Being a Mom is Hard
Motherhood is relentless waves of guilt, responsibility, hope, wonder, anger, despair, boredom, monotony, joy, acceptance and sadness crashing into you every single day. You try to keep your head above water and mostly, you do.
Because you’ve learned how over the days and years and months.
But sometimes the bad nights catch up to you.
The mountains of laundry turn into something insurmountable. The appointments and things to remember start adding up to numbers you can’t comprehend anymore. The level of worry and anxiety for your kids are so high that you can’t see the good things, the peaceful moments anymore.
Some days you’ve poured and poured and poured all day and have had no time to refill your cup. The waves are coming too fast and you’re barely breaking the surface to catch your breath before the next waves crashes into you and knocks you back under.
Motherhood is when you lock yourself in your room as soon as your partner is home and cry. Just cry. Even when it’s their birthday and you feel like the world’s biggest jerk.
Motherhood is when you’re angry watching your partner drive away, to WORK, because that seems like heaven when you’ve been up since 5 with a screaming 2 year old.
Motherhood is feeling crushed, absolutely crushed by the responsibility of keeping everyone alive, making sure they’re emotionally looked after, knowing when the appointments are, where everyone’s hats, gloves and clothes are and cooking nutritious meals and trying to find time to exercise and pursue your passions outside of kids (do those even exist anymore?)
Motherhood is doing the same things, over and over and over again and never having an end or feeling like you’ve completed something.
Motherhood is feeling crippling guilt no matter what you do.
Motherhood is rushing through the bedtime routine so you can be ALONE and not be TOUCHED only to feel sad you rushed through it and spend your alone time wondering if you’re doing a good enough job.
Motherhood is getting a good sleep after weeks of terrible ones and remembering why you love being a mom again.
Motherhood is changing the car seat to a bigger one for the last child, the baby, and realizing she isn’t a baby anymore.
Motherhood is realizing that those chubby hands don’t stay chubby forever. That the chubby hands stop reaching for you so much.
Motherhood is realizing you haven’t picked up your oldest child since… well, you can’t remember the last time because she’s too heavy now.
Motherhood is hard. So hard.
But, so is life. Life is hard. There is no magical last hill to climb where you’ve “made it” and it’s suddenly easy.
And sometimes that acceptance, that it won’t ever be easy, is what we need to carry on.
This too shall pass mama.
It will. Good or bad, it will pass.
You can make it <3
at least until bedtime