pizza preferences, even though it gave me a short term headache with all the hissy fits people had in that thread. Everyone will be happier in the long run and happy people mean less headache for me.
posted
It may not come from compassion (and boy, if most of my mothering is supposed to be coming from compassion I am in Big Trouble), but it IS nurturing. The fact that it's nurturing on account of you being practical doesn't make it non-nurturing.
The reasons you give sound an awful lot like the reasoning behind why I do lots of things with my kids.
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posted
Funny. I also tell my children to bring jackets and ask their pizza preferences for the same reason - to avoid whining. Just kidding! (ok, mostly)
Why do you not want to be viewed as nurturing? Or is it just being viewed as something you don't think you are? I'm just trying to figure out why it bothers you so.
posted
I guess it bugs me because people then classify me as "maternal" and make assumptions that I like babies and small children which on the whole I can't stand. (And then they arrange it so I get stuck holding one at family gatherings and can't give it back without being rude.) They also assume I want children, which I don't.
That is probably the root of my annoyance.
And yeah Space Opera, I don't consider myself nurturing in the least, so it really shocks me when people say I am.
quote:My motivations don't come from there. I told people to bring sweaters to Kama Con cause I don't want to hear whining and moaning the entire time and (indirectly) associating me as co-ordinator with their misery
When my little sister was a toddler, I had to look after her quite a lot. I became an old hand at taking the juice, fruit, snacks, spare jumper, story book and stuffed toy wherever we went. Not because I was concerned that she'd die of hunger/thirst/cold/boredom in the 30 minute shopping trip. Just because it was easier then dealing with a screaming child at the supermarket.
posted
*twinkle* Page one of the Mommy Handbook (and shhhh! don't tell that I told!) includes the line, "Never let your kids suspect that you aren't as Perfect as a TV Mom! Be sure to emphasize -- daily if possible -- that you have given up everything for them, and do so gladly."
Fortunately for me, I have the Updated for a New Millennium edition of the Handbook.
Seriously, I really think you are not giving yourself enough credit, Anna Jo. You can have ulterior motivations and still be acting in a compassionate manner.
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posted
Nurturing also to me, means voluntarily subjecting yourself to the screaming crying and tantrums as well. I don't subject myself to it voluntarily in the least, though I will deal with a situation if it exists to keep my own sanity.
posted
Makes sense, AJ. I think there is a lot of prejudice against women who aren't "baby crazy." Getting stuck watching other people's kids when you don't want your own has to bite. However, I've also had that happen to me just because I'm a mom. i.e. you must love all kids since you decided to have some. Give me a break! I do often enjoy small children, but I've been through enough dirty diapers produced by my own kids to be smart enough to avoid changing the ones of kids who don't belong to me.
How about instead of nurturing you're incredibly practical and honest? Sounds good to me.
posted
But if you all you have are ulterior motivations than it isn't actually compassion. Compassion stems from love. You can have ulterior motives, I guess, but it has to include "Love" in there, and I don't think my actions actually stem from "love" as the source, particularly NOT in the parent- child manner.
posted
*grin* I could live with "practical and honest" in fact I would honored to be described that way. But how come "practical and honest" seems to get so convoluted with "nurturing" in the process?
Basically if a guy had done the exact same actions, especially since they are involving adults rather than children, I highly doubt he would be called "nurturing". He'd be called someone with practical common sense.
Though I could easily see a guy being pissier about puke on his leather seats. I probably would have been more upset had it happened in the Spyder than the minivan. But, the beauty of leather is that it cleans so easily!
posted
I do not know any parents who had kids because they thought screaming and tantrums were fun to deal with -- and the realistic ones don't even expect them to be easy to deal with. People have kids for many reasons. But dealing with such things as crying and tantrums is one of the downsides.
Those who choose to have kids anyway have weighed the upsides and downsides and decided the good outweighs the bad. Sort of like how you probably weighed the cost and trouble of having dogs with the joys and benefits.
However, if people have frequently slapped the label "nurturing" on you as a prequel to unloading their kids on you without being very sure you have volunteered to take them . . . well, I can definitely understand avoiding the label. I think that sort of behavior by parents is reprehensible. I love holding babies (especially when I don't have any of my own that small), but I expect the parents to check every so often whether they should be taking their offspring back.
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posted
AJ- It seems like we have similar personalities. But if so that means that you probably do have a nurturing instinct - it just more readily relates to animals but it is valid. I have incredible patience for pets - just not people.
I am 36 and never even considered kids until the last couple years and now I have to worry about a heightened risk of birth defects so I am probably going to adopt. BUT if anyone would have told me a few years ago that I would want kids at all I would have thought they were insane.
I tend to have little patience with people. I tend to not really trust children's strange little ways. When friends whine about the same BS I get frustrated. I am blunt. But maybe underneath it all there is an instinct - biggest surprise of my life.
