Looking In The Mirror

Every night the Diva Princess makes her request for who she wants to snuggle. On the nights that the honor is so graciously bestowed upon me, I can’t help but watch her sweet innocent face relax into a deep sleep. There’s just something about a sleeping child that soothes your soul.

Two nights ago, as she lay fast asleep, I couldn’t help but wonder where life will take her. What will she be like at 16, 18, or 25? Will I have done a good job? Will I have prepared her for life? Will I have given her the keys to success?

See, back when I was a non-parent, I had it all figured out. I knew what had to be done. I could tell parents exactly what they were doing wrong…and then I realized I didn’t have a clue. The easiest parenting in the world is to parent someone else’s child, from a distance. But living it, breathing it, every day of your life. Having your every mistake emulated and magnified, that’s insanely terrifying.

Something I know all too well.

For those of you who have been blessed with multiple children, you know the struggle. As my hormones rage (and raging they are) and my body is no longer my own, it’s difficult to still be the mommy my daughter has always known. Try as I might, I fail a little every day. And then it happens, life bites you in the ass.

Now, I am well versed in a three-year-olds ability to play their parents like a fiddle, but sometimes you just know there is a certain amount of truth to their words. See, I’ve been what we will call “moody”, a lot. My patience are thin, my body is tired, and I may be guilty of flying off the handle…a few times too many.  Did I mention I really miss wine! I would love to blame it on a life lived in constant pain, but the truth is, that’s just an excuse. Oh, the pain is real I assure you, my womb can attest, as is the perpetual state of hunger that leaves me in a haze of endless Hanger (hungry and angry, if you’re not familiar with the term), but I’m the adult. It’s my job to control my emotions. Something I have successfully failed at for months.

I say all that to say this…

After the second day in a row of picking up my dear, sweet, darling child only to be told that she has hit another child, my heart hurts. You can know things, rationalize thoughts and actions, but when it comes to your child, every good parent looks at themselves for where they went wrong. It’s natural. It’s human nature. Something you can’t avoid. Kids are what they are taught after all, right? Now, the small part of my brain that’s still rational knows that we don’t hit, so she didn’t actually learn it from myself or her father. That small part also knows she is exposed to endless amounts of outside influences that cannot be controlled. Influences by other kids whose family may not hold the same values as ours. And though being the bad guy, the disciplinarian, is the worst job in the world, you do what you must. You take a stand.

Then she puts the icing on the cake…

While calmly (although I was feeling anything but calm) explaining why we don’t hit, what it means to take responsibility for our actions and consequences, and why she was angry in the first place, my precious child says the one thing that can knock me to my knees. “I’m angry because you are always angry momma!”

Done. Toast. Finished. Failed.

In one simple sentence, she handed me my purple heart for parent of the year (insert sarcastic eye roll here). Of course, I fight back the hormonal tendency to cry my bloody eyes out, and explain in all my parental wisdom the many reasons we cannot let our actions be the result of someone else’s actions, but the truth remains…

It is up to me to be the woman I want my daughter to be.

#ThinkBeforeYouAct