Money Saving Mom®

In January, we celebrated my oldest daughter’s 10-year-old birthday and I’ve been thinking a lot about what I’ve learned in the last 10 years. I’ve also been contemplating what I wished I could go back and tell my then 23-year-old self.

There’s so much I could say. So much I’ve learned. So much I wish I’d done differently.

Before my first daughter was born, I went into motherhood thinking I knew a lot about parenting and caring for babies. In truth, I did have a lot more experience than many people: I’m the second of 7 children, I spent many hours and days while a teen babysitting for a number of large families of little children, and after my husband and I got married, I worked as a mother’s helper/nanny for three different families — all who had young children.

I had changed countless dirty diapers and soothed many a crying baby and child. I had helped potty-train. I had cared for sick kids. I had cleaned up throw up. I been spilled on, wet on, and spit-up on.

So I thought I was pretty well prepared and realistic. I didn’t expect motherhood be a walk in the park and fully expected that many days would be tiring and hard.

But the day Kathrynne was born and we brought her home from the birth center, all that former confidence grew legs and walked right out of my life.

I felt so scared. What if I don’t feed her enough? What if I don’t lay her down in bed right? How do I know if something’s wrong?

I felt alone — especially since I didn’t know any other young moms in our area. Am I the only one who feels this way? Do all the other moms know instinctively what to do?

And I felt overwhelmed. Am I ever going to get in a shower again before noon? Will I always feel this tired and worn done? HOW ON EARTH DO PEOPLE HAVE TWO KIDS??

If you’re a young mom right now, I want to tell you what I wished I could go back and tell myself when I was a brand-new mom:

1. You are not alone.

No matter how incompetent or unskilled you feel for this motherhood thing, I can promise, promise you that you are not alone. There are an army of other moms in the trenches with you. And none of us have it together.

Some of us may hide our struggles out of fear. Some of us may be more skilled in certain areas. Some of us may naturally have more energy or capacity.

But none of us have all our ducks in a neat and alphabetized row. We all have areas we fall short in. We all have times when we feel like we’re not doing a good enough job. We all have times when we struggle with “mom guilt”.

So, instead of trying to hide your struggles, be honest with those closest to you. Vulnerability breeds strong friendships like just about nothing else will.

2. You’ve got what it takes.

I know it doesn’t feel like you’ve got what it takes. You feel scared and unqualified. You’re overwhelmed.

Your heart is walking outside your body. You worry that you’re not doing enough. You wonder if you’re seriously messing up your child.

But I’m here to tell you: you’ve got what it takes. You can do this.

You were uniquely gifted and equipped by God to be your child’s mother. God doesn’t call the qualified; He qualifies those whom He calls.

Cry out to Him for the strength, the grace, the patience, and the energy to carry out this calling He’s given you. He will never, never, never leave you or forsake you. And His grace is always sufficient.

3. You won’t be this tired forever.

You’re tired of your child crying. You’re tired of waking over and over again in the night. You’re tired of doing the same things again and again.

You feel flabby and lethargic. You look in the mirror and barely recognize the woman staring back at you. You wonder if you’re ever going to be able to fit into your pre-pregnancy jeans. You wonder where all your energy went.

Trust me on this: you won’t be this tired for ever. Even though it feels like you’ll be waking up every two hours for the rest of your life and propping open your eyeballs with toothpicks to make it through the day, it won’t always be like this.

So don’t stress over tomorrow or two years from now. Get as much sleep as you, accept any offers of help, do whatever it takes to get some shut-eye. And just power through, knowing that there is light at the end of the tunnel — and it’s called kids who sleep through the night!

Also, please know that just because your 12-month-old doesn’t sleep through the night yet even though you’ve read all the books and tried all the tactics, you’re not a bad mom. You just have a child who struggles to sleep.

Don’t beat yourself up over it. Do the best you can, keep experimenting, and know that someday soon, your child is going to figure it out.

For now, just do what you need to do to make it through — even if not everyone thinks it’s the “right” thing. You are your child’s mother. Trust your gut.

4. You don’t have to do it perfectly.

Really, you don’t. Just stop trying already.

I know you feel like you don’t measure up to Sallie Sue who arrives early to church every Sunday morning looking like a model with her three kids under 4 all in hand-smocked outfits and intricate braids in their hair. I get it.

Maybe that’s what gives Sallie Sue great joy and fulfillment, but take a deep breath and know that it’s completely okay to walk to the beat of a different drum. You’re not Sallie Sue. You’re YOU. Be you — and embrace what’s best for you and your family.

You don’t need to apologize for it or explain it. Just be you, bravely.

5. You are going to work yourself out of a job.

Right now, it’s completely impossible for you to imagine not changing diapers, wiping bottoms, taking little people potty, not constantly hearing “Moooommmmy!”, not having to cut everyone’s food up, not having to buckle everyone in when you get into the car, not having to give baths, get everyone dressed, and help little people brush their teeth.

But there will come a day — and it will be sooner than you believe it will be — when you start working yourself out of a job. When those little people get a little bit bigger and they start learning how to do things for themselves.

It’s a S-L-O-W process, but looking back, it seems to happen in the blink of an eye. And all of a sudden you wake up one day and your oldest is 10 years old and she’s taking over the family’s laundry, helping with the cooking, cleaning bathrooms, and asking what else she can do to help you.

