November 2021

If parenting is easy, you are doing it wrong.
Okay, I am sure I lost half of my readers just from that title but for those of you who hung in there, you feel me right!? Now, I am not saying parenting is miserable, terrible, no good, and ugly. I am saying the opposite actually. I am saying that the things we work  the hardest for, are the things we love the most. I always chuckle inside when people talk to me about running. I usually say something like “I love running”, “running is the best”, “the feeling of running is unlike anything else”. Some people hear what I am saying and know what I mean while others look at me shaking their head and say “how? Running hurts everywhere and is terrible” to which I think…yes, it hurts my feet and my knees and sometimes my back and occasionally I roll an ankle and have to limp around for a few days and sometimes I get side-aches and headaches and last but not least I get mental fatigue about just wanting to STOP…
It is not these moments of pain that define the run, it is the way I feel after. It is the reflection on what I have done, what I have tackled and how I have overcome something that challenged me. Now I am not saying that every run hurts or even that every run is hard, but running is hard and running does hurt and those days when 5 miles feels like 1 and my body feels 19 again and everything lines up with the stars, well those are like perfect parenting days and while they happen, we have to be honest with ourselves in saying those are the exception and not the rule. 
So I will say it again, if parenting is easy, you are doing it wrong. It is the Luke warm cups of coffee, the stained clothes that you thought were clean, the bags under your eyes and the grey hairs growing from your head that are your badges of honor. They make you shine brighter because they signal what you are putting into parenting each and every day.  I am here to tell you that being a mom is the only job I have ever wanted, I yearned for it and I am in love with my kids more and more every day and yet this shit is hard! I cry, and I mean I ugly cry where no amount of makeup will save me and yet I wake up and do it all over again because well, it is the best. 
So hold your head high and remember, the challenge makes you stronger and when you are done with these early years of parenting you will look back, you will reflect on it all and notice things you could not see before. You may regret some moments and long for other moments, you may be able to feel moments as if they are happening right now so don’t hide behind forcing it to “all be okay” and to be “easy”. It is not supposed to be easy, it is supposed to challenge who we are, shake us to our cores, mix us up and settle us down, remind us of how capable, strong, resilient and incredible we are. 
“How lucky I am to have something that makes saying goodbye so hard”  - Pooh Bear