To my girls,

In a world that has gone a little mad I need you to know some things.

You will always be enough. Just as you are.

There is nothing wrong in striving to be better, but strive to be a better version of yourself, not of somebody else. We are not created to be the same, so take pride in who you are and what you bring to the table.

As a whole we need to start celebrating that even if something is different, it does not make it wrong.

You will not be liked by everyone.

This is a hard truth, but just as you may not like everyone, you may also not be everyone’s cup of tea.

You will meet people in your life, who will make you want to be a better person. Hold on to those people tight.

There will also be people that expect you to change to be what they want. Be gracious, be humble, but always be you.

We don’t have to agree on anything to be kind to one another.

Having the best friends is far better than having the most friends.

When and if you choose to find a partner (In 30 odd years) do not settle. You are precious. You deserve somebody who loves your brains, and who every day makes you smile.

This person becomes a partner, but doesn’t define you. Find someone who not only tells you that you are special, but really makes you know that you are.

Never go to bed angry, forgiveness doesn’t necessarily mean forgetting, but it means living without bitterness.

You are loved, unconditionally.

There will be days, when you might feel alone, that the problems you have are consuming. Sometimes the burden that you are carrying takes its toll.

On those days especially, you need to know that you are not alone. In those moments when you feel a little lost, know that you are so loved.

To the world you may be just one person, but to one person you may be the world.

You are my world.

(Every Sunday for the rest of your lives you will expected to attend a family lunch.)

Love mum.

x

Time.

When I was younger I held my mum’s ring and put it on my wedding finger. I was playing out these scenarios in my head about how I would be married, have children and all my problems would disappear because I would be a grown up. I remember thinking how I can’t wait for this to happen, because it feels forever away, and my teenager problems felt never ending.

I recall the day I played with the ring like it was yesterday, and here I am today married with four children and my teenage problems seem like they were as difficult as the decision on which shoes to wear.

I remember sitting in History class thinking that it was never going to end, I remember looking forward to graduation like it was never going to come. Trying to fall pregnant, thinking it was never going to happen. The last trimester thinking it was an Elephant pregnancy. I remember waking during the nights with the girls feeling like I will never find sleep again. Spending time in hospital with my baby and wondering why this feels like forever.

I now walk around the shops holding their hand and I know they won’t want to do this forever. Reading them stories, only now they want to read it themselves. Offering to tie shoelaces, but they have already got it. Taking them to their first day of school waiting for the tears, but it seems it’s only me crying today.

I blinked and I grew up. I became a grown up. I keep blinking and now my babies are growing into these girls and I want time to stop so I can enjoy this moment a little longer.

I wish I knew back then what I know now. That time doesn’t stand still. Not to wish the days away.

I would tell my past self that there is good in every day. That just because the boy in year ten doesn’t like you, doesn’t mean you are destined to a life with cats.

I would say that my parents are not my enemies, but nor are they my friends. They are my people though. They have the best intentions. I have learnt that ‘because I said so’ is a good enough reason.

Invest into your relationships. Always be kind. Learn to love yourself before you try and give your heart to someone else.

I would also mention not to stress about the crazy hair too much, the future self discovers wonderful hair heating tools.

I would tell my past self that there is so much wisdom from those around you. You aren’t expected to have all of the answers. Learn from other ‘s mistakes.

Do not compromise yourself for anybody.

There is so much I would tell my past self. Most importantly though I would say that on the days that feel never ending and when time feels as though it is standing still.

It is so worth it.

At the end of each semester the girls receive their school reports. When we are given them, my first response is to flick past the first few pages and head straight to the back.

The first pages are the academic grades and comments by their teachers. The back page is all about the student. It’s reflective of their behaviour, their attitude and the effort that they apply to school. (It also notes how many days they were late to school – lets not go there.)

I expect these columns to be excellent. Don’t get me wrong; I hope that their grades in all the different subject areas are good as well, but knowing that my child is putting in the effort, that they have a good attitude. This is what is important to me.

I was thinking about how this applies in my role as a parent. At times I wonder if my report would say ‘shows potential, lacks motivation.’

Fortunately I don’t get ‘graded’, or given a report but I guess we now get unwillingly judged.

People feel the need to make comments on our ability to parent whether it is constructive or not.

At the end of the day while it may be helpful to receive feedback about the way that we parent, I am not sure in the grand scheme of things that it will make me a better mum.

If I was graded on my ability to let my child self settle I would receive a big fat fail. I have fed each and every one of my children to sleep. If feeding didn’t work I would rock them to sleep. This apparently is a big fat no no depending who you speak to, but I did it.

There is no one book or any given advice that I have applied to all my four children. Not because I was intentionally disregarding the advice I was given, but because it wasn’t what worked for my family.

We might not get it right all the time, in fact some days we might get it flat wrong.    We don’t always get the results that we want.

I want my parenting to be reflective of the fact that even on those days, I put the effort in. Not that I followed everyone’ advice, because that wont make me the perfect mum – whatever that is!

