Family life can wear you out
Dealing with all the 'must dos' of parenting we often starve ourselves and our relationships with partners or spouses. It is ever so popular to throw around the advice of "take time for yourself", but who feels they do enough of it?
A really interesting advice I've come across just simply says Live the life you would like your children to live. The simplicity just blew me away! I don't see it as a life of luxury or buying things, rather on an emotional level. You want your children to achieve personal goals, to have happy relationships, to care for themselves...simply to be happy.
As parents we are always told that children do what we do, not what we tell them. So if we cannot be happy with our lives, how do we expect our children to learn how to do it?
As parents our family's collective need should always come first, I believe. But as parents we often forget that running ourselves into the ground and depleting our energy without regularly topping it up, actually makes us worse parents. I certainly wouldn't want to grow up with the worn out shell of a mother my kids have to put up with at times.
I seldom notice when I get worn out and I'm suddenly stuck in hell. I scream at the kids, have no patience and parenthood feels like a never ending chore. At those times I feel I would need about a week away from the whole set up. Living with the 'bad parent' guilt does not make things any better.
My plan for the future is to find time and schedule activities that make me happy and replenish myself as a person. Maybe I won't loose myself so easily in the fog that family life can be at times. It'll just swallow you up, you can't see a thing in front of you, but you can definitely feel every 'must do' lurking in the fog
