It’s easy to feel like a failure as a mother, especially when you haven’t been doing it long.
You lose your patience, you fail to recognize the signs of an oncoming illness, you realize your kid has their shoes on the wrong feet (and they have been all day). Piled together these situations, while innocent, can make even the most self-assured mom second-guess herself.
But what’s important is that you don’t dwell on your mistakes. Really. Chalk it up as a lesson learned and keep it moving.
As moms, we put a lot of pressure on ourselves to get it right. As young moms, we have double the pressure because we feel everyone is rooting for us to fail because we don’t know any better.
We may not have a mom we can talk to or a spouse who understands where we’re coming from. A lot of times we’re alone in our heads, keeping our doubts and regrets to ourselves.
But everyday you wake up and try to do what’s best for your child. Every single day. And occasionally, you will fall short. It happens. To EVERYONE.
You have to assure yourself that you are the best mother that YOU can be. Don’t aim for perfection, because it simply doesn’t exist.
Do you often go over situations in your mind, thinking of something you could have done differently? Do you second-guess yourself?
Oh yes, I do that from time to time – especially if I spoke sharply to Chase or didn’t have as much patience as I could have. I feel bad afterward (thinking about it once he is in bed), and hoping that I didn’t damage him “for life” or something.
This is a good post, because I’m sure many moms – young and old – can identify with this.
Oh, Tara, I’m so glad you posted this. As mothers, especially new first time around mothers, we do tend to beat ourselves up and overanalyze situations. I do it all the time. I’m not as bad about it now, because I understand that things don’t always work out the way I planned, and I know that I try my very best to do whats right. But my worst case of flogging myself over a mistake was definitely when my son was born. How was I supposed to know that cramps were actually labor pains? 2 hospitals told me there was nothing wrong with me. Several doctors told me to relax and drink some water. After my son was born, I was a mess. I waited til everyone left my room, my mom had followed the ambulance that took my little boy to a different hospital, my fiancee had gone home to get me some clothes, it was just me and my grandma in my hospital room. And I bawled. I cried, and I asked my grandma what I did wrong. Why did this happen? I had to have done something wrong, if my body couldn’t take care of my unborn son, how in the world could I be a good mother? Was I being punished because I didn’t know if I should keep my baby?
Looking back, I know I didn’t do anything wrong. But it didn’t stop me from feeling that way at the time. I was a mess. But I know better now. Another big one for me was after I brought my son home from the NICU, I could tell he was in a lot of pain. But I didn’t know why. No one else did either. Finally, a month later, at his first NICU follow up clinic visit, the RN was examining him and said “So, what are we doing about these hernias?” Uhh, excuse me? Hernias? What are you talking about? I know of no hernias. Turns out none of his 7 specialists ever noticed that he had bilateral inguenial hernias. That was what was causing him so much pain. And to top that off, the only pediatric surgeon in the area was on vacation for 2 months, and we couldn’t schedule a surgery until he came back. So my poor baby was in pain and I could do nothing but wait. I beat myself up for that, too, thinking I should have known, I should have pushed harder to find out the cause of his pain…but eventually I realized that I’m not a medical professional, I’ve never had a preemie before, and theres no way I could have known what to look for.
@Katie – Aww, I’m sorry you were beating yourself up over that. But I’m glad you have looked at the situation and realized the truth behind everything. Like you said, you are not a medical professional. You do not know everything that could go wrong in the human body. All you can do is work with what you know. And also, remember that you can’t beat yourself up for things you didn’t know at the time you made the decision. As time goes on, things changes and in retrospect you think a situation could have come out differently, but you didn’t know it at the time. So let those things go and move forward. There’s nothing to do but move forward.
@Tara – you are so right. Its important for all mothers to realize that we should make the best of every situation and don’t dwell on the “what ifs” and “could’ve beens”. I believe everything happens for a reason, and we just aren’t always aware of the reason at the time. But I believe everything is purposeful, and things work out the way they are meant to. We need to take care of ourselves during tough times, rather than beat ourselves up.
And I have some happy news! My cousin welcomed her first baby into the world at 3 am this morning. A healthy little boy named Tywan, who weighed 9 pounds 2 ounces cuddled happily with me this morning while my little boy was in preschool. Momma is doing good, even after a completely natural delivery
@Katie – Aww, what a chunky baby! I love it. I saw a newborn this past weekend and I wanted to eat it up!
So delicious!
I spent the entire first 6 months of my daughter’s life beating myself up about her heart condition. It HAD to be something I did when I was pregnant. Maybe I ate or drank something, slept wrong, thought wrong, something. My OB (God bless her) sat me down in her office and said to me that sometimes you can do everything right and still something can go wrong. What she needs is you to be present today.
@ Katie – OO he is a big’un! I love chunky babies (not to give birth to though, no)! I am having a serious case of baby fever these days. Not telling hubby however, he might have a heart attack.