The Effect Of Motherhood On Clothes Shopping

When I go shopping, I usually have my learning-disabled (yet very energetic and curious) child with me.  This means that most of my trip is about the process of teaching him how to behave in public.  This means that most trips feel like an exercise in frustration and futility (not to mention the un-ending judgement of strangers who don’t know what I’m up against, but I’ve learned to ignore that for the most part).  However, he actually has made progress over the years (he is 5).   So I know it’s not truly futile – it’s just a very long process.

 ANYWAY, this leaves me very little time for actual shopping.  Therefore I basically shop with a list.  The higher-priority items are at the top, and if he becomes too hard to handle, we just pay for what we have and get outta Dodge before he goes completely ballistic.

 Sometimes, however, I get optimistic and actually try to clothes shop for myself.  For me to take the time, with child in tow, to actually try something on, it has to really grab me.  So I limit myself to five minutes of grabbing what grabs me and head for the dressing room.

 I then try items on with a one-minute time limit for each item – which includes putting the item on and taking it off.  Which leaves about 30 seconds for making my decision.  If it looks decent and I like how it feels, it’s a “yes.”  If I have to question it at all and look at longer in order to make my decision – well, that makes my decision for me.  It means I don’t like it, and it’s a “no.”

 With this method, surprisingly, I rarely get home with things I wind up having to take back.  And while I’d like to do some more in-depth shopping, I’ve learned it’s not really necessary.

I’ve found that the effect of Motherhood on clothes shopping is this – a lesson learned in efficiency that extends beyond Motherhood.  In other words, nowadays, even when my child is NOT with me – I use the same method in the dressing room.  If it doesn’t immediately shout “yes” at me, it goes in the “no” pile.

Thusly, I can go shopping, get it done, and move on with my life.  I have tried extending this to other portions of my life as well, with varying success.  Sometimes you really do have to take the full amount of time to do something and there are no shortcuts.  Other times, however, you really can just stop endlessly over-analyzing every little thing in your life and just go with your best instinct at the time.

 And if you make a mistake, most mistakes are correctable.  And you will have learned a lesson.

So the lesson here:  The lesson is that there are many lessons in Motherhood, I guess, which often have less to do with your child and more to do with your outlook.

 Is that clear as mud?  LOL