Do You Get Eco-Guilt?

We celebrated my youngest son’s third birthday last night. I served a home-baked banana cake, hung decorations made from recycled construction paper, and asked my parents (our only guests) to wrap their gifts in the comics section.  But despite my green party-planning efforts, I fell short in one pretty important area: I used paper plates.

There, I said it. Ms-Trying-to-Be-a-Greener-Parent served her son’s birthday dinner on paper plates.  If you’re at all interested in my rationale, here it is: I have been incredibly busy and stressed out, between nursing strep throat (my five year old’s), cooking and hosting Rosh Hashanah meals, and tackling a never-ending list of work commitments, my house has taken a backseat on the priority list.  To wit: My sink is practically sinking under the weight of dirty dishes. 

So, when it came time to sit down to dinner last night, I couldn’t even wrestle up seven clean plates. Which is why I copped out, grabbed the last of our disposable stash and set the table with paper plates and plastic cups.

Of course, the convenience of the disposable plates quickly got overshadowed by my eco-guilt. As Tree Hugger said back in February, eco-guilt is a powerful force — akin to Jewish mother’s guilt (at which I am an expert), but worse.

Every choice, from diapers to dishwashing, can leave parents with the stress of finding the greenest choice and the guilt of not going far enough with environmental efforts to keep your loved ones safe.

My list of guilt-inducing decisions doesn’t stop with disposable plates.  In fact, just today I managed to feel guilty about:

• Ordering a cup of tea at Panera and taking not one, but TWO, styrofoam cups. (That hot water burns right through the single-ply.) I did vow to bring my travel coffee mug the next time I visit Panera.
• Washing my dishes with Cascade gels, rather than an ecological tablet, like the ones Ecover makes. Those gels tap into my whole dilemma between living frugally vs. living green.  Many times, these two goals line up in perfect sync. But other times, I’m still choosing to use a mainstream product that I can get practically for free (thanks to advice from couponing geniuses like the Money Saving Mom).  Perhaps I’ll try making my own detergent.
• Putting my cottage cheese containers in the garbage bin rather than the recycling bin. My justification was that the sink was overflowing (remember?), so I couldn’t reach the faucet to rinse the containers out. That said, I have noticed that since implementing a home recycling program, we throw out significantly less garbage.

Tree Hugger suggests that the antidote to eco-guilt is taking action. Maybe I’d better go fish those cottage cheese containers out of the garbage.

Do you suffer from eco-guilt, too?  What trips up your green conscience?