'I'm not a good mum and I feel like my kids are suffering.'

I had a realisation this week. I’m not a very good mum.

This isn’t me self-flagellating unnecessarily, the way some overly self-critical mothers do. 

I’m not giving myself a hard time because I don’t work at the canteen, go to the school assemblies, or put a Pinterest-worthy selection of fresh foods in the school lunchboxes (although, spoiler-alert, I do none of these things). 

I’m not looking for people to pat me on the back and tell me that I’m a much better mum than I think I am. Because unfortunately, while people may say that, it wouldn’t be true.

Watch: Be A Good Mum. Story continues after video.

Here is what is true. I love my kids with a ferocity that sometimes wakes me up at night and makes me go into their rooms to watch them sleep. I know most of their friends’ names, I occasionally go to school and sporting events, I ask my kids questions about their respective days. 

I do all the things that are required of a parent to an average standard. Occasionally I do it to an above-average standard … but that is usually to ward off the gnawing sense of guilt that I’m not doing enough. 

Because I’m not. And my kids are suffering for it.

It's worst with my son – the oldest, the only boy, a teenager. He is, what I have come to call affectionately, a cave-dweller. If it were up to him, he’d spend the entirety of his life in his dark bedroom watching his iPad and eating junk food. And, because it is up to him, when he’s not at school, this is exactly what he does. He doesn’t enjoy showering, socialising, sports or sunshine. He also doesn’t like vegetables. Recently I bribed him to eat some fruit and vegetables (with junk food). Afterward, when he immediately retreated to his darkened cave, I didn’t protest. I was delighted. With him in his cave, I could move to other things.

See? Not a good mum.

My middle daughter is on the cusp of being a cave dweller. She’s involved in some team sports and can be convinced to have a playdate occasionally but more and more she retreats to her room with her device. A couple of things can lure her out. Shopping, which I suggest when the cave-dwelling is threatening to leave bed-sores. Going to the movies. Meeting a friend at a play centre. My son, of course, has no interest in such activities so he remains in his cave while we go out. By the time we get home, I’m exhausted and desperate for the kids to get on their devices so I can peace out.

There goes the afternoon.

For my son, who didn’t even go out in the morning – there goes the day.

My youngest child knows nothing of cave-dwelling. She likes to play. She says things like “Mummy, let’s bake cupcakes” or “Why don’t we make an ambulance out of this cardboard box?” or “Let’s make lemonade and have a lemonade stand.” It’s indescribably adorable. Yet every time she says these things my heart sinks. I could say I don’t have time to bake cookies or make an ambulance or run a lemonade stand and it would be true. I work full time, I have ageing parents, pets, friends in crisis... plenty of reasons. But you know what else? I don’t want to bake cookies. I want her to do something that doesn’t involve me at all. I want to watch her doing something crafty, while I work or read or rest. The other day she asked me if we could make slime. I said: “Why don’t you watch your iPad?”

Not my finest parenting moment.

Make no mistake: I would take a bullet for her. I just don’t want to play with her.

There’s nothing you could say to me or about me that I haven’t thought or said. I’m lazy. Selfish. The kind of person who never should have had kids. These things are likely true and the shame and self-loathing of this are ever-present. The other thing that is ever-present is the fact that I want to be better. And I’m just hoping it’s not too late to restart.

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