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quote: But if you all you have are ulterior motivations than it isn't actually compassion. Compassion stems from love. You can have ulterior motives, I guess, but it has to include "Love" in there, and I don't think my actions actually stem from "love" as the source, particularly NOT in the parent- child manner.
I'm beginning to see the root of this, I think. You were taught (I'm assuming) that compassion/giving comes from love. I was taught the opposite; love comes from giving. In fact, in Hebrew, the word for love, ahavah comes from an old word for giving, hav.
I was also taught that, "From doing things with an ulterior motive, one will come to doing things from a pure motive." *grin* I'm still working on the transition.
Also, I disagree about this:
quote: Basically if a guy had done the exact same actions, especially since they are involving adults rather than children, I highly doubt he would be called "nurturing". He'd be called someone with practical common sense.
That sort of thing is precisely what I looked for in a mate, and specifically because it meant he was likely to be a good dad.
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posted
Rivka maybe we are getting to the bottom of this.
My father always quoted his father (who was a chaplain in the army so it does have hints of army jingo about it) as saying:
"If you are who you ought to be, then you will do what you ought to do"
I agree there is a self re-inforcing effect of character and action. C.S. Lewis argues that the "doing" will make you a better person though performing from love rather than duty is the "higher" action.
posted
I think there is a common instinct for people who do have children to think that having kids is the greatest thing ever and that every good person should have them.
Society plasters us with tons of wholesome images of mothers and children, from the clichè endings of movies and TV series where babies are being born, to the mom that always puts Skippy in her kids' lunch ("I know my mom loves me, loves me a bunch/cause she always puts Skippy in my lunch"; although, for fair advertising, choosy moms choose Jif), even extending to the grandparents surrounded by grandchildren, as opposed to bitter, lonely, crotchety old people. Do you know of any shows that have married people who never want to have kids? I don't know of any.
In short, I think AJ has a right to complain. Her decision not to have kids and her right to not want to have kids are being questioned by society's standards fairly often. I applaud the minority viewpoint! (sorry, CT. Don't hate me because I'm not gung-ho about all Hatrackers making tons of Hatrack babies )
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posted
Merely being concerned about whether or not people will be cold and whine during KamaCon because of it is a nurturing trait.
I admit it. I'm the one that called Banna "such a mom." I also stand by it. I think the cooing and gushing about babies in general is evidence of a romantic sensibility. The practical care aspect is the actual Mom-labor.
But good heavens, you HAVE to know that I'm not saying it to encourage you to have kids. If anything, I'm actively campaigning against it. My favorite roommate used to do the practical care thing for me, and she quit doing it when she had a kid of her own. Being a wildly selfish individual, I'm all for having Banna confine her worry to her dogs, friends and Hatrack.
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posted
I do think that society tends to push people into parenthood. I have been told all my life that, while I did not think I was suited for kids, if I just had them the maternal instinct would kick in. Gee, let me gamble a child's life on the woman in the break room being right on this.
I think there are people that should not have kids, watch the news any given day for evidence. So if someone tells me that they do not want them or are not ready that's good enough for me. Michelle
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posted
kat this rant wasn't directed at you. you just happened to push my button that you didn't know was there... don't take it personally please please!
AJ (*sheepishly realizes Kat wasn't taking it personally... I really need to go to bed...)
posted
Michelle, like you, I figure if I suddenly hear the ticking of a biological clock I'll go out and adopt. I'd probably try to adopt a family that includes older children that they don't want to separate.
quote: Why, oh why, would treating the whole incident matter of factly, and using common sense to get it taken care of make somone more "motherly"? Do normal people actually lose their heads that much in minor emergencies? I don't think so. I think more people would have behaved as I did than not.
You seem to think that it was your common sense and 'not losing your head' that had your friend claiming you were motherly. Given her reaction, it was much more likely that it was your patience and understanding.
She could have said you'd make a good nurse or some similar 'caring professional' but I guess little kids are the people most likely to throw up in your car for no apparent good reason.
And trust me there are plenty of people out there who would shriek, "jeez, couldn't you have told me to stop, or opened a window or something!!" then thrust their friend into the bathroom, point them towards the sink/paper towels, and say, "there you go, clean yourself up and I'll meet you out at the car", and then drive straight to the nearest car cleaning place to have someone else clean up the mess (or done it themselves but in a pissy manner), silently cursing their friend all the way. Sad, but true.
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posted
If it makes you feel better, Banna, I'm pretty nurturing, and the very thought of having a kid gives me the heebie-jeebies. Does maternal and caring = inevitable baby dispenser? I'm not sure.
I do know that if my doctor told me I was PG, I'd have the same look as Phil Conners in Groundhog Day when the cop said, "You can either go back to Punxsutawney, or stay out here and freeze to death. It's your choice. What'll it be?"
And Phil says, after a pause, "I'm thinkin'."
Of course, exchange "Punxsutawney" for "being knocked up with baby" and "freeze to death" with "bang bricks repeatedly into your head until you loose every sort of sensory apparatus."
