mother of the year

Being a mom is effin hard. I could go on for a solid 20 minutes of all the pieces of motherhood that are difficult. But no one wants to read a 20 -minute blog post. Plus, I don’t need to hash out the challenges. If you’re a mom, you know. If you’re not a mom, be glad. Lol, just kidding….kinda.

One extra special thing that’s hard about being a mom is admitting when you’ve failed. Not full blown “you’ve raised a serial killer” kind of fail. I don’t know how I would grapple with that outcome of my parenting skills. No, I’m talking about those times when you simply made a mistake and know it in your heart. Social media is so overrun with perfection, parenting tips, and Pinterest boards that our feelings of aloneness when we mess up or don’t live up to the expectations of society can be heavy.

We all KNOW that we all mess up, but so many of us try to emulate the “perfect” lives we see on social media. Because even though we KNOW perfection isn’t attainable, that’s what we put in front of our eyeballs every day. People don’t typically share their mistakes or shortfalls – when their kid has a meltdown and the mom screamed instead of comforted, when you burn dinner and your kids have to soak the chicken in ranch dressing so they don’t choke on their meal, and so on. We don’t normally see that realness online.

We see the highlight reel or the filtered life.

Surrounding yourself in positive messaging is great, don’t get me wrong. But positivity doesn’t equal perfection. Positivity is overcoming your mistakes and learning. Taking your shortfalls and growing instead of falling and giving up.

Let’s stop. Let’s be real. There is comfort and camaraderie in sharing the failures and imperfections- along with the successes, of course. But let there be balance. I know I feel better hearing how other moms make mistakes. That I’m not alone in failing sometimes, even though I’m a damn great mom.

Mother of the Year

After thinking about how we all have struggles and moments where we just #failed as a parent, I decided to officially adopt the acronym MOTY (Mother of the Year) to share these moments as a mom when I stumble. The moments where I could have done better, and I know it. I’ve shared these stories in the past, throughout various blog posts and on Facebook/Instagram. But branding it MOTY makes it more official and maybe it will start a movement. To share our failings so that others know they aren’t alone on this ride called parenting.

MOTY can be times when your kid gets hurt, and you were checking your phone instead of gluing your eyes on their every movement. Or MOTY could be when you forgot to buy teacher gifts for the holidays, so you took something off your shelf and tossed it in a gift bag. (I haven’t done that…but I’ve thought about it!) MOTY is when you “fail” as a parent. But make sure you dust yourself off and keep moving forward. Failing doesn’t equal bad parent. It equals realness.

My Mother of the Year Moments

To start, I am sharing the highlight reel of my Mother of the Year moments. These aren’t all of them…this post would be a book, but they are some of the bigger ones. Not all MOTY moments must be this big.

I’m a good mom, I tell myself this. Still these MOTY moments are hard to share.

MOTY Evie – I had the diaper bag on the floor as we were getting ready to leave for soccer. She got into the hand sanitizer gel and ate some of it. I realized this a minute or so after the fact (she was quiet…I was filling water bottles and nagging Scarlett to hurry). When I peeked to check on her, I freaked out and my adrenaline immediately kicked in. I scooped her up, consulted Dr. Google then called Poison Control, and tried to remain calm. The lady from Poison Control didn’t seem worried, which was reassuring. I gave Evie some orange juice and kept an eye out for her to act drunk. She was fine…but I felt awful. I shouldn’t have left the bag on the floor. 

Lesson learned –  don’t leave diaper bag on floor. If child has the possibility of getting ahold of something dangerous, make sure I am watching.

MOTY Scarlett – I shared the story before about the time she choked on a toy when I was distracted. But I have a more recent moment I can share. Last week, Scarlett asked me if she could watch Squid Games. I’ve never seen it, so she pulled the show up on Netflix and I read the summary, watched the trailer, and noted the TV rating (MA). I was a little leary, but she has seen some MA shows before. The summary Netflix provided just made it seem like it was violence. Still unsure, I said go ahead. I loosely watched the first episode with her and, while it was a lot of killing, it didn’t alarm me. The storyline was interesting too. So, she watched a handful of episodes. 

Turns out this show, along with a healthy dose of violence, also has sex and suicide. Not that sex is bad, but my kid doesn’t need to be seeing that just yet. Luckily, she fast forwarded through that part. Honestly don’t know why I let Scar watch it. Normally I research things more before I say yes, but for some reason this time I didn’t. Maybe it was because Vince was away and it was just me with the kids? Maybe I was more strained and just wanted to say yes to avoid conflict? Squid Games isn’t a show for kids. Vince was livid I let her watch it, and I’m not proud of the choice. Definitely a mother of the year moment.

Lesson learned – always research a show before you say yes. Don’t rely on a summary or past experiences with a TV Rating to make your choice. 

MOTY Gianna – For some reason my Gianna’s moments aren’t that many. Did I peak at being a mom with her? Was it because she was an only child during her early years that I didn’t fail as much then? Or is it because this was eons ago, and I don’t have the best memory? 

Likely all the above.

The one moment for me that always stands out was when G was an infant. I would nurse her to sleep, lay her in her car seat (unstrapped), carry the car seat to her bedroom, and put the seat in her crib. She didn’t like sleeping in open spaces –none of my kids did for that matter – so she slept in her seat at night. This was before research came out that sleeping in car seats was dangerous.

Well, one night I put her in her seat, went to pick up the seat to move her to her room, and I lost my grip. She rolled out of the seat and dropped onto the hardwood floor. I can still hear that noise in my head. I’m sick just writing about it.

I can’t remember who called 911 that night. But they said she should be fine. It was a short enough fall and baby’s heads are rather bounceable (not their words) that there shouldn’t be any negative effects. They were right. We do joke occasionally when Gianna has brain fart moments that it was because I dropped her on her head. We can joke about pretty much anything. Not that I find the fact that I dropped my child on her head funny. I remember that moment like it was yesterday and am I sick thinking about what could have happened. How this situation could have turned out drastically different. How blessed I am that she is fine. 

Lesson learned – take your time, make sure you have a firm hold on your kid in all situations where there is a possibility of getting hurt.

Don’t Be Afraid to Be Real

My mistakes are numerous and always growing, but every day I wake up and try the best I can to be the best mom for my girls. I don’t always succeed in the seconds of my day. They get hurt when I’m not fully present. They yell at me out of frustration and stress, and I yell back instead of breathing and being the calm adult. I let them have too much screen time because it means quiet time for me. I choose to work on my computer instead of disconnecting and making a point to spend 1-1 time with my girls.

Being an imperfect parent is not something I am “proud” of. I’m not sharing this because I think it’s good that I made these mistakes. I think it’s REAL that I made them. I know many of you out there are the same way. Sharing these moments hopefully makes you feel less alone. But let’s not beat ourselves up about them. Try to find the lesson and learn from those mistakes. I’m going to try and take my own advice and do the same.