The Real Mama
This post is created in collaboration in Pampers. Happy Mother’s Day, no matter what kind of mama you are
Does anyone else feel a little bit like a fraud on Mother’s Day?
I still feel about 17, so it’s crazy to me that not only do I have a baby but that I have FOUR babies (when I call Star my baby, she sternly corrects me, “No, my name is ‘Big Girl.’”).
I remember leaving my girls with my parents a few years ago while I went to a conference with my girls sobbing when I left and my first thought was, “Are you girls crazy? Don’t you know these guys actually know how to be parents and I’m just making it up as I go along?”
But along the way, over the past seven years, there have been moments that made me feel like a “real” mom.
When one of my girls wakes up in the night, crying, and they want ME to rock them back to sleep.
When I packed my first lunchbox for my kindergartener last year (and then immediately ran out of lunch ideas by the third day of school).
When I fold piles of laundry on Monday night while I watch Netflix.
When we go for a walk around the neighborhood and one of my little girls reaches up to hold my hand.
When Ella wants to tell me in detail about the book she’s reading, just like I used to do to my parents.
When one of my children gets sick in the night and my first thought is concern for them, rather than how I have to clean out a crib at 2 a.m. (that, obviously, is my second thought).
In the past few months, I’ve thought this several times as I quietly walked around my dark bedroom with a baby who just couldn’t quite fall asleep yet.
Because no matter how much I still feel like a teenager inside, my little girls see me as a real mom.
We’re all real moms, whether you’re pregnant with your first baby or sending your youngest off to college.
I love this sweet video from Pampers, celebrating every mom on Mother’s Day and reaching them at a time when we’re just doing what us moms do.
Happy Mother’s Day to all the real mamas.
As a single 31-year-old girl (I still say girl because I feel like a fraud to even say I’m a woman. Is that insane? Immature?) who has no kids, it gives me a little comfort to hear that a mom of four can feel like a teenager because I clearly still think I’m a teen. Happy Mother’s Day!
That’s crazy- I’m not a mom yet but I imagine I’ll feel the same way about it when I am one. Like “what am I doing here, I’m still just a kid?” I feel that way about being a married, too. My husband and I will sometimes look at each other and be like “wait are we really married?!” And there’s definitely a lot of trying to act like we know what we’re doing but really we have no clue… that’s life’s I guess. Great Mother’s Day post.