I’ve had the house to myself over the past two days. I am not going to lie to you, it has been glorious. Breathing in the silence and eating food in the living room has been liberating. My brain tells me to feel bad for saying that.
But I don’t.
This season is hard. Parenting is hard. Sometimes you just need a few minutes to breathe, to think, to sit in silence. Turns out I need this much more than I ever thought I would. Turns out I am a fairly high maintenance individual. I reach a people/person/social interaction quota and then I am tapped out. I have always considered myself a social person. Life of the party, make people laugh and outgoing. I mean I was voted “best sense of humor” in high school. But now that I have had children. Now that I am juggling work, parenting, and my mental well being. I sometimes just need silence.
Small humans are not silent. And if they are silent you can almost bet something terrible is happening. I feel like I’ve been surrounded by small humans desperate for my attention on the tiny things in life while juggling big decisions in my brain. My mind like a hamster wheel unable to stop and take in the moment.
But then today, while busy completing three thousand different things for work. I turned on my video conference app to start a meeting. Behind me, I saw the children’s artwork hanging up over their table in our kitchen.
I missed them deeply.
I took two seconds and admired my background. I looked at the wipes sitting on the table and thought ‘ i wonder how much longer my girls will need wipes for their Mac and cheese covered faces?’. I glanced at the toy trucks nearby and thought, ‘ I wonder what my home will look like when they are all grown up and too cool for toys?’ I missed them so much in that moment that I thought I could just clock out, leave work behind, and go snatch them up. While they were only away from me for two nights, I realized how important the time away was for both them and myself. It takes just a second away from someone to appreciate them fully.
So to my Mama friends that need just a moment to breathe, do not be ashamed in asking for a break. There are times when the best thing you can do for your children is to be away from them. Maybe all it takes is just an afternoon to yourself or an evening date with your spouse.
Perspective changes everything.
And sometimes just like a good artist does with his artwork, we gotta step away from our children to shift our perspective and gather some appreciation for all our hard work.
