Raise your hand if you got everything on your bucket lists checked off......yea....me either.
Mommin is HARD. I'm talking we jumped into this olympic sized event with no training. We squeezed out these adorable, tiny, squishy little humans and thought it might be easy.
We were so incredibly wrong.
I don't care if your squishy human turned into a typically developing or a non-typically developing bigger human. The journey was still hard and we are all lucky we're not drowning along the way.
I see you. I see behind your smiling facebook snapshots. I see your tired. I see your angry. I see your love. And I see your sacrifice.
I'm also here to tell you that it's completely ok to feel like you could strangle your eye-rolling teenager, or to feel like crying when your adult disable child poops out of his diaper. Or your dog chewed up the cord to a brand new gaming mouse and you need to take a time out and just scream in frustration.
Believe me when I say I speak from experience in all of the above "hypothetical" situations.
And yet.....I keep going. I keep talking (or yelling) and the eye rolling teenager. I go clean up poopy carpets (sometimes I'm crying while doing this), and I still feed the dog who just got his fill of gaming mouse cord.
And you.....YOU keep on GOING. Every day. Every night. We make sure the little people in our lives are taken care of.
I don't give a flying rat's booty if you're the mom that gets school supplies 2 months in advance, 2 days before school......or 3 days after the first day of school. Guess what? You'll get it done.
I STILL don't have school supplies bought yet by the way. I'm actually fairly certain both my children's backpacks look pretty much the same way they looked the last day of school.
Despite what I had in mind for the summer that might not have happened, I still loved my kids. We survived some tough days. And we had awesome days.
We made memories.
And, my dear mama friends..........so did you. Your kids were loved whether or not you took a vacation, went swimming, or sat in front of a television or a gaming device just so you could have 10 minutes to yourself to breathe.
Honestly? You all deserve a huge hug and a pat on the back. I know you all beat yourself up for things that are beyond your control. Or making a promise that you didn't keep even if it was within your control.
I know you won't pat yourself on the back. I know it because I wouldn't do it. I just think of motherhood as something that I have the privilege to be able to do and I don't want to feel selfish in telling myself that I'm doing a good job.
But believe me. If you're reading this. YOU are doing an AMAZING job. Your little people love you. They adore you. They might not know to give you a rewarding hug. So.....go hug THEM. It's worth it.
Keep smiling ladies. Behind tired eyes, screaming toddlers, door-slamming teenagers, and adult children you'd love to guide a different direction. Keep smiling.
(PS....it's ok to scream before you smile sometimes too. I promise.)