I like to dance naked.
This could have been a sweet whisper made by my four-year-old privately in the safety of our home.
Except it wasn’t. It was his cheerful declaration to a room full of people as my husband’s boss formally introduced us to the staff.
Lucky for me, my husband jumped in with a timely rebuttal of “He gets that from his Mom.” Lucky for him our couch is comfortable.
Cute, innocent moments make great stories.
Like the time I asked my toddler where his tic tac went before the closing prayer at church. To which he pointed to his teeny, tiny tic-tac shaped nostril. {sidenote: dissolving mint burns slightly}.
Or when my youngest blurted out to our neighbour, “Sometimes my mom beats me” – referring to board games, NOT wooden spoon discipline.
Or when I forgot to pack spare pants in the diaper bag and had to stuff my toddler’s legs into the arms of his winter coat so we didn’t have to leave the Mommy group early.
Or the time….that is likely about to happen today that I don’t even know about yet.
Failing can be funny.
Except when it isn’t.
What about the times we hope the earth will open up and swallow us whole because we are embarrassed, or worse, ashamed. Suddenly wins of the day vanish and failures whisper on repeat if we let them.
Raising tiny humans is hard. Being vulnerable is hard. Doing our best every minute of every day is hard. It’s not that we expected it to be easy, right? But maybe just not this hard?
So we draw hope from friends in the same stage. The ones we can shoot a knowing look as our little ones gear up for an epic mall freak out. Or the ones we call when our husbands accidentally eats the last cookie we had already promised to Little Bear. We huddle with those who really understand.
We embrace the fact that we are all frayed. And we try to breathe deeply, embracing frailty. We seek out hope.
Can this community rally together without criticism or critics? Can this be a place of hope where we learn from each other? I hope so. Because don’t we all need a place where we can be real about the hashtagmomfails? A place where parenting can feel less lonely?
This was my dream when I carved out this tiny corner of the online world. I wanted you to feel safe to share and I wanted to feel the same way. And since my topics tend to be encouraging and not controversial, I guess I naively didn’t see this coming.
This comment was recently posted here:
