5 Reasons Bad Thoughts Don’t Make You Terrible Mom
Five Reasons… Just five? I can certainly list far more than that as to why having bad thoughts and making mistakes don’t make you a terrible mom.
5 Reasons Bad Thoughts and Mistakes Don’t Make You Terrible Mom
To be honest, this post is difficult for me. Not because I can’t think of ten reasons, but because our adopted child ran away as fast as she could do explore life with her biological father (her biological mother couldn’t care for her) and the other child, our baby, ascended to Heaven before her first birthday. So, though my Monkey has done her best to tell us that we were great parents, and I a great mom, my negative thinking is louder and more prominent than any other voice.
I’m going to push past that, or attempt to, because I need it and, perhaps, you do as well.
Five Reasons.
Here goes nothin’.
- You are human. Presumably, we all are except perhaps the bots that are scanning this post deciding if it’s worthy of making the top of search engines. Being human means we all have bad thoughts and make mistakes from time to time.
- Those mistakes will one day become something you recognize as part of the reason you are crushing it. I truly believe that how we ract to those moments when they are long past is what makes us better, because then we know how to handle the bigger things that come our way.
- Frustration is normal.
- It’s okay to cry, that doesn’t mean you don’t love your child.
- It’s quite possibly not your fault, hormones can do some crazy stuff with our moods. (Note: men or those who’ve not been through it because they were born that as biological females do not get to use, repeat or quote that. Period. -no pun intended-)
Five Reasons You Will Beat Those Bad Thoughts
- There is help available and it’s absolutely healthy to seek it out and utilize it.
- The fact that you feel even the slightest guilt over those thoughts is because they aren’t your true feelings.
- Whatever sparked those thoughts is temporary, the moment will pass and so will the overwhelming feelings (even if we do require help).
- Those thoughts are warning signs: take them as such and nothing more. Not warning signs that you are going to do something bad or whatever, warning signs that you need to get some rest and take a moment. And that, my friend, is perfectly normal and healthy.
- Brief, random thoughts do not make you or define you.
And the Mistakes….
Use them! Don’t let them go to waste. Learn from them because one day your beautiful baby will be an angst filled teen and you are going to need every lesson you could possibly learn to manage that mess.
Not only that, but you will run into a mother in a position very similar to where you are and they may need to hear that story and how you got through. Whether it be to inspire or just to make them smile.
You will, I promise, eventually appreciate some of those mistakes you made because they will have built you into a stronger, happier woman. Not just mother, but a person as a whole.
For Right Now…
Take a ‘you’ break. Even if it means you have to get up a little earlier than baby, call your bestie or whatever it takes to get away for a minute. That doesn’t make you a bad mom, but it may help you be a healthy, happy mom.
While my qualifications are not necessarily game changing, I do have plenty of crazy life experience that makes me who I am and is making me who I will be. But if that’s not enough, I highly recommend the book Good Moms Have Scary Thoughts for all moms, not just new moms.
I love the way it looks at moms, from a standpoint of real mothers. Not necessarily professionals, therapists, etc. While they do have their place, sometimes we just need some acceptance and understanding.
Good Moms Have Scary Thoughts says that over 90% of mothers have scary, intrusive thoughts about their baby and themselves. This fact does not at all surprise me. At all. The book encourages mothers and brings hope, compassion and much needed help. It even has 50 stigma busting cartoons that, I do believe, every mom can relate to at some point or another.
Whether your child is a day old or 20 years old, this book will help you through guidance, exercises and acceptance of our mental health. It may even get you past some of the guilt you hold on to from years past.
Kudos and gratitude goes out to author Karen Kleiman for bringing the darkness to light, the stigma to normalcy and acceptance to those of us who feel broken.
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My biggest lesson learned is that no matter how much I want to, I cannot make life perfect for my kids. By perfect, I mean free from hurting and free from illness.
That is so very true and so hard to accept sometimes.
I could use this book. I am in a season of my life that is tough with my children. I use to think it was tough when they were young. That is before I had teenagers!
I can totally relate! Parenting is hard at every stage, but teenagers thinking they know it all is in it’s own category for sure! I think watching my teen make mistakes and feeling totally helpless (because of course she wouldn’t listen) was the worst. Well, right up until those mistakes turned into her life and still I could do nothing. Except learn to grit my teeth!
I think this sounds like a really great read especially for someone who is always worried about mistakes. Thank you for sharing.
With grown up kids, I am still learning on better ways to be a mom. I had to deal with a lot with my son, who is now a dad himself, but one of the things I learned was to not stress over things that were unfortunately out of my control and get him the help he needed as a teen. It has made him a better young man now thankfully.
I absolutely love that! It’s hard to accept things that are our of our control, because we want so badly to protect them! The fact that you got him the help he needed makes you an amazing Momma in my book!
I am not a mom so I cannot say. I would give this to my friend who has 2 kiddos.
I’ve got eight kids and they are a lot of work. I am always doing something so I try to get a lot done when they are asleep.
Wow! What a household! I bet holidays and celebrations are amazing in your house! I love doing stuff when everyone is asleep, there’s something about the quiet and peace it brings knowing everyone is safe and we can just get our things done!
My kids did not make the mistakes I did by having severe depression 9/11 being my birthday and the loss if my mom 4 years ago from Stage 4 lung cancer hit me real hard , I had a nervous breakdown , needed mental health help right away.
Hugs my friend! It was certainly unfortunate for everyone whose birthdays and anniversaries were on September 11th for sure. I’m learning to look at the positives in all situations and having your life to celebrate on that day is most definitely a positive! I hope that the cancer is in remission and gone completely. I understand the Mom loss, I lost mine too shortly after we lost our first and only baby so I get the breakdown and need for mental health. Perhaps not in the exact same way, but in a ‘same but different’ sort of way. If you ever need to talk, please reach out to me. No judgement will be issued ever. I’d be honored to talk to ya, just shoot me a message!
I have often thought about how many times I would change the way I handled things when my son was younger.
I think that is both the beauty and curse of being able to look back. We see so clearly what we could have done differently, but the bottom line truth is that we couldn’t have done it differently as that’s the way it was meant to be. For me, that one is super hard to accept. As long as you are doing your best, you are doing a great job! Hugs Momma, you got this!
Unfortunately, kids don’t come with an instruction manual. It’s on-the-job training that is so worth it in the long run! Mistakes are how we learn.
Spoken like someone who knows! I absolutely agree!
Wow! I wish I had this with my two babies but I think it could help me even now. I had really bad ppd. 🙁
Even though I’m quite a ways past PP, I feel like I still carry guilt and frequently second guess things I did, thought and said. It’s probably more stress than I am due but just doesn’t go away. I am hoping to keep this space as a safe and healthy place to find peace and acceptance with ourselves. This place will always be a safe place for you to express yourself, as I don’t allow hateful things to be posted. Sending hugs, SisterFriend.