5 Reasons It’s OK for Motherhood To Totally Suck Sometimes

Tantrums are a thing. The phase will not pass quickly. Siblings bicker, pinch, tickle, kick, spit, fight, tease, taunt, and tattle. Incessant whining can become a sport. Loudness happens. Privacy disappears. Parental alliances are divided. Toy shrapnel spewed across every horizontal surface in one’s domicile is in fact possible, and most likely inevitable. Pregnancy, labor and birth are not to be trifled with. Nursing is no walk in the park.  Diapers stink. A good night’s sleep? What the bleep is that. I forgot a decade or so ago. Pass the malbec.

Motherhood is tough, glamour-less, thankless and relentless. Resistance is futile. 

I’m sure I left a few mommy-hood nuggets out, that happens, we all like our own brand. But ya know what? IT’S OK, and here’s why:

1. We haven’t given up yet. We are still in the race. Though we may tack on a few miles dragging our feet, or crawling on our hands and bloodied-knees, we are still in it. Through tears, spit-up stained stretched out tee shirts, and gritted teeth, we buck up, carry on and get the job done. It may not always be Pinterest-Perfect, but we don’t throw in the towel. Give yourself a pat on the back sister. This sh!t aint for faint for the faint of heart.
2. We encourage, edify, and lift each other up when we humble ourselves long enough to bask in our ugly incompetencies with one another. Transparency, realness, authenticity. That’s the stuff friendships are built on. And in this world, we need all the girl-friends we can get. Commiserate with me, and I will commiserate with you. We are not complaining, we are acknowledging our humaneness and in doing so we persevere through this shared experience of motherhood together, no longer alienated by false assumptions of everyone-must-have-it-more-together-than-me crap.
3. We cultivate that very humility, (not humiliation, though that has been known to happen too), resiliency, self-confidence and independence in our children when we struggle. Let them see you strive. Let them see you question. Let them see you mourn. Let them see you pray. Let them see you fail. Let them see you recover. Let them see you overcome. They are watching anyway. And want to know a secret? They are impressed.
4. Wiping buts sucks. Poop stinks. It just does. Cloth, disposable, hybrid -or even all you elimination communication folk, we all can at least agree on and concede to the olfactory truth of the situation. But this too shall pass, just like each and every fleeting season of motherhood, it is in fact only temporary. One day we will morph into the graying grandmother at the grocery store beckoning us to enjoy it while it lasts. Mark my words. 
5. Perspective is a beautiful and horrifying thing: Someone always has it worse. I won’t list examples, well, maybe just one; I will admit that I have learned not to complain about the long hours my husband works to my two-year widowed best friend.  The grass may be greener to the left, but it is most likely brown and scorched to the right.

So mamas, it’s ok, and we’re in this together. It’s ok to wallow in the pit for a little while, but climb out, (And if you can’t climb out, I beseech you, PLEASE ask for help, I’ve been there too!), and don’t forget where you came from. Reach out a hand, (or a phone call), next time you think you see your play-group comrade slipping down the slope.

Give yourselves a pat on the back: you are lone-rangering a job of fifteen most days. You, we, I totally rock.