Imperfect Motherhood

The other day I was talking with an acquaintance who has three children.  We both homeschool our kids, so we were talking shop.  She looked around at my five kids and asked, "How do you do it all?" 

My reply was pretty quick.  "I don't do it all."  She literally shook her head and gave me one of those disgusted sounds.  She was not happy with my answer. 

Another day, I was chatting with a new friend at Starbucks about schoolish things.  She was struggling to find the right curriculum combination.  Her oldest is the same age as my oldest.  After she finished her tale, I filled her in on my own quest for Ben.  Poor guy.  I constantly apologize to him for having to be the oldest - the guinea pig.  When I finished, I learned very quickly that she had called the meeting at Starbucks because she thought I was going to give her the equation she needed in her struggle.  When I finished talking she said, "Well.  You're in the same situation I am.  You don't know either!"

It's strange.  There's the crowd out there who thinks I'm completely insane because Darin and I have five kids.  They shake their heads at me and wonder how I could ever have time to love all my kids equally.  Then there's the crowd who thinks that just because I've given birth five times, that I have all the answers to parenting, marriage and homeschooling.  I break these ladies' hearts all the time because just like them, I learn as I go, yet they think that I have some magic formula that will make their days hum. 

Every new baby brings new experiences that I've never dealt with.  Every grade level for my oldest brings new territory to explore and learn from.  Circumstances that surround our school days are never static.  One week we're dealing with our Daddy working long hours.  The next week, I've got a cold, the next week no one wants to do their work, the next week...and so on.  It's all new.  Life constantly changes, and yet we somehow make it through.  Chores and schoolwork get done.  We have fun together.  We make it to church together.  And so how do we do even that? 

The first is that we don't sweat the small stuff.  I was so serious when I told my friend that I don't do everything.  I don't.  I just don't.  Laundry, house cleaning, cooking dinner....that stuff is optional, my friends.  It's a-okay to dig a pair of jeans and a t-shirt out of the dryer for the day.  It's perfectly dandy to forget to dust the mantle for awhile.  No one will have an asthma attack over it.  PB&J on those hectic days is grand. 

The second, and last principle I work extra hard at applying to my days is discipline.  My biggest fault is that I love to get things done on that dang "mental list of things to do."  When we first started this journey, if it seemed we weren't going to be able to cross everything off that list, I could feel myself start to get tense.  But that's when everyone else starts to get tense and tempers flare cause you know what they say - if Mama ain't happy, ain't nobody happy! 

So I've disciplined myself to stick to the goal - the vision - the mission statement that Darin and I agreed on when we started homeschooling.  Rather than crumbling into a heap and giving up, I've learned to move on to the next thing, then the next, and the next.  Giving up is not an option.  Freaking out is not an option.  Choosing self-control always gets more done than losing it. 

And that's all.  Once we can all accept imperfection, we'll all be a much happier bunch.  ;-)