As you all know by now I am a huge advocate for positive parenting and peaceful parenting. I am the parent that is constantly watching her tone, lowering myself down to Toren's level and trying to see it from his point of view. In fact, I am the parent that apologizes to her kid and even wrote a whole post detailing this. https://torensmama.wixsite.com/mysite/post/mama-is-sorry
The truth is though that underneath this peaceful exterior is an irritable angry person.
The truth is though that I am anything but soft. Just beneath the surface lies this angry, loud, dish breaking monster.
Now when I first had Toren I had no idea what kind of parent I would be I didn't subscribe to any particular parenting belief. I was just going to wing it and do what my parents did. That worked for them right?
At about the 6-week mark though, I could feel my anger getting a little worse. I was snappy and irritable at the smallest things. All of this anger at seemingly unimportant things simmered and simmered getting a little worse with each passing week.
Now you would expect that I would go back to trusty Google to find the root cause of all of this rage but nope. Not once had any mom or anything in the media made mention of angry moms so this was evidently not normal and I was too ashamed to talk about this publicly.
What if people thought I was a bad mom? Would someone come to take my baby away because I dared to feel something other than pure joy during this motherhood journey?
So I pushed it down, bottled it in till one day I totally snapped and ended up smashing a plate against the wall. No one was near me I was alone in the kitchen but I was frustrated that I was struggling to get everything done, frustrated that I was tired, frustrated that I had no one to talk to about all of this.
For as long as I could remember I had always wanted to be a mom and here I was living my dream life and yet I had moments of such rage.
When I finally did seek out help I was surprised to realise that so many moms go through this and everyone felt as ashamed as I did about it.
I have since learnt what my triggers are and and that most times my rage is intrinsically linked to my anxiety. I've now learnt how to take time out to recharge and regroup.
I've been pretty good at being a calm peaceful parent, and I was riding that smug train of calm. Then lockdown hit and guess who fell off the calm train?
You would think that by now knowing my triggers I would be able to sense that I'm burning the candle at both ends and it's about to get loud, but nope. Homegirl here was riding that wave of arrogance that comes with being that smug peaceful parent that when I snapped it caught me totally off guard.
So here I sit starting from scratch again to work on myself and my ability to control my emotions so I am a better human for Toren.
To all the parents struggling during this lockdown know that you aren't alone. Cut yourself some slack, life is crazy right now so lower your expectations.
If at the end of the day everyone is fed and they felt loved it was a good day, everything else is a bonus.
Before I end this I have to give a super huge shout out to Tony who has been such an amazing partner on this journey.
A messy house is one of my biggest triggers and he has taken on the task of ensuring that everything is put away and as tidy as possible.
Now, remember you are a good parent. God chose you to parent these babies so you've got this. So love those babies and take it easy.