These are my confessions…

Confession time… I write this not for pity or to ignite anger that you take out on the comment section, just to round out the experience of motherhood that I share here. So, my confession. . . I don’t know if I’m a great mom. Every mother has guilt and I am not immune. I come on here and write strategies that work for us in our family affected by ASD. I try to be positive and not make it a blog of my whining, but I struggle with more than I say – I think we all do. Most of the time in daily life with my kids, I am overwhelmed. I am auditorily overwhelmed by their incessant question asking (what are we doing? What’s for supper? When can I have screens?), their fighting (she wrecked my lego! My brudda is boddering me! STOP IT!) and their demands (Mama, milk! Mama, fix my shirt! Don’t help me! Help me right now!) I am physically overwhelmed by constantly sharing space with a 4 and a 6 year old and all their books and toys as well as by their energetic bodies pulling at me, climbing on me, and running into me. I am mentally overwhelmed by my ongoing to-do list of tasks that need to be done to care for my family – groceries, cooking, laundry, mending, dishes, school drop-off/pick-up, after-school activities, on and on and repeat. I am left exhausted and anxious, not knowing what to do, so often I do nothing. I put on Netflix for the kids and I avoid them and my tasks and myself. I play silly games on my phone and read celebrity gossip instead of spending quality time with my kids. I was thinking back on 2018 with sadness knowing I have been in survival mode most of the time and not been the parent I want to be. I don’t blame myself for that as life has thrown a fair number of curve balls our way and survival is important. But it’s a new year and with each new day I can make the choice to move closer to the mom I want to be – someone who has fun with her kids, who knows her kids well, who’s kids trust and take comfort in her. That is the great thing about new days, weeks, years – we have a chance to try again, to do better.