When You Hate Being a Mom

Last week I got together for breakfast with my good friend Deniece Williams, Grammy-award artist and mom extraordinaire. As usual, our conversation veered towards discussing our kids and trading parenting horror stories: car keys borrowed without permission, surprise meals for mom that ended up in disaster, a huge Amazon credit card bill for Legos… the list goes on. Most of them we eventually learn to laugh off. Some still made us only half-laugh. I had just shared a particularly crazy one, which had us roaring with laughter when Deniece said:

“James, I love being a mom. But there have been times that… Hmm-hmmm!”

She shook her head with a smile and took a deep breath.

I immediately knew what she meant, and I was reminded of how willfully ignorant I had been.

As a guy, I’ve always idealized moms to be moms, loving, accepting, and sometimes super frustrated with kids but always ready to turn the page and kiss the boo-boo better. That’s a mom’s job, right? I’d never stopped to consider how motherhood affects a woman. I mean, beyond the obvious.

Sometimes we don’t stop to think about what sacrifices have been made, which paths have not been taken, and how dreams get postponed, shelved, and, more often than not, forgotten. Just a quick browsing through statistics will tell you that mothers are the ones pulling the short straw when it comes to parenting. Either they drop everything they had planned in life or continue with their plans juggling so many hats that they end up with little to no me-time. The way I see it, society has made it so that mother is expected to pull triple duty without the support of their employer and often their partner and kids.

Now, let me be clear, I have not met a single mom who regrets being a mom. In fact, they regard their kids as their greatest achievement and joy. No sacrifice is too great, and no task too daunting if it means their children will be happy, healthy, and successful.

But I’ve discovered that they get reprimanded and shunned by others when they dare speak differently from the motherhood script they’re supposed to follow. The pressure to be a Mom goes beyond the actual duties and tasks that a mother tends to have to do for her kid. It’s also an imposed vision of what mothering can and cannot do. Admitting and being vocal about the negative emotions that surface at times is not something society at large wants to hear - they prefer you sing the praises of child-rearing. So, instead of being encouraged to explore these feelings, mothers are guilted into silence.

As we all know, bottled-up emotions have a knack for causing Krakatoa-style eruptions, which mostly lead to more festering and possibly more meltdowns. Or maybe you push them down so deep you start regarding your kids as frienemies?: “Sure, green trousers with orange polka dot tee, what a great outfit for your first date! Now, here’s a spray paint can; go leave her a message on her sidewalk; she’ll love it”  See what I mean?

So all of you moms reading this, please know that when you hate being a mom, you need to speak out! When you share these feelings, you’re actually helping change this stagnant view of who you are and who you need to be as a mother and bringing a lot of truth into this very whitewashed concept.

 (I explore more extensively the sentiment of hatred in parents in my complimentary ebook, How to Stop Hating Being a Parent, which you can download here.).

Learning to Keep My New Year Resolutions

I know everyone makes them, but how many people keep them? I’m talking about New Year’s Resolutions. I always write them down so I can check how many I succeeded at. As I have gotten older the list gets shorter and shorter. So I thought that this year, before I make any new resolutions,  I would look back at the ones I made last year and see how I did in 2021. 

Resolution 1 - “Try to be a Better Person”

I guess the keyword here is “TRY”. I did try - and I can say that with 100% honesty. This is the important part. However, when all is said and done, I don’t think I did too well on this one. I can recall several instances in which I blatantly shoved it to the side and proceeded to be way too cantankerous. On the other hand, there were moments in which I did get it right.  For example, I didn’t lose my temper over bad driving nearly at much, and I refrained from ripping a certain home security company a new one after calling me for the umpteenth time to sell me the home security package I’ve already brought from them - I’m particularly proud of this one. So, for 2022, I hope my calm persona prevails over my loud and excitable nature.

Resolution 2 - “Be a Better Father”

This resolution is the reason I set out to write my book Unlocking the Secrets for Successful Parenting. Part of my understanding of my role as a father has been to examine what has worked and what needs improvement in my parenting skills and in my relationships.

For example, there were many a morning in which Aaron said to me, ‘Dad, don’t think I will do well on the test today”. I would say calmly, “I just want you to try your best, I can’t ask for more.” I felt this made him more at ease before an exam - I still can’t see how threatening a kid with punishment if they fail, right before the test, can be beneficial. 

I think I nailed this resolution n 2021, and I’m continuing on in 2022 pondering and discovering the nuances of parenting and applying them at home and in more books.  But don’t ask Aaron for his opinion, I’m sure he’ll disagree since his weekday iPhone privileges were revoked :-)

Resolution 3 - “Be Healthy”

Easy enough, I thought back then. Eat the right foods and go to the gym and get back into shape. Nope. Didn’t happen. I actually managed to get new bad eating habits (three breakfasts in one morning, four times a week, became a new normal for a while). I practically forgot about the gym, coming up with whatever excuses not to go and/or working out in a burst of energy and pulling a muscle, which kept me from going back to the gym for weeks on end. And then, repeat. By December I had really packed in extra pounds and even my doctor told me off me about it.

But since the new year began, I’ve been walking a mile and 1/2 a day. I’m using light weights at the gym to avoid injuring myself, and I’ve stopped eating like a pig. Well, half a pig, I need to watch out for those extra breakfasts trying to entice me out of my diet!

Resolution 4 (the last one) - “Be Happy”

I was able to keep this resolution in 2021! On a personal goal level  I followed my inspiration, tried new things, set out to create new projects and ventures, and slowly but surely I’ll be reaping this harvest in the coming months.

But infinitely more important, my family is my true happiness.  When I look at the chaos the world is in today, and the daily frustrations everyone feels, I come home to my family and everything melts away.  Aaron runs to greet me with “I love you Daddy”, and my wife shares with me her day. And despite how long or crazy the day may have been we find a moment to have dinner together.   No man, or woman, could ask for anything more.

I’m not going to add any new resolutions for 2022. Instead, I’ll continue to grow and improve on these, and hopefully, I’ll ace #1 and #3.