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Motherhood.

You sneaky sneak foe. You fair-weathered friend.

Every time I think I have you figured out. You go and change on me.

Every time I fiiiinaly master an age + stage you move right along to the next one without any notice of new changes.

Every time I think I know what to expect or how to handle a situation you throw a completely new + more difficult one my way.

Motherhood.

You give me glimpses of knowing exactly what to do + how I should handle a situation. So I begin to think “Oh yea. I’ve got this. I’m rocking the shiz out of this mom biz.” Motherhood is faaantastic.

Only to be side-swiped by some new challenge that you present that I haven’t a single clue how to handle.
…At least gracefully anyways.

Typically you give me a great big feeling of being incredibly invincible and a notion that I can take over the world & rule with my 3 kids. That I am just the most awesome-st lady that ever lived.

And then BAM. Some inconvenience such as nap time becoming a 45 minute back + forth game of “stay in your bed” and you bestow upon me the ability to lose my shit and that awesome “ I can handle any + everything” crown in less than a microsecond.

At no point did I think I would have to negotiate with the toddler to STOP getting back into the crib every nap + bedtime process. Just because he wants to sleep with his brother. Cute- yes. Annoying- absolutely.

At no point did I think I would have to say “I know you love your brother |but| please stop strangling him.”

At no point did I think at [almost] age 3, I would still be trying to figure out how to make this kid sleeeeep through the night |and| not wake up at 6 am every.single.freaking.morning.

At no point did I think that my soon-to-be ten-year-old would want to be spending even more time with me yet
simultaneously screaming “I hate you” all while navigating through the mean girls [already] together.

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I mean, I guess with struggle and even failure comes growth. When I struggle and feel the mom guilt of motherhood + want to say eff it all, those are the moments that ground me and bring my attention to what I need to work on so I can grow as a mother.

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I honestly just think [for me at least] motherhood is just a constant attempt to try + figure out what to give your kid[s] that you didn’t receive as a child. That way they don’t struggle with the same things that cause you inner conflict.
The hard part comes in that because we might be missing what we don’t know we are missing, it’s kind of hard to know what that thing is to give to our children.

Some times that missing piece from our own childhood could be material things, sometimes it is getting + giving more hugs and sometimes it’s just being more present.

And nothing allows you to become more aware of those missing things than motherhood.

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Ugh.

**giant sigh**

Motherhood.
You are perplexing.
You are confusing.
You make me want to scream.
You are just the perfect gift I needed.