Mom Life

In spite of my best efforts? I am that mom who yells. Maybe not as much as I used to but there are still times that it does happen. And at first, I’d thought it was just me. Or that maybe, I was a bad mom. Now, however, I’ve come to better understand myself and how my brain works. While I’m not entirely blaming my own mental health issues for my anger issues, I do know that they just make them that much worse. So it’s not just me- it’s my ADHD.  Well, really, it was my emotional regulation issues. But this isn’t new information. Maybe it was new to me, but the connection has long been there according to science and psychology.  And that…

We, as parents, aren’t perfect.  Let’s face it here: most of us, as human beings, aren’t perfect. It’s just a fact of life. We may have some perfectionist tendencies, but perfect? Nope.  It’s just not going to happen that way. And you know what? That’s okay. We don’t always need to be perfect, anyway. But, that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t strive to do better. That doesn’t mean that we can’t do better. Especially after those moments where haven’t done our best. Or maybe we’ve let our tempers get the best of us. Those times, and we all have them, that maybe we need to take a step back. That we need to be completely honest with ourselves. Those times that maybe, just maybe, we need…

Being  a mom is one of the most difficult but also one of the most rewarding things I’ve ever done. And it wasn’t until I became a mom that I truly started to appreciate my own mom. But, with all of the ups- also comes the down. That includes the stressful moments, the sleepless nights, the times I’ve lost my temper. And the times that I wasn’t exactly enjoying motherhood. But how could that be? Wasn’t I supposed to love being a mom? Wasn’t every moment supposed to be a good one? Wasn’t I supposed to feel guilty about wanting a break from my kids? It wasn’t until I was starting to reach the end of my patience with my kids that I realized the…

I can’t tell you the number of times that I’ve started to yell at my daughter– and the irony? It was to tell her to stop yelling. And yet, I know I’m not alone in this struggle. Often, we as parents, find ourselves yelling just to be heard. We think that our children aren’t listening. And because of that, we raise our voices. But there has to be a better way, right? Discipline doesn’t have to involve yelling.  Even if we, as parents, can’t think of a better solution.  How to discipline without yelling The best thing that we can do when our child is acting particularly defiant? It’s to keep ourselves calm.  Our attitude towards the situation, whether we realize it or not, has…