Joyfully At Home: Chapter 14 - Part Four

Spawn's been in preschool for a little over a year now. 

His classmates and teachers join us as imaginary playmates in games.  This week, when we walked to the local restaurant, Spawn informed me as we entered the back door that the school bus pulled up and all of his classmates were joining us for lunch. I said that I'd need to order more French toast and French fries, then, between stifling giggles at the thought of herding seven energetic preschoolers into the local greasy spoon for lunch by myself.

Most days, Spawn is a dinosaur when he gets out of school.  I know this because he says "I'm a dinosaur!  Roar!  Roar!" as he takes off down the sidewalk as fast as he can.    When he gets past me, he says, "Mama dinosaur, catch you!  Catch you!"  (Using the correct direct object pronouns has been a challenge for Spawn).   I turn and lumber after him.    Sometimes, I'll say, "Oh, I am trying to catch my little dinosaur, but he is so fast I can't quite get him."  At first, that would cause Spawn to giggle and run faster.  Right now, he slows way down so that I can "catch" him by putting my hand on his head or tickling his neck.   Other times, he wants me to go first and he catches me.

His giggles are the best.  I know I'm biased - but his giggles are deep, throaty and use his entire body.  You can't feel bad while he's giggling - and I love making him giggle.  Heck, his giggles are the reason I bought a bunch of Solo cups and some "indoor snowballs" for a game we call "Crash!Bang!"   That's a game I created where we build a pyramid of Solo cups on the floor throw indoor snowballs  at the pyramid until it crashes and we all yell "Crash!" or "Bang!" Spawn created a modified version where toy cars are used to knock out the bottom cups causing a big crash.    It's a great way to blow off steam for all of us while being stuck indoors due to deep snow and cold temperatures.

When he's sad-angry and his chin wobbles, I want to bulldoze whatever problem is making him sad because it reminds me of the first time I ever saw and touched Spawn a few minutes after birth when he was crying loudly enough for me to hear with teeny-tiny chin wobbles.

I was thinking about how grateful I am to be Spawn's mom while prepping some materials for blog posts when I realized viscerally how badly CP/QF has lied to young women about education, careers, marriage, and motherhood.   I have achieved what in CP/QF-land is impossible; I have a college degree, a career, a husband and a child.

Jasmine Baucham trots a fast overview of false dichotomy in Chapter 14 of "Joyfully at Home":

For too long in our culture, parents have been training their daughters in the exact same way that they train their sons, launching their female arrows to go through life the same way their male arrows do. Fathers have been abdicating their duty to protect their daughters; mothers have neglected their duty towards the discipleship and guidance. Young women who not only lost their femininity, but they've lost their desire for the biblical role that the Lord has called them to. We no longer want to be wives and mothers, and we no longer realize the power of that calling. As a result, many of us no longer realize what a unique time in our lives this can be, not only to take advantage of our ministry to our homes and families, but to minister to others through that sphere,. (pgs. 165-166)

In Christian Patriarchy/Quiverful beliefs, women are locked into a dichotomy between choosing education and careers or being a wife and mother.  

Women who choose post-secondary education or careers will never be satisfactory wives and mothers.

Conversely, women who forgo education or working outside of a family business/ministry will always become wives and mothers.

Well, for people outside of CP/QF, that dichotomy is palpably false - but CP/QF homeschooled kids whose parents extensively shelter them have no way of poking holes in that dichotomy since everyone they know is telling them that attending college and having a career will destroy their ability to become wives and mothers.   

Ironically, the girls from CP/QF families that are the poorest may well have the most exposure to the wider world since their families can't afford to keep them isolated once they can earn money.   Working at a local retail establishment or a restaurant will quickly demonstrate that there are certainly women with college degrees who are good wives and mothers.    At the same time, having a job makes a young woman more visible to young men who are looking to settle down.   CP/QF parents live in terror of premarital sex - but keeping your daughter invisible from young men also decreases her chance of marriage.

The well-known CP/QF stay-at-home daughter authors generally have one or two parents with college degrees, have many fewer sisters than brothers, and can live indefinitely as dependent adults with their parents without undue financial stress.  This group includes Jasmine Baucham, Sarah and Grace Mally, Sarah, Anna, and Mary Maxwell, and Anna Sofia and Elizabeth Botkin.   For those young women, their choice between college and motherhood was stark; their families on paper should have been able to educate them to college-ready standards and should have been able to afford supporting the young women as they attended college.  

