This One's For All The Moms Struggling To Keep It Together
You are strong. You are Mom.
By Lauren Levy
As a mother herself, Mia Carella knows the struggle, uncertainty, anxiety, and turmoil that many parents are dealing with daily. But she also has an unexpected message to other women going through it:
To the Mom Struggling to Hold Her Sh*t Together,
I have something important to tell you, mama: I don't see you.
Now, don't stop reading just yet. Please hear me out. It's true I don't see you, but I know what you are going through.
I know that these days you are almost always exhausted and fueled by caffeine and anxiety ... I know that more than once a day you scream on the inside, "There's only one of me!" I know you feel deep mommy love, as well as deep mommy guilt, for not being the person you think you should be.
Mia is personally familiar with the days when you just want to run away but instead escape to the grocery store and stay in the car a bit longer than necessary just to savor the alone time. Mia is also aware of the endless to-do lists that stack up while you're trying to raise tiny humans, which can leave you feeling overwhelmed, disorganized, and even flawed.
"I know the weight of responsibility sometimes feels so heavy you can barely move," she wrote in a post on Scary Mommy. "I know you worry that you are not patient enough, present enough, fun enough, or even enough at all. I know all these things because I feel them too. I don't see you, but I am you."
However, just because Mia knows the internal chaos doesn't mean she sees others going through the same thing, because those struggling to hold their sh*t together work so hard not to let it show:
Like me, you wear a brave mask. You smile to hide your stress, even on the bad days. You get up every day, put yourself together, and do what needs to be done. You are strong. You are Mom.
No, I do not see you struggling, mama. In fact, it is quite likely that the only one who sees what you view as your "weaknesses" is you …
Please remember this the next time you feel like the only hot mess mom at the playground. It may not be obvious by looking around because we all wear our own masks, but you're not the only one who feels like they're dropping the ball in one way or another. It is OK. That is why we have each other. And wine. Or chocolate. You choose.
You got this, mama. Give yourself a break. Having our sh*t together all the time is overrated anyway.
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