Magpies are scary
What I dislike about parenthood is that suddenly you’re expected to be a fearless leader to your children. Show them the path, raise them to be strong and brave. Well guess what? Sometimes I don’t feel strong or brave at all, and I am scared of a lot of things. I am scared of the dark which I can thank myself for, I shouldn’t have watched so many horror films in my teenage days. I am also scared of any kind of bug, especially spiders and I am recently scared of Magpies, at first it was just my brother who was scared of them, but I realised he had a point, Magpies are scary. Magpies are nasty birds that like to swoop down and attack innocent people, ironically these magpies that swoop down are mothers trying to protect their young. I try and protect Willow too but I don’t swoop people.
Due to these fears I have had some embarrassing not so brave parenting moments where I have not been a good mum. Just yesterday Willow and I were on our way to swimming lessons, I strapped her in the stroller and I was walking her to the car. As I walked minding my own business, not trying to steal any baby birds from their mothers, a vicious ass, beady eyed, monster magpie came and swooped me. And I screamed, it was 9:30am and I was screaming on the street and then I ran, I ran like three steps before I stopped and realised that I’d ran without the stroller, I left poor little Willow strapped in helplessly and just ran for it. I just left her, on the sidewalk. My god, that was a total bad mum moment, what does this say about me if I am scared and run without the baby? I didn’t even think just ran. What the hell. The worst part is that this isn’t the first time I’ve seen something scary and ran.
As mentioned before I live at home with my mum and brother, so one day my mum’s partner comes over in the morning to drop off some papers and then he left. I strap Willow into the high chair, get her breakfast and then notice a huge spider on the wall in the dining room. I freak out and have no idea what to do, I call my mums partner to come back and get rid of it for me (poor guy) and when he came over I looked at Willow who had happily noticed the spider and pointed at it and I said to her “You’re on your own child,” and then I went to another room while he took the spider out. I mean I just left her. To be fair in my head I thought at that time if she’s happily eating breakfast then there’s no reason to take her out. What I don’t want to do is impose my fears onto her so she has them too.
One of my ex boyfriends a few years back hated heights and theme park rides, he literally thought he was going to die and when I asked him why he told me about how unsafe they were and how he could die, his fear was intense but once I met his parents I understood. He had hardly been on any rides but every time he mentioned it his parents were like “oh my God they are so scary, so unsafe” they would go on and on about their fear of heights and I would think no wonder he hated them and was so scared, he has been taught his whole life that they are something to be afraid of. So that’s what I didn’t want to do with Willow and bugs, I don’t want her to be afraid of the spider just because I am. There was no reason to interrupt her breakfast, my fear was irrational.
However when it comes to Magpie that was just a bad moment, hilarious now but bad, I should try and remember to take her with me next time.