Mamas, Cut Yourself Some Slack

A darling little three year-old girl with curls in her hair and glittering shoes went running between two pews at the wedding rehearsal Friday night.


We'd been there for over an hour. She had already practiced her part as a flower girl three times and was getting tired, hungry, and bored.


My sil shook her head and said, "Everyone must think I'm the worst mom! I can't get her to sit still!"


We hear a lot about how we shouldn't judge each other as moms. That we never know what someone else is going through. That we could just be witnessing a really bad moment.


I'm all for that. Depending on when you see my boys, you could think that they are little angels or total demons. When the reality is that they are just your average little boys- they have their good, bad, ugly, and "average" moments.


I might even get up on my soapbox about not judging each other. I'm sure I've even done it on my blog. If I hadn't gotten in late last night after being out of town since Tuesday afternoon, I probably would even go searching for a link or two to prove this point. But, you'll just have to take my word for it that I am a firm believer in not judging.


Not judging others.


But, when it comes to my own kids, to my own parenting, oh, how I feel like a failure.


And judge myself for it.


For things that I would never judge your kids or you for.


Because I'm hard on myself.


At my brother's wedding reception Saturday night, Cub(2), was dancing his little heart out on the dance floor.


I stepped away for a minute to help my oldest at the cookie table, so that he did not eat his way through the whole thing.


Soon, another mom was carrying a sobbing Cub to me and told me that her son(7) had knocked him over and stepped on him on the dance floor.


She was very apologetic. And honestly, I probably wouldn't even think twice about this and wouldn't be blogging about it now if Cub hadn't been so upset that his sobbing turned into puking and he puked right down the front of my dress, forcing us to leave the reception.


But, aside from that.... I wasn't upset that Cub had been knocked over and stepped on. It was most likely an accident. All the kids were dancing together. Even if he was pushed on purpose- well, kids don't know the best way to deal with situations and so sometimes, things like that happen.


What I realized is that I didn't think badly about that child for what happened and I didn't think badly about his mom.


Really, if it hadn't been for the puking incident, this wouldn't even be in my mind at all.


But, if the situation were reversed and it had been my child who had knocked another one over and stepped on him...I would feel awful. I would have a hard time letting it go. Every time that I thought about my brother's wedding, I would cringe and think oh, that poor little one that my son hurt.


I'd feel like I'd done something wrong as a mom. That I'm a bad mom.


But.... if I don't think those things about that mom....shouldn't I cut myself some slack?


Shouldn't we all cut ourselves some slack?


We gave birth to little humans, not to little robots.


Don't get me wrong- I'm not saying that we should laugh off or brush off our children's inappropriate behavior. I believe that it should be dealt with. Absolutely.


And that we should be teaching and modeling appropriate behavior to our children.


I just hope that we can all remember that an incident here and there where our children aren't behaving the way that they should- it doesn't mean that we are bad moms.


Let's all cut each other AND ourselves some slack.