Welcome to my new series where I interview real-life mamas. My blog is titled “Be the difference” Parents have the power to make a difference in their children’s lives from the very start. I want to honor parents in this series for the hard work they are putting into raising the next generation.
The intention of this series is to showcase a number of individuals with children primarily in elementary school and younger (But I will interview some mamas of older children too!) I will not be sharing names or photos.
Why is this you ask? The purpose of the series is to bond together with our similiarities instead of using our differences to compare each other. Comparison can be the devil when it comes to parenting. I want to try to eliminate factors that would make us doubt ourselves.
Please enjoy reading these interviews every Friday over the next few months!
Making the decision to have a child is momentous. It is to decide forever to have your heart go walking around outside your body. ~Elizabeth Stone
Before I got married I had six theories about bringing up children; now I have six children, and no theories. ~John Wilmot
It’s not only children who grow. Parents do too. As much as we watch to see what our children do with their lives, they are watching us to see what we do with ours. I can’t tell my children to reach for the sun. All I can do is reach for it, myself. ~Joyce Maynard
There are two lasting bequests we can give our children. One is roots. The other is wings. ~Hodding Carter, Jr.
Interview #1
Let’s face it, this mom gig is hard! What do you find to be the hardest part?
Patience!! I struggle with having patience with my 3 yr. old. Sometimes, I lose my patience with her and end up yelling at her or snapping at her. And then of course, I feel really guilty about it.
Not having enough time to myself. I LOVE spending time with my girls. However, after watching them all day (I’m a SAHM) and then helping make dinner, cleaning up dinner, and then putting them to bed, there’s not a lot of “me” time. It would be ideal to have 2-3 hours each day to workout, shower, read or do whatever I felt like doing.
Laughter is the best medicine. What is your most embarrassing Mama Moment you can look back on and laugh about now?
My 3 yr. old went through a mooning phase where she thought it was funny to moon people in public. I remember standing at the front desk at the vet office and someone tapped me on the shoulder and then pointed down at my daughter and she had her pants down to her ankles and was sticking her little booty out at people! what?! Where did she learn this? I certainly haven’t been mooning people!
Which moments in parenting make you feel the most vulnerable or unsure? What resources do you turn to in order to feel better?
I struggle with how to deal with her bad behavior. We do time outs and they work most of the time. However, sometimes if I talk to her about not saying certain words, she gets really upset and cries as though I’ve made her feel horrible. So I read a lot about how to stop bad behaviors like hitting, breaking rules, saying certain words, etc. I like “Happiest Toddler on the Block” and recently “Love and Logic.” And most of the time, I ask my friends that have kids how they handle certain situations and that’s very helpful.
We all have bad days, and some are worse than others. What’s your go-to coping strategy to make it through the really rough spots?
On really rough days, I cope by having my husband take over totally when he gets home and then I go workout or take a hot bath. And then I just try to think of how to handle the situation better next time and visualize what I’ll do differently. If it’s in the middle of the day and I need a coping mechanism right away, I usually have my daughter have some quiet time in her room while I read a magazine for 10 min. Or I load the kids up in the stroller and go on a walk if it’s decent outside.
We all need help to make it all happen. What tools do you use to help organize your family? (app, product, etc.)
I have a little weekly list of what’s happening each day and “to do’s” for the week. I just write everything down and use my google calendar, too. I’ve learned I’m much happier with not having too much on my calendar!
What is the best advice anyone has ever given you on being a parent?
That there’s no “right” way to do it. We all make mistakes. Just learn from your mistakes and do your best! 🙂