It’s tough to be a mother. I know, because I am one. If you’re reading this article, you’re either feeling like a crap mom or you’re too exhausted to care about how good of a mom you are — and that’s okay.
As my husband would say after he came home from work all stressed out and ready for the weekend: “It is what it is. You are a good mom, and you’re doing a good job. And that’s all you can be at the end of the day.”
Every mother has her own story. The one I am sharing with you is mine. This is how I have learned to be an assertive parent and say no without feeling guilty.
The other day in a dispute over dinner, my husband said, “This is how your mother would have handled it. She would have told me that she chooses to eat with the children, and I can sit at the table or I can starve.”
I felt a bit insulted. His version of our mother eating her own dinner must be different than mine. At first, I thought he was right. My mother was pretty rigid when it came to dinner — every night at 7:30 we had one meal that lasted until 8:00 p.m.
It could be a simple soup or pizza, but every night he would have to sit at the table and listen to her critique everything we ate. I can still hear her voice today: “I do not feel comfortable with this. Why didn’t you use real mushrooms? This casserole has too much cheese. Next time, then let’s throw out anything that looks bad.”
My mother was not afraid to tell us what she did and did not like about our dinners and the way we dressed when we came home from school. After I finished college and had my first child, I started to change. I became more relaxed about my kids eating dinner with us. And that’s why, when my husband says he would throw out the bad food, I say, “Great. Carve up the pizza.”
But this is not how you are supposed to be a good mother. I know — I used to think this way, too.
How am I supposed to be a good mother? The image of the perfect mom never sat right with me. She was someone who did everything perfectly, who never yelled at her children or got upset.
She was always level-headed and calm. The perfect mother was everything I wanted to be, but she wasn’t who I could ever be. I am not a perfect mother — nor am I expected to be one.
To me, the perfect mother is the one who is there for her children and will do anything to make them happy. She’s a mom who can sit through an entire baseball game without complaining or falling asleep.
She doesn’t compare herself to any other mothers and she doesn’t measure herself according to the words of those around her. Instead, she allows her children to express themselves without judgment.
And that’s exactly what I want to be as a parent — unjudging.
One night when my older daughter was 6 years old, she was reciting a poem for school. As she held her head up high, reciting the poem, the emotions just came over her and she burst out crying. Right there in front of all of us in the audience, she cried so hard that I didn’t know what to do.
I sat there with tears in my eyes and as much love as I could give her through my touch, but within a few minutes it was over. My daughter apologized for crying, and I cried a little myself. Why? She didn’t do anything wrong.
She was beautiful reciting her poem, and in those moments when she opened herself up to us, we were given a glimpse into her soul — and ours.
Our children are just like us: They have rough days at school or with friends that they want to share with their parents. They may think that we don’t want to hear about it but the truth is we do because we love them.
https://nanniesandkidsunited.com/parent/
