I am taking a stand...MOMMY GUILT BE GONE!

Other than the occasional white lie, (No Josh, I didn't realize I drank the last cold Mt Dew we had....) I'm not much of a liar. I also don't cheat, break the law, spit, sweat, or do anything else unpleasant.
 Okay, I curse...just a little :)  Point of this story is that I have not spent a whole lot of my life feeling guilty about anything.


Then...I had kids. I don't know what it is about growing a tiny human in your uterus that flips some magical guilt switch in your body, but I have felt guilty for more things in the last 3 years I have had kids than in the 26 years before that,  COMBINED.

Look at her, probably thinking about how if I loved her enough I would hold her
 instead of making her sit in this bumbo seat

Actually it started in utero. If you are like me, you probably spent the better part of 9 months trying to choke down your own vomit instead of taking any good meds for nausea, in fear of hurting your baby. Then once you go into labor, you go back and forth in your head about getting an epidural, because you don't want to "drug" your baby. Well people, much like a colonoscopy, some things are best done under twilight sedation. I would dare say coming through the birth canal warrants some good drugs. After that, there is the immediate breastfeeding dilemma. There were various nipple Nazis that made me feel like giving my child Similac for ONE night-time feeding was the equivalent of a bottle full of antifreeze. The list just goes on and on.

I think you may spend the rest of your life feeling guilty about something in reference to your kids. If you go back to work, you will feel like dog doo for leaving your 6 week old infant with a sitter, or worse (GASP!) a daycare! If you stay at home, you will likely feel guilty at some point that they have not had enough exposure to other kids. How about, on Saturdays when you are actually home,  and instead of spending every minute playing with them you do something horrific like watch an episode of Vampire Dairies on Netflix. I bet when your child thinks back on his or her childhood, you will certainly only be remembered as a TV watching vegetable that could have stood to lose about 10 pounds. (When I get home from work to be with my kids, I then feel guilty that I didn't find a way to go to the gym to help get rid of the aforementioned 10 pounds of fat on my a$$ and stomach- Thanks baby #2!)

For some reason I have this complex, if I am not at work, I feel like I need to be home with my kids. So from the minute I get off, I feel immediately guilty until I get home with them. So although it would be so much easier to leave Tripp at daycare for an extra 30 minutes while I grocery shop, I never do. I don't know why I think that the minute I leave work he knows I am off and just haven't came and got him yet. I have this awful visual where he spends every minute that I am "off work" and not at the daycare thinking about what a CRAPTASTIC unloving mother I am. The truth of the matter is that he is so busy playing at daycare that he probably wouldn't notice if I waited 2 hours after work to pick him up. Sometimes when I get there for Pete's sake, he is "not ready to leave!" I think, that's just great, because I have just ran over 4 pedestrians trying to get here because I thought you were probably looking out the window wishing for a mommy that loved you enough to pick you up  before 5:30.


I don't even want to talk about the guilt trip if you have to leave your baby overnight at some point. I have a friend that had to be readmitted to the hospital for a couple of nights postpartum because of high blood pressure and a wound infection,  and she is convinced that this has permanently scared her baby. I really hate it for her that she managed to screw up her kid in the first 3 days of being a parent. Oh well, maybe next time! I hope one of these days the baby doesn't remember that for 48 hours you needed IV antibiotics, because I am sure she will likely spend the rest of her life in counselling for "abandonment issues." (I'm talking to you Torey, love ya!) The real deal is that my friend is an awesome mom, and sweet baby Caroline got to spend a few nights with her Dad and Grandma that love and cherish her very much. She will never remember it!

Here a typical day for me.....
Go to Walmart....feel guilty because I should be spending time with my kids.
Stay home with them...feel guilty I did not go to Walmart and plan for more nutritious meals.
No food in the house...End up feeding them a smorgasbord of hostess donettes and Lays potato chips for supper. 
Kids don't learn to eat healthy.....feel guilty because its my job to give them nutritious food choices. Imagine all the trouble they are going to have finding clothes for obese individuals because of the poor eating habits I have managed to instill in them.
Decide to take a stand and ask 3 year old to eat two bites of sweet potatoes... ends up in a screaming match and 3 year old is sent to bed without supper.
Feel guilty because I know 3 year old is hungry.... end up letting him have a sleeve of chips ahoy cookies for a bedtime snack.
 Should have just gone to Walmart for an hour after work....INSTEAD, you just spent the last 4 hours on a trip down guilty lane.

Now does he look like he cares that its 5:15 and I haven't picked him up yet?

The truth of the matter is that you really don't have to feel guilty about not being with your kids 24/7. It takes a village to raise a child, and its good for them to have time away from you. Sometimes I have to remind myself that they need alone time with their Dad too. So,  maybe instead of feeling guilty for getting my hair cut on Saturday, I should treat it like an opportunity to let the kids bond with their Dad.
I also don't think they have the sense of time that we do as adults. Hell, most of them can't even tell time. Hours probably seem like minutes when you are playing with toys and crapping yourself at daycare.


So I propose that we all band together and make a vow to GET OVER THE MOMMY GUILT! No judgmental witchy super moms allowed up in here. We are all a species I like to call "human mommies."
We make mistakes, we need time alone, we make bad choices,  and we occasionally hide in a closet to eat a Little Debbie Cake so we don't have to share it with our kids.

My son wanted me to wear his noise cancelling headphones....I might have kept them on for awhile. Don't judge me!