The Non-Blog Post Which Started It All: "Parenting is Hard."

My friends and family had been telling me for years that I should write a book or start a blog. Their words of encouragement always came after I posted some sort of story about our ever changing life on my Facebook page. I seriously considered the advice every few months, but I just never had the chance to make it happen. After all, I had been a little busy for the past several years.

Here's the lowdown on our family: 

I was a teacher and Mark was an engineer. We were married for a couple of years before our life as we knew it would change forever. I left the workforce at 24 to become a full-time stay at home mom. Our first two children, a boy and a girl, were born just over a year apart from one another. When they were still pretty tiny, we decided to uproot our babies and spend two years living in a foreign country: Japan of all places. That experience in itself warrants an entire blog. More on that later. Baby Number Three surprised us during our last year in Japan. We moved back to America while I was eight months pregnant and joyfully welcomed that little guy. Fast forward another year, and we moved again. Thankfully this time it was just one state away, still in the Midwest. After living there for just a few months, we learned that Baby Number Four would make a grand entrance into our family. He was our last baby, and we have been living in the same city for six years now. 

 

It’s the perfect time to start my long-anticipated blog, right? We feel settled, with no major life changes on the horizon. Well, that’s what we always say.

A few weeks ago, I posted an inspirational note on parenting to my Facebook page. It was greeted with so many positive responses from friends telling me that they really needed to hear what I was saying that day. Then I shared it on our school’s PTA page, and teachers and some parents I didn’t know were saying similar things, thanking me for my honesty. I shared it on a national page and a woman told me that my words were refreshing. I knew I hit a nerve with my writing, in a positive way, and I decided it was finally time that I did something about it. I began doing a little research, brainstorming titles for my one day, down the road blog. Then today, July 6, 2014, after I shared another parenting post on Facebook, my good friend told me I really needed to start a blog.

I’m listening. 

I’m ready. 

Here it is..."Mama Loves You and Chocolate, Too." 

Please read on to see what I wrote that really made me bite the bullet and start this blog.  I hope it touches you as it has touched many people in my life. 

“Parenting is Hard…”   Written on June 25, 2014

I keep having to remind myself of this new mantra I've discovered: "Parenting is hard." Nobody ever told me it was going to be easy, but somehow it seemed easier in the beginning. Sure, I was sleep deprived and up to my eyeballs in diapers for ten years, but I've found this next stage of parenting to be the most difficult so far.

Having a middle schooler threw me for a loop I was not expecting. Having four kids in three different schools made for a crazy year. I could not wait for summer vacation to be here! I realize now that our life will be this way from now until who knows when...crazy. The kids will always be in many different schools and experiencing different stages of growing up. Their ages are so spread apart, and it's extra obvious now. When the oldest was 7, they were all still so young and little. Now the older two are 11 1/2 and 10 1/2, and it's a whole new world. We can never go back to what it was before, and I have found myself struggling to accept it.

A friend of mine recently told me that these are the hardest years on a family. I can see it now. All the kids have mood swings like you would not believe. One minute, they're best friends; the next, they're screaming at the top of their lungs that they wished the others didn't exist. One day, they're telling me I'm the best cook in the world; the next, they're saying I only make "gross food."

We can't let our egos get the best of us. We can't believe these outbursts, or we'll never want to wake up to face another day. When I look around at school or church or on Facebook, it's easy for me to feel like our family doesn't measure up to the others around me. It makes me want to shut down and lock ourselves inside till everyone learns to behave in every social situation. Then I remember, parenting is hard. Everyone thinks it, they just don't always say it.

I ran into two friends at the grocery store the other night. We were all having the wonderful experience of shopping without our many children whining and pulling on our legs, calling us mean for not buying them a new toy or treat or whatever. We were relishing in the rare quiet and chance to talk without being asked, "Are you done yet? Let's gooooo!" We laughed that we should grab some wine and not go home. We had the chance to see that only a few weeks into summer vacation, we were all experiencing the exact same things. We all could see that parenting is hard, and that everyone feels it. Everyone's house is messy. Everyone's kids claim to be bored when they have an entire house full of toys. Everyone's kids fight with each other…a lot.

I'm writing this today because I need to vent, but also because maybe someone needs to hear it. Maybe one of my friends is feeling the stress I feel. Maybe you look at others and feel like they make parenting look so easy, but wonder why it's hard for you. I won't have the chance to run into most of you at the grocery store. I won't have the chance to give you a hug and say it's great to see you. Believe me, I wish I could. In the meantime, please take my little note as encouragement from afar.

Parenting is hard.

Let's admit it.

Let's accept it.

Let's get through it together.

 

I'd love for you to find me on Facebook: 

https://www.facebook.com/mamalovesyouandchocolatetoo