I don’t know who this is for – but you need to clear your mind and relax! You deserve it. You are doing an awesome job, and no one can say otherwise. From the outside looking in, life looks easy and fun, but it is sometimes SO hard to take everything in and keep everything afloat without losing it. Yeah, we all smile for the social media pictures, but you don’t know the chaos that goes on daily to produce those smiles and make them genuine, especially in my household.
Zoning in on my own life, I feel like people don’t understand the pressures of being a parent, and it shows. It shows when people sometimes downplay the reality of the day-to-day activities and emotions women (especially mothers) go through.
Sometimes it feels like my mind is going in a thousand different directions, but I have to remember to slow down, take a break, and do something that I actually enjoy doing even if it’s just for 5 minutes out of my hectic day.
We should never get to the point where we are overwhelming ourselves and not saying anything about it.
This will negatively affect not only you, but your mate, and your kids as well. I know that everyone does not have help nearby (myself included), so it gets tough when you can’t just go drop your kid(s) off at their grandparents for a few hours or with a relative that stays nearby for a weekend. Although it is tough and you have a ton of things to do day in and day out, you must try to get yourself and your family accustomed to a routine that works for you and allows you some “me-time” and try to stick to it.
Routines don’t work for everyone, but they work for me and my household.
I set aside a time where I take a few moments to myself just to relax, lay down, or just sit in a chair and listen to music while enjoying the scenery outside my bedroom window. Whatever it is, I make sure that no one bothers me (unless it’s an emergency) during that time. I have to take my me-time when my baby goes to sleep, because he is currently 9-months old and just getting riled up. Him and his sister (5 years old) can go on and on with the noise, racket, singing, laughing, and so forth, but during the few moments to an hour I take to myself, I make sure my daughter understands that I am not to be bothered, because mommy is trying to relax. She gets it for the most part but will occasionally come to where I am to tell me she hurt her knee or something (you know how kids are).
To keep my daughter occupied, I usually find her a movie to watch, and again, my son is usually napping during this time, so everything works out perfectly until the baby wakes up and Kamea gets restless; and then, it starts all over again. Depression and anxiety can creep up on you slowly without you even realizing it, so it is important to give yourself time to breath and take a break from the day-to-day activities that you are so accustomed to doing. Find a friend that is also a parent and vent to them (not every day because they have kids and are busy too), but every now and then just so you are not holding your emotions in and allowing them to kill you slowly. No one understands your struggle better than someone living a similar experience or someone who has gone through it previously.
If you like to have a glass of wine to relax, HAVE THAT GLASS OF WINE.
Don’t feel bad for taking time for you and winding down. Now, what we aren’t going to do is get drunk, because we have our little ones to tend to, but by all means – enjoy yourself and take a break every now and then. You are an amazing person and you deserve it!!