FOMO!

Emily has grown distrustful of me, bursting into tears when I set her on the floor of the playroom and begin to tiptoe out the door backwards.   Just like Andy has FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) whenever he gets on that bus to go to school and Alex and I set off on whatever adventure I have planned for the day (Library!  Target!  A day of indoor yelling and spankings!), Emily has her own version of FOMO. Fear of Mommy OUT.  Surely, this is partly developmental separation anxiety, but this is also, I'm sure, partly because sometimes when I do leave the room... I truly don't show up again until the next morning.  Her fears are not unfounded baby fears. She is not an idiot.  Mommy regularly goes missing for entire days or evenings.

Ah, the guilt-ridden life of the ever-so-blessed part-time working mother.  Actually, I lie- I'm barely guilt-ridden at all, except when I see a Dr. Sears post on my Facebook page suggesting that I'm doing irreversible psychological damage to my child by not keeping her strapped to me every waking and sleeping moment, like I'm a sherpa headed up the mountain.  That I'm destroying her ability to love and have faith in the human race by not rushing into her bedroom whenever I hear the beginnings of a whimper at night.  It's Dr. Sears and the occasional Parenting.com article that make my heart twist just a little.  Of course, that is what the Unfollow button is for.  Good-bye, Dr. Sears.  See you in Hell, Parenting.com.

Where you going, Mom?

Despite my daughter's Fear of Mommy Out, despite her heart-breaking sob when I place her on the floor and take that first step backwards, I think she's an essentially happy little baby.  This coincides with it happening, that second level of falling in love that occurs when the baby starts to truly *earn* parental love. Sure, I loved all of my babies fiercely that second they were born (slightly less fiercely when they were balls of squirming in my lower gut), but then when they started moving and giggling and playing and showing who they might become- that's when I fall in love all over again, harder.  And Emily knows I'm in the second level of smitten-ness.  We have our own private jokes, songs, looks. We clap together and giggle about things falling down or Alex being Alex.  We share a deep and tenacious love for snacking.  She's happy because she's in a family in which she's unconditionally adored by her mother, her father, and two proud older brothers.

(Perhaps there are a few conditions.  But I'll start laying those out when she reaches the preschool years and I've advance into the third level of intolerance, which is like the second level of falling in love except slightly more violent.)

Even if I disappear sometimes, Emily never seems surprised that I've returned.  Of course I've returned!  How could I leave her?  And all of my things?  Home is where my family is, and also the place where I know the wi-fi password.

***

On another note, we recently had one of those moments that would be just right for a four panel comic strip if only I had my own weekly comic strip (I would name it Peanuts.  The other Peanuts did so well.)  I don't want to forget.  Adult Andy might one day think this is as hilarious as I do.  I walked into the playroom where he was wrestling Alex, who was yelling out for him to stop.  "Andy!"  I cried.  "What are you doing??"

"I'm doing the Golden Rule."

"What? What do you think the Golden Rule is?"

"Treat others how they want to treat you."

Long pause while I look at Alex and think about that.

"Andy, that's not the Golden Rule.  It's Treat others how you want to be treated."

Andy, mildly sheepish.  "Oh.  Nuts."

Too bad.  The kid had almost found a loophole.

Join us next week on Peanuts when Emily gets left behind waiting for the Great Pumpkin.