Well, I guess it's about time for my quarterly entry. I don't mean for months to pass by between posts, it just sort of seems to happen that way. Maybe once my son is on more of a schedule...or maybe that's just one more excuse.
Motherhood has been much more of an adjustment than I ever imagined. A good adjustment, but boy they aren't kidding when they say it's the toughest job in the world! And that's for a number of reasons. Of course "hard" is so relative. But parenthood, and motherhood in particular, is "hard" because it's difficult on every possible level: physical, emotional, mental, emotional, spiritual, emotional. Perhaps it's the emotional aspect that makes the others so hard. Don't get me wrong, I absolutely LOVE being a mom. They were also right when they said it's the best job in the world. I am 100%, head-over-heals, irrefutably, in love with my son. I could go on for days about that and tell you every cute little thing he does. I have to check myself in conversation with other moms (or anyone in general) to make sure I'm not constantly saying, well then my son did this, etc...
I have recently realized that the biggest challenge to my role as his mom is my own level of self-confidence. I am my own worst enemy. Every moment I am down or question my ability as a mom is of my own doing. No one is standing over my shoulder saying I'm not doing this or that right...I only imagine the critics. So my goal for this week is not to second-guess myself. I love my son and want what is best for him, so I'm naturally going to make decisions based on that fundamental principle. I'll make mistakes at times, and that's something I have to accept. I definitely have perfectionist tendencies. But I'm going to stop the self-defeating talk. If we don't leave the house for a day, (or two, or three) it doesn't mean I'm a failure. If my son starts crying in the grocery store, well, that's what babies do sometimes. It doesn't mean I'm a bad mom.
You get the point. No more beating myself up. I will be a better mom if I believe myself to be a good mom. And at the end of the day, I really do believe I'm a good mom. It's just those little daily doubts in the minutia of it all that drag me down. Well, they're going down now.
