Bad Mom

I sound like a broken record. To myself and most likely to everyone else I communicate with. It's as if I am stuck in this season of life with an infant. I constantly beat myself up mentally for not being strong enough to be a good mom. I tell myself that I wanted to be a mom so I need to suck it up and move on with the hard days, the sleepless nights, the endless dishes and laundry and stop complaining about it. But the thing is, I don't HATE those things. I absolutely love being a mom and I would not change being Theo's mommy for the entire world. But ya'll, I am exhausted. I crave some sort of consistency and routine in my day to day responsibilities, and throwing in an unpredictable 7.5 month old (who is now mobile!) has been a tricky adjustment. I never know much and how well Theo is going to sleep at night. I never know where he's going to sleep at night. I don't know how clingy he's going to be and how much of my time I have to spend holding and rocking him (no complaining on that) And now I don't know how long he's going to sit still and if it will be long enough for me to go to the fridge and back. He's mobile and he's fast! He's army crawling like he's got somewhere to be and I know it's only a matter of days before he is up on those knees and crawling on all fours.

Back to the topic at hand. I don't know how to stop beating myself up over the things that I feel like a failure at. Like...why isn't Theo gaining any weight? He gained 3 OUNCES in one MONTH. Why won't he sleep in his crib for more than a couple of hours at a time? Why, when we bring him into our bed because we are tired and don't have the energy to let him figure out how to put himself to sleep, is he incredibly restless? (And when he isn't restless he is the best snuggle man around) He doesn't want to be in his crib but isn't comfortable with us, either, why can't he just figure out how to put himself back to sleep? Are we terrible parents for not doing sleep training? We want to do sleep training, but we can't afford the professional help and don't have the heart to listen to him cry. Hell half the time we have let him cry it turns out he was hungry. Why don't we have him on a schedule? Are we too lazy to put in the work? Or is not having him on a schedule better in the long run? How will we know? WHAT ARE WE DOING?!

And here's the thing. I know deep in my heart that I am a great mom and I'm doing an amazing job raising Theo. He is the happiest little boy, he loves his mom and dad, he is clean and healthy, and we get so many compliments on how "good" he is when we are out and about with him. The boy is so chill that sometimes servers at restaurants don't even know we have a baby with us! So yes, I do have all of this guilt and negative self talk about not being cut out for this, but at the end of the day when I get home from work and see his adorable face light up when he sees me my face lights up and I know that I am doing just fine.

So why is the negativity inside of my head louder than the beliefs of being good, okay, ENOUGH? Enter anxiety. Enter lack of confidence. Enter all of the things that go along with anxiety; fatigue, headaches, brain fog, forgetfulness, anxiety, worry, fear, irritability. I'm just not ever rested enough to be able to BE my best self. I'm past the point of exhaustion which means I'm running on empty and definitely not firing on all cylinders. Repeating this and explaining this is where the feeling of being a broken record comes in along with guilt and shame. I don't even know why I feel that because I have literally never be told I am doing something wrong. I guess I just assume, and compare, and maybe even imagine that this is happening. The common denominator in all of this is lack of sleep. They say it will get better which while true, is not validating in the moment. And I don't fault anyone for saying that because it's absolutely the truth and I know that. But it's really hard to get someone to not only listen but to truly comprehend the level of fatigue and exhaustion that literally hurts to my core when you factor in all of the changes that have happened in my life in the past year, hormones included. So while telling me to be gentle and give myself grace is very thoughtful relevant advice, it's not so easy to do. So instead maybe you could validate me and tell me HOW I can be gentle with myself and give myself grace, because my mind is not in the place to figure that out.