What would a cavewoman do?

I feel about modern self-help cults much the way I feel about the patriarchy. I’ve written extensively about how I don’t want to be a better person. I’m not going to floss more and drink less coffee (although I do keep an eye on the wine intake), and while I might exercise more, I’ll always do it resentfully, and… well. There it is.

None of this is to say that I’m perfect. Or that I accept myself as is. I irritate and disappoint myself continually. I wish was kinder. More patient. Thinner, fitter, all the things my Instagram feed tells me I should be. I am not immune to those social pressures.

Just, as I’ve gotten older, I’ve increasingly come to terms with my innate… laziness? Wiring? Whatever you want to call it, it boils down to this: I don’t want to put my limited energy into making myself a work of art.

I’d rather put it into making works of art.

And, loving my children.

Question from a former lover who never understood me: Everything in your life and its quality remained the same but you didn’t have children. Would you choose that option?

Answer: Never.

Also, the fact that you’re asking that question is one of the reasons, maybe the reason, I don’t love you anymore.

You never understood how important my children are to me. How they shape my work, how they fuel me, transform me – drive me. How they are an inseparable part of me – three living, independent beings that exist outside of me but whose every pain and joy I feel in my own flesh.

I could not love as I do, live as I do, write as I do if not for the joy and pain (there is a lot of pain, I won’t lie) my children bring. So the “Everything in your life and its quality remained the same but you didn’t have children” statement is not possible. The question is something only a psychopath would ask.

Right, I forgot. You are a psychopath.

(I knew he was a psychopath when I loved him – I probably loved him because he was a psychopath, but that’s another story.)

I don’t tell him all of that, by the way.

I just say, “Never,” and move on.

iii

My good friend, who works on herself a lot, often says, “I work on myself so that I can be a better mother.” I never say anything in response – just make supportive sounds – but the phrase always bothers me.

Being a mother is… well, it just is, right? I try my best, every day. Sometimes, I fail, spectacularly. Sometimes, I’m amazing.

Sometimes – like that day, ugh – I’m barely adequate. Not even adequate. Sub-par.

On those days, I wish I was a cavewoman and that doing my best meant not letting the children get eaten by the neighbourhood tiger.

That must have been very high stress, high stakes, of course, but also, very clear: Woo-hoo, child alive! Good job! Fuck, child mauled and devoured. I fucked up and have increased my chances of becoming an evolutionary dead-end.

I don’t suppose a cavewoman ever said, “I work on myself so that I can keep my children from getting eaten by a tiger.”

She just, you know. Did her best to keep her kids alive.

Recently, though, I have been thinking that I should, perhaps, exert a little more effort on Project “Be a better person.”

Peri-menopause is coming, is possibly here, and the happy “I’ll adjust and love you no matter what” hormones are leaving and the “Smash all the things!” hormones are spiking. I suppose I could take drugs to balance them out, but, to be honest, I want to see what the “Smash all the things!” hormones do to my work (and the patriarchy).

It could be amazing.

So, no drugs. But also, no temper tantrums – not with the kids, not at work. (But in the work, maybe. Things need to be smashed.)