Raising four girls who are respectful, happy human beings, this is what is important to me. I want them to look back and know that even when I didn’t quite get it right, that I always tried.

Recently I was talking to a mum of an 11 month old who had just moved over from another country. I asked her how she was going and she said she was lonely. I could only imagine, having no family here and adjusting to a new culture, whilst raising a baby. We continued talking and I asked if she was able to get out of the house much, she replied that no it was too hard with a baby at the moment.

I remember those expectations that I had for when I was going to be a mother. I was going to really enjoy my coffee dates with other mums, I was going to become a lady who lunched while my children sat at the table quietly and lunched with me.

Reading an article about a lady who had recently had a child. The journalist was asking how she was coping with waking during the night. She responded, “I get really excited about seeing the baby again.”

I thought that was great advice and would obviously put that into my parenting bank and apply this amazing advice to my children.

When one of my children wake during the night my entire body tenses, my toes curl and I have been known to kick my legs and throw the doona. I wouldn’t exactly say that behavior is reflective of someone who is excited about seeing her children in the middle of the night.

Those coffee dates I had planned became too hard to even imagine. The thought of taking a two year old to a public place became too overwhelming.

I would make plans in advance, but then the day would come and it became too hard. So I would make an excuse and stay at home. Aside from school drop off and pick up and maybe the occasional phone conversation with my husband I could go an entire day without really speaking to anyone. That is lonely and isolating.

When we become parents we need to change the expectations we placed on ourselves before we had children. In my experience you can read all of the books you like, speak to as many friends and family who are parents, but until you experience it first hand you have no idea the ride you are in for.

Looking after your children becomes a priority, but looking after yourself is as important.

I found on the days that I woke up and didn’t ‘feel’ like getting out of the house, those were the days I really needed to.

I have a permanent catch up scheduled every week with a girlfriend. We meet at a park where we can buy coffee and let the kids play. Sometimes the kids play nicely, sometimes they throw tantrums but I have never walked away wishing I hadn’t gone.

Parenting might not meet all of those expectations you had, but don’t stop trying. Don’t doubt your ability as a mum. There will be days when you wake up and staying at home is the best you have to offer, that’s ok. Look after yourself, and when it feels too overwhelming to get out of the house, just know that so many other mums before you have been through and are going through the same thing.

Changing your expectations does not mean you have failed, it means that you are adjusting. You are adaptable.

I wish that it was as socially acceptable for me to throw a tantrum as good as the ones my three year old has when she wants to wear her stripy shirt and not her spotty.

Some days all I want to do is stamp my feet and jump up and down. Not for any real reason except that all the little things that have accumulated have now become a giant ball of too much to deal with. Trying to verbalize the feelings that I actually can not make sense of. I now have a little more understanding as to why children just throw themselves on the ground.

My husband was mowing the lawn, he put his head phones in and mowed the lawns for two hours. I love him for that, but I was so angry, because I had to look after the children. Our kids had been sick, one in hospital and one close to being admitted. The kids just wanted cuddles, and I just wanted space. I wanted to put headphones in and zone out. Walk in a line back and forth for two hours. Be lost in my own thoughts. I went to him in tears and said I need to go out for a bit, I put the youngest in the car and went for a drive with tears running down my face. The poor guy stood there with the most confused look, because at this point his wife had just gone crazy.

All these emotions had come to a head, and it was nothing that he had done. I just needed to throw myself on the ground and have that tantrum.

Adulting is hard because it comes with responsibility in the same sense that parenting is tough because it doesn’t take that responsibility into consideration.

When you go to bed at the end of a long day, you don’t just clock off from your parenting duties. It is a constant.

As adults dealing with tough circumstances is hard, having bad news delivered is hard. Trying to work through struggles in your home life and work life is hard. Having to do that while bringing your ‘A’ game as a parent is really hard.

Parenting doesn’t wait for the tough times to end before it starts working you again. It’s all the time. And it’s exhausting. Just when you think you are moving forward, you start going sideways instead.

Even if you have the perfect child – whatever that is, juggling life as a parent with those adult responsibilities will always present its challenges. If you need to have a tantrum, throw it. There would not be one parent who judges you for it. It’s only a shame that unlike children we don’t get timed out in the process.

Parenting is for most people the journey of raising a child into an adult who isn’t a jerk. Of course a long the way it’s nice to have a child who may be academic, maybe sporty, attractive. I think ultimately we want our children to be respectful, to contribute to society, to succeed.
Parenting is our journey, it is different for everyone. What works in my family, most probably won’t work for yours, and vice versa. 
The problem now in society is that we have been told that there are ways to parent right and if you aren’t doing it that way, rather than just being different, you are doing it wrong.
The parenthood journey is the constant ability to make decisions. Natural child birth vs Caesarean. Breast milk vs formula. The list goes on, disposable nappies vs cloth nappies, dummy vs no dummy, cows milks vs goats milk vs camels milk? Public schooling vs private schooling. Still it continues.
We are forever making decisions based on what we think is best for our children, to only be told that we are doing some of it wrong.
At what point did we stop cheering for one another and instead start finding flaws in everyone else’s ability to parent. 
Destination raising your child to not be a jerk is your journey to take. If you decide to do that by taking the bus while someone else takes a plane. That is absolutely ok. At the end of the day we are heading to the same destination, just different means of getting there.
Don’t get me wrong for each of my children I might change my method to suit the child, but again doesn’t make it wrong – makes it different. 
Lets start lifting each other back up and working on our own journeys rather than criticise  those around us who may do life a little differently.

