Loving Yourself At Every Stage of Motherhood

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You are not perfect. I am not perfect. We are not perfect.

There’s so much pressure on us as mothers. It starts the second you find out you’re pregnant actually. Pressure to be perfect. To do literally everything right, from food choices to putting down that bottle of wine (for…how many months?!), birthing choices, oh and how are you planning on feeding your baby?

Whatever your choice is, make sure you pick the right one to avoid mommy shaming!

Fast forward to making sure your kids are well-behaved, keep them entertained, help them with their homework, and involve them in activities outside of screen time! You have no other job than to make sure that all of this runs smoothly, this job of raising and molding tiny humans. Forget worrying about whether your jeans still fit, whether the house is clean and whether you put two matching shoes on every day.

Are you a stay-at-home mom?

Are you a working mom?

Entrepreneur mom?

Maybe you lean all the way in corporate mom?

Maybe you’re just a mom!

It is okay to be just a mom. It is okay to be the chicken with your head cut off mom. It is okay to be an entrepreneur mom, half listening to your kid interrupt you for the 50th time while you try to eek out just one email for the day. It is okay to lean all the way in, climbing the corporate ladder so that you can provide for your family…mom.

It is okay.

It is okay to just be.

I bet that if you’re reading this right now, you’re a mom who tries. And that’s the only kind of mom that matters. Don’t you ever forget.

Don’t let yourself fall into the comparison trap game. We are all SO different, and also so alike. I’ve been all of these moms, honestly. I haven’t loved every version of the mom I’ve been, but I can find goodness in each version.

I was the mom who climbed the ‘corporate ladder’, nodding my head along to Sheryl Sandberg’s messages while my husband stayed home by choice to spend time with our kids. At the end of this version of myself, I didn’t gain anything except for burnout and distance from my family. Imagine spending New Year’s Eve pregnant and at home on your laptop working, developing a SharePoint site for someone else? Did that, and no thanks.

I leaned in so hard I fell over. (P.S. I’m pretty sure I heard someone else say that first, probably on a Facebook meme somewhere, but it is so true). I started to crave a simple life. This version of motherhood actually helped us in making our decision to move from Minneapolis to Charleston. We wanted to move to the south, where time ticks a little more slowly. I’ve since quit said job and moved into entrepreneur mom, fueling a passion in photography I’ve had since I picked up my first ‘real’ camera in high school. This version gives me time to let ‘just mom’ creep in some days too. I’m good here.

It’s up to you to decide which mom version makes YOU, well you. Which version makes you happy? Which version makes you comfortable? Chase that version. Maybe you don’t need to chase anything at all.

At a time of resolutions, I challenge you to challenge yourself to block out all of the cliché’s and resolve to appreciate yourself in the very stage of your own motherhood walk. And pat yourself on the back, because you are amazing.

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