Mommy Are You Happy When You’re Not With Me?

About a half a dozen times yesterday my 4-year-old son Jonah asked me the same question: "Mommy are you happy when you're not with me?" This wasn't the first time he posed this question. About a month ago, out of the blue, he asked the same thing. In a knee jerk, sing-songy mommy voice, I cheerfully answered "No honey I'm not happy when I can't be with you, I always want to be with you." I punctuated my answer with a big hug and a quick kiss. But four weeks ago, his question didn't feel as loaded as it does now.

Now I figured Jonah couldn't help but feel my stress over having no childcare and household help over the past two months. I was doing little to hide my tension and clearly it was taking its toll. A highly sensitive and perceptive child, Jonah was feeling my brewing resentment toward the world and in particular to the mounting piles of dirty laundry.

The cliche "a happy mother is a happy child" has never felt more appropriate. As I struggle to do a bare minimum of work, begin looking for a real job, the kind that comes with a 401 K and a dental plan, research a potential new book, make plans for the holidays, and clean my house including a pile of dog vomit I found on my white living room carpet this morning, I realize my sour mood is affecting my kids.

So yesterday when Jonah asked again if I were happy when I wasn't with him, the question stung. This time as I truly considered what he was asking I decided to re-jigger my answer by turning the question around. "Are you happy when you go to school and have playdates," I asked Jonah. "Yes," he answered. "Are you happy when you go to karate?" "Yes," he said. "Well, I'm happy when I play with my friends and I go to work and I get to exercise my brain. That makes me happy. But it doesn't mean I don't love you."

When I repeated this story to a bunch of my girlfriends desperately searching for some mommy soul support and an interpretation of Jonah's emotional state, my friend Kerry, a mother of a one-year-old thought I scored an ace parenting move. "Brilliant!" she declared when I told her how I shifted the question. "It really is easier when your kids aren't old enough to truly talk to you," Kerry laughed and I agreed.

Jessica, also a mother of a four-year-old boy who is well read on positive parenting strategies seemed to think Jonah's question wasn't as heartbreaking as most of my other friends did. She reassured me that four-year-olds can't imagine a world outside of their own and therefore Jonah's question was just a legitimate inquiry into what I do and how I feel when he's not around.

Ultimately, it did seem that Jonah was finally satisfied after I explained that yes, I can be happy when I'm doing things for myself just as he does for himself and my love for him is always there. Today he hasn't asked me that seemingly awful question. But he did tell me that he loved me. So far so good.