You’re Still Doing better than you think

By Emily Morrison

Years ago, I wrote a story called “You’re Doing Better Than You Think” about how overwhelmed I felt as a mother of three young children. I stayed home with each kid for their first year of life and traded off maternity leaves with my husband so the kids could spend most of their early years with people who weren’t paid to watch them.

Don’t get me wrong — the people we paid were also excellent, and generally better than us at child-rearing. 

The point is, we wanted our kiddos to feel well taken care of, and as sleep-deprived as we were, we still put them to bed with stories each night. On any given weekday, they didn’t watch more than a morning’s worth of PBS, and we always had a Friday night pizza, movie, and slumber party. 

Every. Friday. Night.

So why was I so hard on myself back then? Why did I feel like if I didn’t cut their carrots or the crusts off the sandwiches, I was a “bad mom”? 

Maybe because I saw so many other moms doing it better. Their kids had each food group colorfully represented in L.L.Bean lunch boxes (that our dogs kept eating). I felt like I couldn’t compete with all those Karens and Beckys and Susie homemaker types because I eventually had to go back to work full-time, and there wasn’t enough of me to go around. (No offense if your name is Karen, Becky, or Susie. I’m sure you’re good people.)

It took a while, but I eventually realized that I may not have done everything as, well, gracefully or organically as other super moms, but I did one thing right.

I loved the ever-loving snot out of my kids. And there was a lot of snot, trust me. They all had asthma growing up, and they caught every upper respiratory illness, ear infection, strep throat, norovirus, and mononucleosis kids could catch. 

But they also caught how much I loved them and never questioned how much I would do for them, if only I could stay awake and live another day while consuming copious amounts of coffee, chocolate, and occasionally, white zinfandel on the rocks. 

Now that they’re all college age — the oldest just started her first year of grad school and the youngest is in his first year of undergrad — I’ve spent a good deal of time anticipating the empty nest, but it isn’t empty yet. The oldest lives with us while commuting to grad school, and the other two still come home for all their breaks (and the dogs fill any void with their ever-present need for constant companionship and milkbones).

So, the moral of my story: stop comparing yourself to women you think are doing it better on social media or in your family, work, prayer, or whatever group you’re judging yourself by.

Everybody, and I mean everybody, struggles with something, and nobody has the right to judge you. As I grow into this middle-aged, perimenopausal woman and join the sisterhood of wise women who have gone before me into the empty-nest era, I’m realizing two things.

I come from a long line of women who don’t give up. They face adversity, take it on the chin, and still find a way to do their kids’ laundry (well into their 30s and 40s). 

Life isn’t about making everybody else think you’ve got it all handled over here — it’s about making sure the people around you know how much you love them, even at the expense of everything else (a clean house, a manicured lawn, outfits that match your nails and shoe color, etc.). 

And the second thing? It’s okay to worry about what comes next, when the kids are grown, the husband’s busy, and you’ve got the kind of time on your hands you only dreamed about back when you would have sacrificed your firstborn for a hot shower and time to shave both legs. 

Things will be ok. You’ll be sad, but you’ll also be so unbelievably happy that everybody made it out alright, especially you.