I’ve always said I wish I could live two lives – one in which I get to be a mother and one in which I spend all of my time and resources on myself (with abs and nether regions that look… unviolated). It’s pretty damn cool that we get to help shape entire human beings into (hopefully) functional adults. And yet, nearly 10 years into this “mom” gig, there are still parts of me kicking and screaming at the magnitude of this forced mental shift toward sacrificial love.
Do you recall the moment you realized this “job” was 24/7, 365 and you could never, ever, ever quit? I do. It was on day one.
Once upon a time, I was an only child who felt fairly well-adjusted in the world. Turns out, my ability to cope with life’s majesty and madness while still maintaining a decent attitude depended entirely on a good night’s sleep, a solid grasp on my daily schedule, and plenty of time for quiet self-introspection. Guess what happens when you introduce a baby into the mix? You get me, reduced like a fine wine sauce over steady heat into a thick tangle of idiosyncrasies. Within minutes of meeting my firstborn, nine months of blissful expectation morphed into a monstrous new reality in which every worst part of myself – all of those terrible baseline traits I could usually gloss over or avoid – unleashed like Pandora’s Box.
We made so many great memories as a family when my kids were small, and I’m glad we captured a lot of them on camera because the bulk of what I remember are the moments when I blew it. There were more sweet moments than awful, but with nowhere to channel my rage and disappointment that motherhood didn’t feel the way I’d expected – that I didn’t always feel the way I’d expected – I lost my temper with the kids too many times to count. I yelled. I screamed. I slammed doors. I’m not proud. My husband finally admitted to me that he didn’t relish the idea of leaving them home with me all day. That revelation really cut deep. But it also catalyzed a long overdue change.
Somewhere in the toddler phase (both the kids and mine), I had to make a choice: stay the course and risk f&cking these relationships royally OR attempt the winding road toward being the mom (and partner) my family needed. Both options would cost dearly. So I chose the latter, with zero clue how to go about it. Reaching into my bereft emotional and mental toolbox had me repeating patterns of extreme dysfunction, which meant the path felt a bit like pushing a boulder uphill in the dark. But I clung to this vision of what my family could be and a determination to fill this “mom” role like I really mean it.
Almost a decade later, here is what I know: we aren’t always given the kids we want, we’re given the kids we need.
My children resist conforming to my expectations every single day, and it’s taken me a long time to overcome the initial shock and inconvenience to see this as an incredibly wonderful gift. Aside from the desire to impart values like kindness and emotional intelligence, my expectations are bullsh&t, and if my kids conformed to them, they would be mindless automatons void of their unique gifts and talents. My goal as a mother has shifted dramatically from solely shaping my children to partly shaping and also supporting their interests and developmental path. This mothering journey is as much about what I have to learn from them as it is about what they have to learn from me.
What if everything you’ve experienced – your successes, failures, shortcomings, and talents – are all there by design, to serve (among other things) the purpose of supporting your unique child(ren)? The painful, beautiful, never-ending act of mothering can be a process of emotional healing and powerful growth for YOU, if you’re open to it. You have what it takes. You already ARE the mom your kids need. The trick is to identify the sticking points where the old yuck from your past continues to surface, so you can allow this process to clean it out, refreshing and refining your heart in unimaginable ways.
Not sure where to start? Let’s do it together.
the dirty laundry show 