You are not alone in this battle. I am in the trenches with you. Fight on, baby mama, fight on.

I had a bad parenting moment the other day at Costco. Let's be honest, who doesn't have a bad parenting day at Costco with small children? For a child, that place is like Disneyland crack without ride lines, height restrictions or $20 burgers. This one visit, though, where I may have temporarily "misplaced" one of my 4 kids in the parking lot, reminded me of the pressures we feel as parents to be more than who we are, to be better than the sleep deprivation and round-the-clock triage we call parenting will allow. Every time I leave the general safety of my house with my kids,  I fear the fishbowl status my herd commands. We are on display for an often unforgiving and judgmental society. 

I have sought commraderie from other mothers who I would hope could share in my less-than-perfect parenting adventures, but, mothers, I have learned, can be like a pack of wolves. We are at our strongest when we stand together, but are often prone to bouts of inter-squabbling and "fur-biting"as we draw comparisons between our lives and that of others. 

I once traveled alone on plane behind a woman I had too often been: short-fused with her posse of young, inattentive children. Her middle child was asking to watch a show on the iphone, but because she'd just hit her younger brother in anger, was being denied access. She was screaming her frustration and while it would've been easy for Mom to give in, hand her the phone and pacify a plane full of annoyed, "it's going to be one of those flights" strangers, she stuck to her guns and refused the child's escalating pleas. 

As a mom to 4 vocal kids, those noises are easy for me to tune out. They are white noise and, to be fair, I was probably working on my 2nd Bloody Mary of the flight. I don't get to travel alone often. I did tune in to the commotion, though, when the guy next to me said "some people should never have children." Matt Walsh said it best in a recent blog, "parenting is the easiest thing to have an opinion about, but the hardest thing to do." Parenting will strip you raw. It's like that dream you had in High School about walking the hallways naked. That's what parenting makes you feel like every day: vulnerable and exposed. And nobody knows how to target that soft underbelly like your own children. So, we need a line of defense. We need each other as parents, as Moms to stand together against those who would judge us harshly. One of my favorite quotes from Katrina Kenison's book, The Gift of an Ordinary Day, is this:

"One of the greatest challenges I've faced as a mother-especially in these anxious, winner-takes-all times-is the need to resist the urge to accept someone else's definition of success and to try to figure out, instead, what really is best for my own children, what unique combination of structure and freedom, nurturing and challenge, education and exploration, each of them needs in order to grow and bloom.”

We are taught to re-enforce good behavior in our children. As parents, we should also re-enforce it in each other...especially when well-intentioned parenting brings on the most difficult of public moments. That Mom on the plane could've caved. She could've quietly handed the phone to the child to make the screaming stop. I probably would have. In fact, I know I have. But she was stronger than I and she could've used a show of solidarity, a fist pump for her strength of character in the face of extreme social pressure to make the problem go away. So, I leaned over the back of her chair and said "You are not alone in this battle. I am in the trenches with you. Fight on, baby mama, fight on."

Parent Ed speech

I have missed writing about my parenting exploits. As busy as this last year has been, the closest I've gotten to putting pen to paper about parenting was for a speech I was asked to give this morning.

 I have been involved in a Parent Education program for over 7 years with my 4 children. They asked me to speak briefly to the church congregation with whom the program is associated about my experience in Parent Ed:

The last time someone asked me to speak into a microphone, it was to officiate at my sister’s wedding. When the vows were said and I had to relinquish the mic, it was harder than I expected. It was the only time my voice carried louder than that of my children’s. So, if I get carried  away, you have been warned.

Long before I started picking up the occasional wedding gig, though, my last big speech in front of a group this size was in college.  It was for a public speaking class and I was emphatically discussing  the increasing cost of living in New York, an irony not lost on me considering I knew even less about the cost of living as an NYU student than I do now about both marriage and parenting combined.  What I did know in college, what I’m sure every cocky college student claims to know, was how I would one day parent my unborn children. I had it all figured out.  Grocery store shopping with whining kids: Easy. They’d never whine because I’d be that good at saying “no”. Long car rides with the inevitable “Are we there yet’s?” Impossible. I’d be too cool a Mom to ever let them get bored.  The coup de grace: Plane rides with screaming kids. No problem. A stack of attention-diverting books and magazines would always be at the ready.

Fast forward some or many years and I’m that mother with the whining child in the grocery store, the one in the car answering the redundant question about when we’re going to get there and the one on the plane sifting through the useless pile of books and magazines to appease the screaming child. If you've ever taken a 5-hour plane ride with 4 kids under the age of 6, you understand what I mean when I say integrity is off the table and no bribe is too small.

It turns out I know far less about a lot of things now than I used to in college and my cockiness has long since been replaced by humility. Survival is my watchword these days and since parenting doesn't come with a manual, I rely on a network of "been there, done that or going through it “ mentors. The most vital of which are my Parent Ed teachers. I have been a parent for over 7 years and in the Parent Ed program with all 4 of my children for just as long. Never have my parenting questions or concerns been better understood or accepted than here.

You know that plane ride I took with 4 kids? On our descent into Boston, my 3 year-old awoke from a nap cut short by painful eardrum pressure. She screamed for the entire 20-minute descent. 1,000’s of bribes and 100’s of threats into her hysterics, I remembered something a Parent Ed teacher told me about how anxious children can be reassured by a simple touch. So, I leaned over and held her. I said nothing. I just held her. I don’t remember landing, but I do remember that after she’d stopped crying, I was still holding her, rocking back and forth, and she was patting my back and saying "It's okay, Mommy. It's over.”  

 When I told my LCPC class that story, I expected an outpouring of support and sympathy. And there was some of that, but what I heard the most was, "Tell me about it. I remember the time I took the kids to Disneyland…” or “Reminds me of Christmas with kids at the mall."

For over 7 years, the message from Parent Ed has been the same. No matter how many times I think I get it wrong more than I get it right, it doesn’t matter. I’m not alone. My stories, my questions, my concerns are felt and are or have been shared by every parent in the program. To this day, when I see my wonderful LCPC teachers out and about, they still say "if you need to talk, I'm happy to lend an ear.” And what I say to them is "Thank you. I will always remember that."  And I will. I will always remember their support. What they don’t know I'm thinking is, "Give me a second to tell Trader Joes my kids will work for free and I’ll meet you at Starbucks in 10.”

The Parent Ed program has been a huge resource for my family and one without which I couldn’t be raising my kids sanely. I hope, if you haven’t already taken advantage of this wonderful program, you will or, at the very least, take pity on that poor, frazzled Boston-bound Mom and tell her about it.