That day is coming. When it does, all these years of doing what seems like the same thing over and over again will pay off… and you’ll realize that those little people are turning into capable adults who are contributing to the family in significant ways.

In ten years from now, you’re going to look back a deeply fulfilling and happy feeling knowing that all that hard work, sleepless nights, and exhaustion was worth it.

So, as much as you might want to some days, don’t give up! The best is yet to come!

This post was inspired by my friend Beth’s post: Dear Mom in the Tunnel

Those of you who know me well know that I am a person of strong passion and conviction. I am fiercely loyal, intensely focused, and highly opinionated.

If you’re a newer reader here, you’ve probably not seen this side of me as much as those who know me well have seen it. I’ve learned, from numerous mistakes, that there are many things that are better left unsaid online.

We have a very diverse group of readers here and I don’t feel like my calling is to stir up debate and controversy. Instead, I want to encourage, inspire, and challenge you to live lives of intention and purpose.

So most of my strong words and passionate beliefs are reserved for conversations with those I know best. However, every once in awhile, I just cannot hold back… and today is one of those days.

I hadn’t planned to blog about the whole 50 Shades debate. It’s long been swirling and, with the movie releasing this week, it’s escalating to epic proportions. While I believe that some debate and intense conversations can be healthy and helpful, much of the debate has seemed to be polarizing and divisive. In my (yup, strong!) opinion, conversations that only serve to create an “us” versus “them” mindset don’t foster anything worthwhile.

As a result, I’ve skipped over blog posts and Facebook posts on the subject and kept silent on the topic. We don’t need any more division in our ranks than it seems we already have.

But after this morning, I can keep silent no longer.

You see, Silas (my 5-year-old) had finished most of his Daily List and was getting ready to watch a YouTube LeapFrog video on my phone. I’d picked one out for him, clicked on it, and then was sitting next to him fixing one of the girl’s hair while he started to watch it.

As soon as it began playing, I knew something was seriously wrong. He flipped the phone over face down and acted very surprised. I could tell that the sounds coming from the phone weren’t LeapFrog sounds at all.

I quickly took the phone away to see what it was and was AGHAST to realize that it was a 50 Shades of Grey commercial playing!!! Yes, it was playing before a kid’s educational movie clip on YouTube. For real!

To say I was upset and frustrated was an understatement. So was my husband.

I know that YouTube is not completely safe no matter how many controls we put on it. I get that. And that’s why we’re careful to keep close tabs on what our kids are watching when they do watch YouTube clips.

But seriously? Surely YouTube could at least have the decency to ban commercials for R-rated movies from kid’s channels!!

It was a stark reminder to me that no matter how careful I am as a parent, my children are going to be exposed to things that I wish they wouldn’t be exposed to. I cannot completely bubble wrap their lives from things I feel are objectionable and unhealthy for them to be filling their minds with.

What Can We Do?

As I thought about this more over the course of the day, I realized that while it’s our job as parents to nurture our children, protect their little minds, and instill good values in them, there are ways we can take this a step further.

Instead of just being on the defensive and reacting to the bad attitudes, poor examples, and objectionable things they are exposed to, let’s become offensive and start being proactive about raising our children to be upstanding adults of strong character.

Here are 4 ways we can be on the offensive in our home:

1. We Can Provide Wholesome Role Models for Our Children

It has been well said that you become like the three people you’re closest to.

In the books we read to our kids, the media we watch as a family, the friends our children spend the most time with, and the teachers and coaches they have, we are seeking to have our children regularly rub shoulders with many wise mentors and models.

2. We Can Surround Our Children With Beauty & Purity

We want our kids to appreciate beauty and purity on a deep level, so we are encouraging them to read and listen to good books, develop a love of hymns and classical music, try their hand at drawing and painting, study historical men and women of character, and love the beauty of nature.

3. We Can Fight For Our Marriage

A strong marriage takes enormous amounts of work, but it’s so worth fighting for. We’ve committed to do our best to prioritize our marriage over our kids, spend intentional time each week investing our marriage, constantly look for things to praise and express gratitude for in each other, and work hard to have honest communication between the two of us.*

4. We Can Teach Our Children to Be Critical Thinkers

We don’t want our children to blindly follow our beliefs or the beliefs of others. From the time they were little, we have asked them deep, open-ended questions on a variety of subjects (we let them answer and then we often follow up with, “Why do you believe that?”), encouraged them to question what they hear and make sure it’s valid, and to never accept anything at face value.

How are you promoting beauty, wholesomeness, and a strong marriage in your home?

Note: This is a sensitive topic and one that could be highly controversial. By writing this post, I am not seeking to open a Pandora’s box of debate on whether or not you should read or watch 50 Shades. Because of this, comments of that nature will be deleted. Instead, I’d love to hear you chime on what you’re doing to promote beauty, wholesomeness, and a strong marriage in your own life and in the lives of your children.

*Update: Please note that section on marriage in this post was written for couples who are in healthy relationships where both parties love each other and want to work on issues together and personally. If your spouse is abusive, please, please, please don’t hide the abuse out of fear or let your spouse convince you it’s your fault. Get help immediately.