Thriving and Not Just Surviving

There are times when I reach the end of my day and don’t know when I lost control of it all. When did it slip away from me? At what point in my day did the wave come up over my head and throw me into survival mode? I want to thrive in my role as a mom, not just spend my time surviving and throwing out shriveled-up parts of me to appease my family and meet their needs. I want them to always get the best part of me. That may be a lofty goal, but I think it’s OK to strive for something that seems out of reach.

We are bombarded with the image of today’s modern mom: messy bun, yoga pants, caffeine all day, wine glass all night. You’ve seen it. We’ve all lived it. And it’s not inaccurate. After all, I am tired. But mostly I’m tired of having to just survive. What does it look like to thrive as a mom? Show me that image. What does it really look like to thrive in our present stage? I don’t want to wait until my kids are grown before I look like that. 

That image—of a messy-bun-wearing, yoga pants-wearing, overly caffeinated mom—has come to represent a mom whose life just happened to her. We raise our coffee mugs or wine glasses to her in solidarity because we know what it’s like. She is tired. She gets to the end of her day and can’t give any more. She is done with putting her stubborn kid back to bed 200 times in an hour. She feels like a bad friend for not being able to give her dear girlfriends her time and attention. She tells herself that if she could only have a housekeeper come sometimes, it would help her stay on top of things. She is frustrated by how much she yells. She’s over the teenage attitudes and/or the toddler tantrums. She simply needs more than a three-hour stretch of sleep to feel normal. 

Frustration is so near each day, regardless of how great your start to the day was. Anger is a close frenemy. Most of us feel like we had our hands full before kids. Then as we stepped into adulthood (read: real responsibilities), we let go of things that we could control and picked up wild cards (read: kids). So now we’re left holding a tight grip on mothering and a loose grip on our sanity.

Were you thriving before your kids arrived? Do you feel like you’re surviving the season? I want to feel like I owned this season even if it was completely run by my kids and their needs. I want to look back and say that it felt good to be there and that I enjoyed the madness of having so many little kids at once. I don’t want to look back and remember it as a time when I succumbed to chaos and lost myself in it.

Can we find ourselves in motherhood? One place my brain often takes me is where I will be when my kids are all school-aged, or in college, or just starting out after graduating. I escape my reality to be somewhere I’m not supposed to be at the moment: a future time and place in which I think I will be thriving. I’m cheating my present-day self by not giving myself a chance to thrive. But HOW do I get there?!

I’m figuring that out. I’ve learned that self-care is important and easier said than done. Self-care is not escaping to my phone while with my children. It is setting aside time where I can go and be. Getting outside of our own world, whether it’s by doing something for someone else or just stepping outside of our normal routine, often brings perspective. Reflection on the details of the day can show us our high points and low points. I think this also helps us set goals. Goal setting is not something I ever considered for mothering, but if we do it for all other areas of life, why shouldn’t we set goals as mothers? What can it look like? If we can’t picture what it means for us to thrive in our role as mothers, we won’t ever realize it when it’s happening. Thriving isn’t perfection. Maybe it’s different for every mother. For me, personally? I just want to reflect on my day and not feel overwhelmed by it or like it completely ruled my emotions.

In other situations apart from parenthood, when I’m dealing with something stressful, I try to envision the worst and most aggravating thing that could possibly happen and how I would respond. When I apply this strategy to motherhood, it almost takes the surprise out of public meltdowns, a day of bad attitudes, or a full schedule thrown off by an out-of-the-ordinary event. Then I look back and ask myself, How did I do? What could I do better next time?

Maybe one day you’ll catch me actually smiling through the chaos. For now, I’m trying hard to reach the end of those chaotic days without feeling lke life happened to me and I just barely survived it.

Maria
I was born in Mexico, which means I’m obsessed with the culture and carry it with me, and raised in San Antonio, which means I love longhorns, ranches, and the Spurs. I used to think that I was made up of contradictions—I mean, who majors in art and then switches to accounting? Or who loves to get lost in intricate painting details for hours, and yet has four kids in four-and-a-half years? So, it’s a fun, wild, chaotic journey my husband, four kids, and one dog are on, but we’re learning to soak it in, especially when the “it” is mud in our backyard.