posted by Stacey on children, forgetfullness, large family

5 comments

You know that moment of panic when you think you have lost track of a child, only to find that very child in the highchair where you put him a mere five minutes earlier? I would like to introduce a new syndrome which can be directly linked to child-rearing. I call it Motherhood Induced Memory Loss or MILM for short.

It’s a growing concern among mothers and something that researchers tend to ignore or “Pshaw” at. But it’s a thing. I promise. I suffer from this condition and would like to offer ten evidences from my own experience that this is a real condition.

1. You take your infant out of the car thinking the infant peed through her diaper only to discover that she doesn’t have one on.

2. You can’t finish a sentence without pausing to ask a question. For example: “So the other day, I was going to the store…Where’s ______?…Anyway, so I was going to the store…What’s in your mouth?…So anyway, at the store…Why are you crying?…”

3. You go to the gas station relieved to have dropped some of the children off. You announce to the car full of children that you are running in for two seconds and will be right back. Upon returning, you discover to your dismay that some of the older children you thought were in the van watching over things during your absence were actually the ones you dropped off five minutes earlier thus leaving the two youngest unattended in the van.

4. You run through the house calling for the baby and asking each child if they have seen them. When you arrive upstairs, panicked, you realize that the baby is down for a nap and it’s ok that no one has seen him recently.

5. You never know what the date is.

6. Simultaneously, you live in fear of forgetting which day it is and forgetting which children you have to take where.

7. You think, but you aren’t sure, that at some point the year-round children will go off track. But you figure if you don’t look at a calendar maybe they can stay in school longer.

8. When your second grader hands you her math page to check over for errors, you stare at it intently but not really registering anything at all, and hand it back and say, “Good job.” You then hope she actually knows what she is doing.

9. You have to check the children’s note cubbies nightly to make sure you aren’t forgetting anything major, like a book report due or a field trip.

10. Your child is surprised when you remember the details of a book you both read. “Wow, Mom! How did you remember THAT?!?” I can’t remember who to pick up at practice, but I can remember the last chapter of a book I read last month.

It is real. Motherhood Induced Memory Loss is a real and serious problem that should have some major resources…ummmm what’s the word…devoted to research it and find a cure and stuff. Yeah. That’s it. Oh, and I think I need to go pick up the kids from practice now, but I need to check my schedule.

Tags: humor, motherhood