I’ll warn you, this is an impulse post. Don’t sweat, it’s not full of “language” think more along the lines of a girl venting her problems and spoiler alert! There’s not a happy ending, in fact there’s not an ending at all.
Note: I wrote this on Thursday, May 16th but instead of posting it I thought you guys might prefer an edited version rather than just having words spewed out on the internet. So it took a few days, but here we go!
Writing is a type of therapy for me. Some writers blog for fun, for a source of income, to improve themselves, some write to be heard, but for me, it’s therapy. It relaxes me, calms me down, creates a sense of self-awareness. Kind of like journalling but a little more modest, if you will.
Let’s start at the beginning of today. I did 40 minutes of blood pumping yoga this morning so normally that would be enough to satisfy my daily exercise, but after today I needed something more. Something to relieve the tension starting in my shoulders and slowly creeping its way down my back.
Nevertheless, I ignored the creepy crawly feeling. I had responsibilities to attend to after all so grabbed one of my girly White Claws, ate dinner, and went back to work. Then the baby cried for my attention so I closed my laptop and did my best to make her my priority. My mood spiraled and got worse and worse as the hours passed.
Today sucked. Work sucked. Mommy-ing sucked. Brooklyn hit her head on my head while I was trying to hold her and type for work. Then tonight while I was bathing her she hit her head AGAIN. That time I broke down and cried.
After I put Brooklyn to bed I was tired of feeling sorry for myself so I threw on my workout gear and ran the stairs for a good 20 minutes. Naturally, afterward, I felt better. My heart was pounding and I was getting some of the tension and anger out with every step. Alas, endorphins only last so long so here I am writing a post to try and get myself through my thoughts while they’re still fresh.
Lately, I’ve been feeling like a complete and utter failure. I’m mad. So mad and no matter how hard I try to make life seem flawless, to fake it, to do my best, to make my life seem easier, I end up in the same place. Broken. Feeling useless.
Life at this very moment is hard. There’s a million and one things I want to do and the baby is holding me back. I don’t mean to be rude but we can’t travel to Europe anymore, I can’t horseback ride, I can’t just leave anytime I want nor can I do whatever I want like it was pre-baby life.
And of course just as any other mother would say, I wouldn’t trade my current life for anything (no, it’s not cliché it’s something I can’t really explain as it just happens when you become a mother), yet I still have a sliver of sadness when I get that travel itch or I have to decline outings with my girlfriends.
Kids take all your freedom, all your attention, all your time and it’s exhausting. Within the last 7 months, I’ve realized that I cannot be the best at my job, I cannot be the perfect wife, and I cannot be a superstar mom. I cannot, I just cannot. I am only one person who can literally only complete one monumental task at a time.
I’m going to have to come to terms that cooking dinner might take an hour because of Brooklyn, or my job might require that I work after hours because Brooklyn needed my attention (the beauty of working from home), or that the pile of laundry or clean dishes sitting in the dishwasher will have to wait another day or two.
It’s just how it’s going to have to be. After I worked my way through my “angry workout” I decided that I needed to let the anger and hopelessness of not being able to give 100% to everything I do go, but that wasn’t going to happen overnight.
Mostly my thoughts are self-inflicting. My work isn’t demanding more from me, Brooklyn is a baby with an attention span of a gnat so she can’t tell the difference (quick side note: She has been doing this thing where I’ll be working and she starts fussing until I look at her and then a huge smile spreads across her face. Then when I go back to work she fusses again, so maybe she does want more attention…hmmm this calls for another post for another time), and Kevin isn’t demanding a spotless house or a hot meal every night. All the stress I’m putting on myself to be “perfect” is all on me.
Being a mommy is hard and then adding 40 hours+ of work on top of that makes it that much harder. Let me just pause my rant for a moment to applaud the single mommies, because let me tell you, I couldn’t do it. Our “baby duties” are something Kevin and I split as much as possible whenever possible. Kids are a 24/7 job, not to mention you can’t forget that somebody in the family has to be the chef, maid, comforter, phycologist, etc. and then to add your job on top of that (whether you work from home or outside of the home) I’d lose my mind. Way to go single moms! I give you so many props because you have to do it ALL BY YOURSELF. That’s more working in a day than I ever thought could be possible.
Continue rant: Tthe problem is I always want to be the BEST at everything I do. I’m motivated, determined, self-disciplined and I consistently want to pour 110% into everything I do. Having a baby was a total wake up call. Because now I am always being pulled into 100 different directions, I feel as if everything I do is only done at about a 50% rate anymore. I do my best to put all my effort into everything I do, but it never works out. I end up feeling tired, unproductive, and above all sad.
For example, I end up getting irritated because I’ll be 100% focused on my job then the dogs need to go outside, Brooklyn starts getting fussy, or heaven forbid I get hungry and have to stop for lunch. Another example, when I’m 100% focused on Miss B, my job starts hounding me or there’s dinner to be cooked or laundry to fold. It’s a never-ending cycle and it is exhausting.
I don’t know how to manage it. I don’t know how to be a superstar wife, to have time to work out, create meal plans, get my errands done, keep my house clean, give my all to Brooklyn and let alone make time for myself. Life is consistently moving at a supersonic speed and it’s depressing because I don’t know how to make time for everything I want to do.
As I said, I don’t have an answer to this rant other than everything isn’t always rainbows and sunshine like social media makes it out to be. All I can say is this, to every Mama out there struggling to make it through the day, or wishing time would slow down, or feeling like a failure, or constantly finding themselves overwhelmed, or pulled into too many directions, you are not alone.
Being a wife, a mom, basically the glue within your family is a hard job and I no longer silently judge the non-working stay at home moms for being tired or those who walk into Target with their pj’s on because you know what? Life is hard, it’s messy, it’s raw, organic, painful, emotional, and sometimes you just have to take it easy on yourself. Even if that means walking into Target to get a tub of ice cream with PJs on, then so be it. You do you, Mama.
Kevin asked me why I put all this pressure on myself because he’s never once asked me to be anything but myself without judgment and since I’ve had time to think about it, I found my answer.
It’s because I desire and strive to be that trophy wife, the rockstar mom, the talented cook, to be the best of the best at my job, and to have the cleanest house on the block. I want all those things, but unfortunately, as time goes by I’m realizing that I can’t do it all.
Instead of thinking of it as being a failure, I somehow have to come up with a way to handle all of it, but also be content with the fact that I may not be the best of the best in the eyes of the world, but that I am the best of the best to the people who matter most to me and maybe, just maybe that is enough.
P.S. While it may seem that Brooklyn is to blame for how I’m feeling at the moment, it isn’t the case at all. I am over the moon in love with being a mom and my daughter. However, sometimes I get so far lost in my mom duties or my job that I forget who I even am or where I’m going. I love all these jobs I have, I just am having a hard time figuring out how to smoothly transition from one job to the next without feeling completely overwhelmed. Maybe in a few years I will know what to do and post some miraculous post about how great everything is, but for now, I’m drowning and it’s nobody’s fault but my own.
