Guest post: When does it get easier?

by Sarah

I volunteered to do a guest post on The Young Mommy Life blog and I have been racking my brain for the last couple days to try and figure out what exactly I should write on.

I am far from an expert on anything to do with being a Mommy. At best I feel like I struggle day to day with being a Mom, a single mom at that.

Thank goodness I have a great support net around me and my little ones. I have two wonderful children – an 8-year-old boy (Lil Man) and a 4-year-old girl (Baby Girl). I am divorced from Lil Man’s father and Baby Girl’s father and I split when she was 6 months old.

There is not a day that goes by that I don’t feel like I could have done better. I could have spent more time, or done something different with my children. I feel guilt for not having their father’s in their life constantly, even though the splits weren’t 100% my fault, but I have moments where I think, “I should have tried harder/I should have stuck it out/ I should have just dealt with ____”

When I get the calls from the teachers saying Lil Man had a bad day, or text messages from the sitter to say Baby Girl beat up a little boy, I wonder where did I go wrong and what do I do now?

The longer that I am a mom, the more I realize I haven’t a clue on being a mom.

When I was in middle school we had the “Baby Think it Over.” It was a life-size infant doll that had a computer in it. The teacher could program the baby; we took it home for a weekend, took care of it and then brought it back to school on Monday morning. Then the teacher could get a read out from the computer and would be able to see if we took care of the doll or neglected it.

I loved having the doll and taking care of it. In fact when I got into high school we had the same program and I requested to have the baby for the entire Christmas break. Having the baby was easy. It cried. I fed it. That was it. Yeah, I missed a few minutes of sleep here and there, but overall, it was easy. Nothing like motherhood.

Motherhood has shown me that I don’t know anything. My kids act out, I reprimand then, and they still do wrong. I say the wrong things or do the wrong things, my kids see and imitate what I do, or worse, go and tell my mom and then I get a “talking to” by her. LOL.

There are so many nights that I just sit in the hallway outside of their rooms, crying, trying to figure out what am I supposed to do. Even the great support system that I have in my life, my parents, step-parents, friends, can’t answer those questions for me. They can give me their opinions on what I should, but in the end, it’s up to me. I am the mother. I am the one responsible.

All I can do is pray, and do the best that I can. Pray that I will be the mom God wants me to be. Pray for guidance on what is right and wrong. Pray for patience and wisdom to do right by my kids and still be a good mom and in the long run an even better friend.

I have learned in the past 8 years that being a mom is full of ups and downs, right and wrong, tons of mistakes but even more hugs, kisses and “I love you moms” and in the end that is what counts. The love between a mother and child.

Sarah’s a 28-year-old divorced Christian mom of an 8-year old boy and a 4-year- old little girl. She works full time, goes to school part time and she overthinks, over analyzes and over processes everything in her life. She blogs to keep her sanity at www.overthinkingmama.com. You can find her on Twitter and Facebook.