Lately I've been painting a less than rosy picture of life with small children. After getting the email with the quote in it that I put in my last post, my thinking has begun to change a bit. Unintentionally I was thinking of my kids as burdens and not as blessings. In reality they can be both, but it's how you treat them that makes the difference.
BabyGirl is not suddenly less strong willed if I think of her as a blessing, but I have more patience with her and more stamina to work through the hard times. #1 Son does not get less whiny and clingy, but I see it as his sensitivity and not as his attempt to drive me up the nearest wall. B.B. doesn't calm down and leave his diaper on and stay out of the fridge, but it is easier to find the humor in his escapades. It's more a matter of my attitude than their behavior at times.
That being said, it is not possible to never get worn out, beat down, and frustrated by the in's and out's of life with 3 children under 6. Motherhood was the only thing I ever wanted to do with my life. As long as I can remember, being a SAHM was my only real life goal. Now there are times I find myself wondering why I was ever so delusional. This is the single hardest job I've ever had...and there are times I feel like I'm doing it all on my own.
Why is it that mothers are made to think they can't express these feelings? That it will make us "Bad Mothers?" Why do we have unreasonable expectations about motherhood? We can't all be perfect mommies all the time. We will lose our tempers. We will get stressed out. We will do or say things we'll immediately regret. We will wonder if it's morally wrong to put our kids to bed at 6 o'clock at the end of a hard day. We will wish we never again had to hear someone whine, "Mommmmmmmy...." We will consider packing our toothbrushes in our purses, grabbing all the available cash in the house, driving until the gas runs out in our mini-vans, and taking up permanent residency wherever we happen to land.
But things will get better. Some small person will climb up on the couch with us just to cuddle. Some small person will bring us a fantastic work of crayon art made just for us. Some small person will wrap their small arms around our necks and whisper, "I love you. You're the best mommy ever!" Some small person will remind us that we are the center of their universe. Some small person will remind us what it's all about, and that no matter how bad it was the night before when no one was sleeping and everyone had been fighting for 3 hours straight, that it's all worth it.
Besides, someday they'll give us Grandkids!!
10 comments:
I get everything you are saying! I only WISH people knew how hard and lonely it can be.
I just want to add that I wrote this thinking of Emily, and both Sarahs, and Lauren, and STM, and Ang, and Brando, and Grace, and Art, and The Daring One, and all the the other Mommies I know who are working hard to raise their babies. It isn't easy. But that's not why we signed on in the first place, is it?
Interesting positive outlook.
It's not easy, but it's an adventure. National geographic doesn't have anything that compares.
-cate
I've just had the worst day on record with my two little treasures...and reading that just cheered me up immensely. Thanks sooooo much!
Speaking as the mother of two "older" children, as they grow they have more redeeming moments than not and things do get easier. They won't always be toddlers and preschoolers. There will come a day when you can actually have a real conversation with them and then you'll wonder where your baby went.
Baby Bear's not really in the challenging stage yet, but I do understnad what you're saying. And I would much rather be home with Baby Bear than trying to teach other people's kids while mine are with some other teacher. The sacrifices ARE worth it. I see my older nieces and how much fun they have with their Mom, how much their Mom has taught them, and I look forward to it!
I thought of you yesterday... there was a Mom in the grocery store. Her oldest, a daughter, was sort of skating on those shoes with wheels in them, two toddler boys were in the cart she pushed that's shaped like a car and incredibly difficult to steer, and the older son was pushing another cart FULL of groceries. My first thought was "I wish I could afford to shop at Publix for everything"... and then I noticed that in spite of the kids obvious fatigue and upcoming breakdowns, you could see how comfortable they were as a family. Her kids were older than yours... she was a sign of hope for the weary!!!
Great post!!!!
I really love those words!!
Farmwife, you put into words just how I feel! It is so important that we mums talk about this. We all go through these hard, hard, awful times when we feel like complete failures, but when it comes down to it, even in the deepest darkest times, we wouldn't change having kids and we would give/do anything for them, wouldn't we ? Thank you for your words - and I am so glad that someone else thought about packing up and driving off into the night!! But we didn't, did we ?! S
I love this outlook. This week I read a book about a family dealing with a deadly illness in one of their small children and when I finished I told Dan, "My blog is really negative lately." I'm sick of writing posts about the annoying things in motherhood (although I think it's refreshing to commiserate sometimes). I'd really like to focus more on how lucky I am to be a mother, even if there are parts that leave me frustrated to the point of explosion.
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