[I wrote this six months ago but never managed to take pictures and post....I guess the days weren't quite long enough.]
Sometimes it’s hard to be the mother I want to be. Of course it’s always challenging to be the mother I really want to, but I’m talking about passable here. I mean sometimes it’s hard to muster a ‘C’ performance. I’ve had the talk with myself about being patient: They will learn from you about dealing with frustration, I tell myself. Do you want them to learn that snapping and freaking out are ok? Of course not. So maybe don’t do those things. Duh. But man that’s a tall order some days when they’re both fussing constantly to be picked up (which I can’t safely accommodate for very long and certainly not if I need to get anything else done); when I rack my brain for ideas of what to feed them, only to have them refuse it all…again…after rubbing it in their hair; when every diaper change is like an Olympic wrestling match…You get the idea. Deep breath. So, how to moderate this sky high frustration level (of which I’m not proud)? Here are some things I try to tell/remind/ask myself:
• They’re not jerks, they’re babies.
• This stage won’t last forever, and when the annoying parts are gone, some of the adorable parts probably will be, too. (Will Peanut always do that hilarious pirate growl?)
• When I’m old and gray and can hardly remember babyhood, I’m sure I’d give anything to have just one day with my girls as babies again, even this stinking hot mess of a day.
• I don’t get to choose which days or what bits of mommy the girls will remember. What if today stands out in their memory? (Um, yowza!)
When I can manage to focus on these sorts of thoughts, they really can thwart a downward spiral of funk. But I need these thoughts when I’m…um…not my best self. So I decided that calm, collected me should post a gentle reminder to encourage frazzled me.
The days are long, but the years are short. So true, right? I chose this (possibly overused) adage because I wanted something that would help me see the big picture without screaming “having trouble holding it together here.” I used a high-brow design program (Microsoft Word) to whip this up, threw it in a frame I already had, and put it on a shelf across from our dining table. So now when I sit here…
Hubby in the hotseat
…I can see this over on the shelf. (OK, it looks tiny here, but I can definitely see it well enough to get the reminder.)
Honestly, words-to-live-by decor usually makes me cringe. It’s just not my thing. But I guess I’ll add it to the list of things that parenting has caused me to move out of my never column since I’m quite enjoying this little print. It’s given my view from the hotseat–and hopefully my attitude–a lift. All for just $0.