The other day, in the middle of the day, as the house erupted in a mild form of controlled chaos - milk spilling, math problems needing answering, dishes waiting, to-do list buried under a half-eaten pbj on gluten free bread, phone ringing, email box dinging, laundry finishing, mom cry ensuing - I sat down in my much needed of replacing couch with my heads in my hands with that mom failure feeling.
It didn't matter at that moment that I had written that dear mom who feels like she is failing letter. At that moment - that moment on a Thursday afternoon - I felt overwhelmed with my day. Alone. Like I couldn't do it all and keep things running smoothly. I knew I needed to do one thing, and just keep trying, but I couldn't understand why when it got a bit crazy I fell so quickly into the I'm failing today?definition.
Sometimes it isn't the huge problems - the finances, the relationships, the health - that can bring us to that point of feeling like we're failing point. It's crazy how it's often the little things. Little things that tower up, like blocks one on one on one, until it teeters to the point where it will tumble.
Way too often our day is based on the success of hypothetical perfect motherhood success blocks that we're stacking too fast, too quickly, blocks with labels, and ideas of what makes a good mom and then when it crashes we're so quick to slap a label on our day as not working.?It's not failing. It's just a reality of a life that is full and busy and with challenges and toddlers and dinners to make and errands to run and wiping faces and real, nitty-gritty, everyday without a break motherhood.
As I sat on the couch wishing that the milk that spilled onto the farm bench with the deep cracks between the slats of wood didn't bother me I wondered why on earth these little things - these normal life things - made me feel so inadequate.
Somehow I thought I could control it.
You know what I'm talking about. Somehow all the magazine articles about organization and the pins about quick and easy meals and ways to keep your home spotless and facebook status updates with family pictures made it feel like if I just had better control over everything?or a better plan or more patience or better and cuter storage options or less sleep or more sleep or a new planner or all of that and more then I wouldn't be failing.
Motherhood isn't about controlling everything.
In fact, motherhood is often about letting go of the frenetic need to have everything perfect and instead beginning to embrace making progress, and loving the little moments, and not defining worth on a pile of dishes in the sink or milk spilled on the floor.
Every single day will be different. The fabulous color-coded chart of chores will work one day and the next be met with incredible resistance. The favorite dinner of the month will fade. The clean bathroom will not last. Laundry must always be done.
What we mothers {and fathers} do that is amazing is when we stop, and pick ourselves up, and count to ten, and start again. We apologize for flipping out over the legos that are on the living room floor, and we read that book for the 417th time this week, and we make dinner, and we work on those math problems, we listen to their stories, and fold that laundry, and we know that we won't be perfect, but that we love our kids and we're going to fight for them.Real motherhood days are when we brush ourselves off, find our smile, and keep going.
We can set the structures, routines, charts, simple steps and more, but parenting will knock most of those down. Find what works for you and your family. Embrace the everyday. Don't expect it to stay perfect. Brush yourself off. Encourage your friends. Don't compare. Love today.
And love them.
Even if they just knocked over your coffee...
We can do it.
The more we link arms and encourage each other to be real the stronger we will become.
That is a real motherhood day.
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Source: http://rachelmariemartin.blogspot.com/2012/09/real-motherhood-days.html
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