(This post in no way meant to offend those who have decided to embrace the beautiful life of motherhood. I encourage all who aren't irreparable damaged like I am to continue to have beautiful little bundles of tax payers that will make my social security possible when I'm old and have no offspring to care for me in my winter years.)
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posted
I guess that was an "I need a mother" moment and you fit the bill well with your calm, sensible, care-taking approach. It sounds like she really appreciated you being there for her, and was paying you a compliment. I don't know though. Posts: 7050 | Registered: Feb 2004
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posted
Lol, this thread is cracking me up. People are saying much nicer things about me than I deserve. I try to show how I'm not nurturing and you guys are turning my own examples on me. You are all going to give me a swelled head.
I realize now my original rant was too personal (though most good rants are somewhat personal) and we are concentrating way too much on me and less on the bigger issue that I was trying to get at.
posted
Maybe our fear of the responsibility and permanence of motherhood outweighs our natural desire to be care-takers, Banna. Friends go home after you clean up their puke, and in the meantime you got the warm-fuzzy feeling of making someone feel a little better and, prolly, their eternal gratitude.
This type of thing would make us nurturing, but still totally lack the desire to have one planted one in the easy-bake oven, so to speak.
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Sorry for the delayed post but I was away from the 'rack last night.
I have the same take on "maternal instinct" that I do with people that use religious language to express themselves when they don't necessarily mean for their words to be taken literally. I think that you've taken offense because you've taken the "maternal instinct" quip literally but it wasn't necessarily meant that way! Rather, your friend was just using phrases that she was comfortable with to thank you for being so considerate.
My apologies for essentially repeating what everyone else said for the last 42-odd posts, but I really think that we all have a trend for taking offense at specific language without looking for the true meaning behind the conversation. Now, if your friend had stated that "No man could ever have treated me that way. It takes a mothers instinct to have that type of compassion" and proved that she meant it literally I would be seriously miffed!
posted
If it would make you feel better, Anna, I can pretend to think that you're completely devoid of human compassion.
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Maybe rubble is right and it is like religious terminology. I think it bugs me because I don't self-identify as being "maternal" I self-identify as "non-maternal" and it just seems to be a giant clash with the rest of my life.
posted
Okay -- I haven't read every post in this thread, I'll admit first.
But AJ -- most people, when they say something about maternal instinct (like in your case above) are meaning (in a way) "You remind me of my mother"
or "You reacted just like my mother would have."
Really.
Often when people say "you're such a mother" -- it is because you just said or did something that reminds them of how their own mother would say or do it.
That isn't a bad thing. Really.
By the way -- one of my teens threw up in my truck not long ago -- couldn't get the door/window opened in time, or the vehicle stopped in time to prevent it from landing inside. It doesn't squick me out.
I just pulled into a car wash a block down and HOSED DOWN both said person and the interior of my vehicle (it was mainly the door, so I could open it to hose it down). Worked great. Then could finish cleaning it better later.
quote:I think it bugs me because I don't self-identify as being "maternal" I self-identify as "non-maternal" and it just seems to be a giant clash with the rest of my life.
Part of finding our identity is specifying the things we are NOT. I'm not a girly girl, I'm not a tease, I'm not a shadow, I'm not a mom.
The nice thing about having established an identity is that you're then free to be something you swore you never would/were and simply be the Banna version of it. Being a mom doesn't mean being YOUR mom.
---
*dances out of the way* And I still stand by what I said.
posted
Other people have said it, but I'll reiterate. Real compassion is an action word, not a feeling. How many people feel bad for someone and never do anything to help?
Because mothering often takes so much of said practical compassion, people often confound it with maternal and paternal instinct.
I think maternal instinct can be more hormonal than just romanticizing babies, though it certainly has that effect. I'm not a particularly romantic person, but I found myself baby hungry at 17. I thought it was wierd, since I knew I wasn't ready and had no intention of having a child then. This would happen periodically. When I got over 30 and my body changed a bit, I stopped getting baby hungry. When I did have my children, I had very strong urges about taking care of them that went beyond practical and logical, and even was different than love. Nursing was one of them. Logical, practical, sure, but I was very emotionally driven to it. This was what my body wanted to do. It was the most natural thing in the world for that situation. I think that drive was maternal instinct.
I don't think real 'maternal instinct' actually happens until you are actually maternal. Does that make sense?
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posted
Yeah I'd agree amka, that among other things why I don't think I've got any maternal instinct.
And for the record I'm now 25 and I've Never experienced the urge to want or hold babies my own or others.
Now hormones are powerful things, and I'm not saying that it will never happen cause maybe something will trigger them one of these days and I'll want a kid, I'm still young. But it sure hasn't happened yet.
posted
I think rather than being a "maternal" trait, what you did was a sign of maturity. There was a situation that was no one's fault, and it was a problem for both you and your friend, and you dealt with it competently and compassionately. What does it say about men or fathers that we consider that maternal instead of adult?
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