the mostly happy not-childhood

The topic of not-childhood was really interesting to me in class today. Professor baldwin brought up how children acting in roles normally not associated with innocence and play can be thought of as not-childhood, which is not adulthood but also including behaviors that children shouldn't normally have to acquire. Personally, i had a generally happy life, with the exception that my parents fought every single day.

As i've mentioned before, a familiar soundtrack to my life was the screaming and slamming of doors that goes along with a nice vigorous argument. For the most part, my parents had wanted to get divorced for as long as I can remember. I vividly remember as a child of no more than 7 or 8 hysterically crying while running down the hallway into my fathers room (where the arguments always took place) and yelling, screaming, or using any loud and noticeable behavior to get my parents to notice me, in order to yell at them to go to their separate rooms and to stop fighting. All my life they basically were like unfriendly housemates, with rooms next door. My mother blamed it on my father's snoring when I was younger (it's equal to about 3 tubas) but although that may be true, as I got older I understood that it was for sanity purposes as well.

Both my parents worked, so we had a live-in Russian nanny (like an au-pair), another behavior that is in the category of non-childhood. Instead of Latch-key i had a personal caregiver at home. More comfortable? Yes. As good as having my mom home? No. I love my mom, she did everything for me, but growing up I wouldn't see her on weekdays till around 6 or 7 pm (and go to sleep at 9pm) when she got home from work, leaving a lot of my care to the nanny. I don't blame my mom for loving her career or wanting to work, it's simply a fact that I didn't have a stay at home mom and therefore had to learn to distinguish the authorities of nanny vs. mother, and separate the emotions for my real mom vs the woman who became like a second mother since she lived with us for about nine years. The nanny would often try to distract me with discovery channel (her favorite) and to this day I still sometimes watch it in order to soothe me. But back to non-childhood, I know my parents stayed together so I could live in a beautiful house with our own pool, a great school district and my many friends. However, our surface appearance belied the turmoil that really went on. Is it normal for a small child to have to mediate arguments for the parents? Today, I really don't know. So many kids including myself are used as pawns in the fighting between divorced or separated couples. It may not be intentional, but most young adults are very perceptive to the even subtle tug-of-war between parents. Many kids find themselves adapting skills in order to be peacemakers, trying to minimize the discord in their lives, and it takes a heavy mental toll. Especially as an only child, the burden feels like it falls largely to you. Time that is normally spent playing in the pool or with my barbies was diverted to stashing my father's clothing that was left on the floor under the bed in order to avoid hearing a fight. Many not-childhood behaviors seem to be an increasing trend in today's society as divorce rates rise to nearly 50 percent.

I was a very loved child, and my parents provided me with everything I needed from toys to clothes, food, money, etc. I was just a kid with an outlook and behaviors that were more suited to someone in later teenage years.