Five of the teenagers chose the safest path; they avoided anything that brought them outside of the safe world of their immediate family.    Three of the teenagers chose a riskier path; they ventured outside of their immediate family and built careers.

Fast forward 15-20 years after the height of stay-at-home daughterhood. 

Jasmine Baucham completed a college degree, worked outside the home, got married at age 24 and is the mother of two children.   Sarah and Grace Mally founded and sustained two independent ministries that they treated as full-time jobs; Grace Mally married in her early thirties and has a baby girl.  Grace and her husband introduced Sarah to a local minister with whom she fell in love and married in her early forties.

Those three stay-at-home daughters made it the status of adult women in CP/QF since they've married.

Many of their fellow famous stay-at-home daughters have not fared as well. 

Sarah Maxwell has written 11 children's books for her family's vanity press between 2003 and 2020 with a four year hiatus between the end of the Moody series in 2015 and the beginning of the Hill Top Adventures in 2020.  Her family acknowledged for the first time this year that she's been running Titus 2 Ministries since she was a teenager.  (Compare that with the Mally Family who was always clear that Sarah initiated and built Bright Lights Ministry).  She mentions sporadically that she does bookkeeping for her brothers' businesses - but whether that will continue as Nathan and Joseph's businesses grow and become more professional is an open question.   As of this month, she is 39.

Anna Sofia and Elizabeth Botkin made a small effort in 2017 to revamp their website/blog known as "Botkin Sisters".   Since the new site hasn't been updated since 2018, I've placed it in my "moribund" site list that I check in once or twice a year.    Outside of that, they've spoken at a few small conferences about networking.   Anna Sofia seems to be in a MLM scheme of some kind and has made connections with her local chamber of commerce after they awarded something to her brother Lucas' company.  Elizabeth Botkin hasn't listed any kind of work experience on any of her pages.  Based on my back-of-the hand calculations, Anna Sofia turns 36 this year; Elizabeth turns 34.

Anna and Mary Maxwell have continued to be teenagers living at home well into their twenties.   

Anna apparently worked as a customer service representative for Nathan's company.   That could be a useful gig - but Anna rather catty blog post about how many of the questions could be answered if the customers "just Googled it"  combined with the revelation that she, in fact, Googles the solutions would make me squeamish to take her on as an employee.   At my current retail job, I often use the internet to seek out answers for customers' more obscure questions - but I definitely don't imply that my job would be useless if people just did it themselves!   Why?  Because I use my combination of science literacy and media savvy to sort the results into "possibly good", "probably bad", and "could lead to fatalities" before quickly reading the material to decide if it is a workable solution.  Anna turns 29 this summer.

Mary doesn't pretend to do anything as venial as the family businesses.   Mary is an artist and creates lettered signs of Bible quotes for family members.  She face-paints children  (along with Anna's balloon critters) to draw visitors to their conversion booth at the State Fair.  She also worked with Anna prior to COVID to plan and execute a single children's Bible study a week at a local apartment complex.  Most of Mary's activities, though, are on hold now because of COVID.   Mary turns 25 this year.

TL;DR: Jasmine Baucham and the Mally Sisters spent their SAHD years working outside of the home in careers and ministries as a full-time job - and all three of them married.   The Maxwells and Botkins, on the other hand. had 3 part-time jobs between the five women - and none of them seem any closer to marriage or motherhood than they were at age 16.

I hope I'm wrong.  For all that I dislike CP/QF theology immensely,  I do not have a personal issue with any of these young women.   I sincerely hope that each of them find a nice man to start a family with if that's what their heart desires - or create a niche for themselves as satisfied single adults.

My heart simply aches for them.   I've made my choices in my life freely.  My life doesn't look like I thought it would when I was a girl or a teenage or even a younger woman - but I am content because I made choices based on my values and my desires rather than anyone else's.

I spent the morning at the ophthalmologist with Spawn.   His lovey - a stuffed ginger tabby named Kitty-Kitty - needed an eye exam.   On a completely unrelated note, Spawn's eyes are doing fine.  We got up, ate breakfast, got dressed, listened to "Mama's music" (read: Irish folk tunes) on the drive in, commiserated with a crabby, screaming newborn, and walked Kitty-Kitty through her eye exam.  Afterwards, we brought lunch home and played with trains.

I had an average day with a little boy who is as much a part of me as my right arm - and I regret nothing of my choices that lead to being his mama because I never had to sacrifice my given desire for a career in exchange for the hope of being a mom.