{"id":6117,"date":"2014-02-28T04:57:12","date_gmt":"2014-02-28T04:57:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.motheringinthemiddle.com\/?p=6117"},"modified":"2022-09-01T15:18:30","modified_gmt":"2022-09-01T15:18:30","slug":"the-next-stage","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.motheringinthemiddle.com\/the-next-stage\/","title":{"rendered":"The Next Stage"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"school\"<\/a>I just registered my youngest for kindergarten, and I\u2019m almost positive that means life is getting easier. If nothing else, I\u2019m counting on lower daycare costs, but people insist I\u2019ll soon be spending that money on ukelele lessons, lunchboxes and gym clothes. We\u2019ll have to see.<\/p>\n

Having both my girls in full-time, full-day elementary school come September means I\u2019m no longer in charge of the educational aspect of their lives. I\u2019ve turned that all over to the school. Now, when they ask questions, I can refer them back to their teachers. I can also stop feeling guilty about not doing educational things with them, like \u201cSight Words Bingo\u201d and \u201cZingo Math,\u201d which we really only got around to once and afterwards just felt guilty about the neglected box sitting on our games shelf.<\/p>\n

Now the guilt can rest; someone else can teach my girls math. My job can be reduced to food preparation, laundry, and refereeing fights over whose turn it is to choose the DVD. I have to say, I\u2019m ready for a reduced role around here. Elementary school, I give you my children.<\/p>\n

Their school is huge, so I didn\u2019t know the secretary who helped me register Anna. She was chipper, and when I commented on that, she said it was still early – by 3 pm she\u2019d barely be speaking. I\u2019d filled out a few forms and she started doing the data entry on the computer as I filled out more forms. I\u2019d left the \u201cother parent\/guardian\u201d side of the form blank, and checked the \u201csingle\u201d box on my side of the form, but she leaned over anyway, sotto voice, to ask \u201cIS there a father?\u201d I understand they like to know these things for custody and legal reasons, so I didn\u2019t mind the question.<\/p>\n

“No. I used an anonymous sperm donor. Is there a box for anonymous sperm donor?\u201d I asked, less sotto voice than she. She laughed and said no. I told her there would be soon, it was the way of the future. She laughed and even pounded on the desk a bit in appreciation.\u00a0And then she confided that she thought I was onto something, that husbands weren\u2019t all they were cracked up to me. I don\u2019t know if she was married and telling me something about her own life, or just refering to her experience as a secretary in a large elementary school who has a lot of contact with parents. In any case, I agreed that I had a good deal going on.<\/p>\n

\u201cGood for you,\u201d she concluded, and then broke from her data entry for a few minutes to help the gym teacher deal with two kindergarten boys who\u2019d gotten into an altercation that caused the bigger of the two to have a split lip. She quickly determined a third boy was involved, and the gym teacher, an obvious rookie, went to find the third boy. The first two boys waited outside the principal\u2019s office, sharing a chair. Adorable.<\/p>\n

Good for you. It is the near universal reaction when I tell people I\u2019m a Single Mother by Choice. When it comes up in the media, the online comments section fills up with vitriol, but in person, people are always thrilled for me. They confide that they wish they\u2019d thought of that. They complain about husbands. They tell me about someone else they know who has used a sperm donor. They talk about divorce and custody arrangements. They all seem happy for me.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m happy too. It seemed like a pretty big deal 10 years ago as I started down this track. It seemed a little weird. A little lonely. I little presumptuous. But now, the toddler years behind me, the fertility treatments a distant memory, registering my youngest child for kindergarten, I have to admit it\u2019s been great, not as hard as I\u2019d feared, and better than anything I could have hoped for.<\/p>\n

Many women forged this path before me, and so made it easier for me to get here, late to motherhood and alone. I\u2019m ready to follow them to the next step. Bring on the ukelele lessons and the lunchboxes. I\u2019m ready for the next stage of motherhood.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I just registered my youngest for kindergarten, and I\u2019m almost positive that means life is getting easier. If nothing else, I\u2019m counting on lower daycare costs, but people insist I\u2019ll soon be spending that money on ukelele lessons, lunchboxes and gym clothes. We\u2019ll have to see. Having both my girls in full-time, full-day elementary school come September means I\u2019m no longer in charge of the educational aspect of their lives. I\u2019ve turned that all over to the school. Now, when they ask questions, I can refer them back to their teachers. I can also stop feeling guilty about not doing educational things with them, like \u201cSight Words Bingo\u201d and \u201cZingo Math,\u201d which we really only got around to once and afterwards just felt guilty about the neglected box sitting on our games shelf. Now the guilt can rest; someone else can teach my girls math. My job can be reduced to food preparation, laundry, and refereeing fights over whose turn it is to choose the DVD. I have to say, I\u2019m ready for a reduced role around here. Elementary school, I give you my children.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,7,12,13,17,19],"tags":[27,889,72],"class_list":["post-6117","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-commentary","category-daily-living","category-mothers-over-40","category-mothers-over-50","category-reinventing-ourselves","category-single-motherhood","tag-andrea-lynn","tag-children-growing-up","tag-midlife-mothers"],"yoast_head":"\nThe Next Stage - Mothering in the Middle<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.motheringinthemiddle.com\/the-next-stage\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Next Stage - Mothering in the Middle\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"I just registered my youngest for kindergarten, and I\u2019m almost positive that means life is getting easier. If nothing else, I\u2019m counting on lower daycare costs, but people insist I\u2019ll soon be spending that money on ukelele lessons, lunchboxes and gym clothes. We\u2019ll have to see. Having both my girls in full-time, full-day elementary school come September means I\u2019m no longer in charge of the educational aspect of their lives. I\u2019ve turned that all over to the school. Now, when they ask questions, I can refer them back to their teachers. I can also stop feeling guilty about not doing educational things with them, like \u201cSight Words Bingo\u201d and \u201cZingo Math,\u201d which we really only got around to once and afterwards just felt guilty about the neglected box sitting on our games shelf. Now the guilt can rest; someone else can teach my girls math. My job can be reduced to food preparation, laundry, and refereeing fights over whose turn it is to choose the DVD. I have to say, I\u2019m ready for a reduced role around here. 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