Marina is my housekeeper and I really hate admitting I have a housekeeper because I was raised to think of a housekeeper as a luxury only wealthy people could afford. If I am truly honest, I also thought "having help" was completely unnecessary and excessive.
During the years prior to my father opening his own business, he was a service station attendant and my mother worked as a housekeeper for 2 different families during the week. When I turned 14, I started to babysit for both families, caring for their children on date nights. On Sundays, our entire family including my father would drive about an hour and a half to a house that belonged to a bachelor and we would all chip in to get a week´s worth of mess cleaned up in one day. Cleaning is tiring work and after caring for other people´s houses my mother would always come home exhausted. My father has always been a very chauvinistic man and did very little if any cleaning at home after his tiring full-day of work. That meant that my brother, sister and I were in charge of keeping our own house spic and span from the time I was about 9. Our duties included everything from dusting, vacuuming, cleaning windows, kitchen, bathrooms, bedrooms, laundry, etc. My sister and I did most of the cleaning though because, like in many Latin families, our brother wasn´t expected to do any housekeeping. For dinner my mother would still do the cooking, but breakfast, lunch and weekend cooking were also part of our daily chores.
I grew up doing most of the housekeeping in my house (I am the oldest) and hearing about the trials my mother suffered as a housekeeper so, as a result, I developed a kind of stigma towards the concept of hiring someone else to do your cleaning. I was lucky enough to find and marry a very self reliable, responsible, and tidy man despite living in a country where most men grow up having their mothers and/or nannies and/or housekeepers cater to their every need. One of the many culture shocks I experienced when moving back to Guate was the overwhelming amount of acquaintances, family members, friends who had a housekeeper(s) / cook / nanny(ies) / gardener / bodyguard(s), a combination or all of the above. Because of my stigma-related aversion to hiring help, I refused to succumb to the temptation and managed to do without any help like I was accustomed to for many years. Even after I was married, my husband and I split the housework and cooking, and managed just fine. Then my sister came into the picture and moved in with my husband and I along with her furry little friend, a Maltese named Wonka. I worked, my husband worked and my sister spent all day at the University. Than meant that we would have to hire someone to care of Wonka during the day. He was a very spoiled dog with a grave case of separation anxiety which meant when he was left alone, we´d come home to a house that reeked of pee, with doors / walls / furniture all scratched up, things chewed-up… and in those days doggy day-cares were non existent in Guatemala and the few in existence were ridiculously over-priced. So basically, for my sanity`s sake and the well being of our apartment and furniture, we had no choice but to find help.
From that point on we gave in to the social norm of having a live-in housekeeper. I have to admit I swallowed my words and became very used to having help. It was so nice to come home to a clean house (especially a clean kitchen, another OCD of mine) warm meal and freshly made tortillas after a hard day´s work and to not have to worry about housecleaning during the weekends, which meant we could actually rest or go out. I enjoyed the perks until my sister moved out and my husband and I decided we no longer "needed" the luxury. Then a couple of years later, I found out I was pregnant. Our split-chores arrangement held up throughout my entire pregnancy (except my husband took over all of the chores that involved hard chemicals). However, once Hannah was born I realized that work + caring for baby + housecleaning + cooking became very difficult and taxing to manage on our own and we had no close family to rely on for help (my family lives in Texas and my husband´s lives in a state that is a 6 hour drive from us). That meant that the luxury of having help became a service we were once again willing to pay for. It amazes me in how many ways life continually teaches me not to judge others and to never say never. This is another case in point. I am happy and blessed to be able to count on an extra set of hands to keep my house spic and span, even if there are several things I still prefer to do myself (OCD and all).
The only thing I am not used to and probably won´t ever be used to is having someone else care for my baby. During my 2 week stint in bed with a supercold I watched a lot of TV. Coincidentally, it was also during this time that the whole royal baby craze filled up a lot of channels with royal family specials. On one said special, there was a segment about Princess Diana and her trials living the "royal" life. Among these was having to allow her children to be cared for by nannies. It was discussed how this was one of the hardest adjustments she had to make and how difficult it was for her to see how much her children loved their nannies. I am equally uncomfortable with someone else caring for my baby. I had a small incident with Marina because she is very attentive and every time Hannah would start to cry, she would take her from my arms to soothe her. I allowed this to continue to a few times before going off, I just could not allow someone else to be a source of comfort for my baby. I know that is selfish and possessive of me, but I couldn´t help myself. I told her I didn´t like her taking Hannah from me and did so in such a way that I hurt her feelings. I later apologized after my husband reasoned with me and explained she was probably used to doing that for the other families she has worked with and reminded me of her attentive nature and love for Hannah. I realize there are some moms here in Guate who actually prefer their housekeepers and/or nannies to soothe their children, but I am not one of them. I want to be the one to wipe the tears from my baby´s face, to clean her wounds, to pick her up when she falls, but I also know I can´t always be with her.
There will come a time when I will have to go back to work, or she´ll start school, and I will be praying for her to be tended to and cared for by people who love her and have her best interest at heart. So I should be grateful for the love others show Hannah and the angels God will place in our lives to care for her when I am unable to do so. I know this is another life lesson I have to learn: love is not jealous. There is plenty of love in Hannah´s heart that she can love and be loved by others without her loving her mommy any less. My rational side knows this, but my emotional side still has a ways to go to accept this as true and I really am thankful for the ways life teaches me these lessons because I know they make me a better person and a better mommy.
Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; covers all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. -1 Corinthians 13:4
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