Feeling alone when you are a part of a large family might seem a strange thing. Reality is you are never really alone at home. From toilet breaks to showering, a set of eyes follows your every move.

When you are left to fend off the little army you created day and night it can become isolating. Catching up on the latest schoolyard gossip, re-learning the six times tables, listening to reading books and supervising mathletics. Cooking dinner, bathing children, putting them to bed 27 times before they go to sleep. Once this is done you sit down in a quiet house and get ready to start preparing for the next day, sometimes it feels like Groundhog Day.

So yes while being apart of a family with children means that you are never physically alone, sometimes you never feel so alone.

While you are pushing repeat on your household tasks, life is happening. People around you that you love are getting sick, bills are coming in thick and fast that you start walking around the house seeing what you can sell. Adult decisions need to be made.

Some days feel like a box is closing in around you and it’s suffocating, the days that your brain feels like it has ten thousand conversations going on in your head and yet you don’t actually feel like you are apart of any of it.

Some days the burdens start piling in, the emotional toll takes its place inside you and your body aches, because up seems down and down seems sideways.

The insides of you are tearing you every which way, but on the outside you are still Mary Poppins. The kids still need you; quitting parenting is not an option.

Some days the simplest tasks feel like such a heavy burden.

Some days we just survive. We hit survival mode.

Some days we just feel alone.

But we aren’t alone. We are never alone.

We aren’t alone, because everyone has someone who loves them. In those moments of need there is someone who is willing to listen, to help, to understand.

Life happens, and it is so hard to do the parenting thing when there are so many other struggles we are dealing with as well.

To ask for help or to share your load is not a sign of weakness. No in fact it makes you stronger.

Surviving this crazy journey of parenting is sharing it with people who are cheering for you. Who will walk along side you encouraging you forward, and on the days that you hit survival mode they will carry you.

Parenting can feel so lonely, but you are never alone.

Be Kind.

Three weeks after my fourth child was born I decided it was time to venture into the unknown. Take my four children shopping.

I wont lie I was feeling confident.

We walked the aisles as a tight unit. Two kids in the trolley, two kids holding either sides of the trolley. We walked as one. I proceeded to place groceries in the trolley, smiled at the well-meaning people who looked at my little family unit like we were a circus act.

We were doing ok.

We reached the sultana aisle. Baby decided today she would let us know she has great lung capacity. She screamed. Child 3 then proceeded to cry because she didn’t know why the baby was crying. #1 kindly reminded me that the baby was crying and #2 wanted the sultanas that weren’t there.

At this point I am wondering what I am to do? I had committed to my shop and it was too late to abort the mission. My cupboards at home were bare and the children demand to be fed every night. I wanted a giant sinkhole. The smiles from fellow shoppers had now turned to looks of disgust and pity. My two little ones were still crying and I desperately wanted to join them.

As I held a box of sultanas in my hand, on the verge of tears a sweet looking lady came up beside me. I felt hope. I looked up to her with a small smile between my tears.

“Oh no they aren’t all yours are they?” “You are much too young for this, don’t do it to yourself”

Sucker punch right there.

I thought of course woman they are mine. Look at them, they are carbon copies of each other and they look just like me. Along with too late sweet heart I have already done this to myself.

I looked at the box of sultanas in my hand and in that moment I wanted to throw them at her.

I was having a moment. A bad moment. A hard moment. Kindness would not have hurt. Someone saying – well done for getting out of the house, hang in there – you are doing a great job, don’t worry it gets better.

As mums I am pretty sure we have all had these moments. Even just with one child who doesn’t want to cooperate. One of the most difficult things about being a parent is the inability to control how your child behaves in public, all we can really do is control our reaction.

So while we are trying to deal with a difficult situation in front of us, the last thing we want to do is hand out front row tickets to the circus act.

As fellow parents, we should be each other’s cheerleaders, hold your arm up in solidarity. This struggling mum is surely not on her own, so she should not feel like she is.

Some days we are one comment away from self-doubt and really questioning our ability to parent. We are one comment away to committing to house arrest for the foreseeable future.

There is so much power in our words and in our actions.

Kindness my friends, does not cost a thing, but can make a poor struggling mother of four feel like she isn’t doing such a terrible job.

Be kind.

Seasons.

When you wake up in the morning and check the weather report and it says sunny, you think perfect. I love this season, today is a happy day. However you walk out the door and instead of feeling that warm sun, you get hit in the face with rain. It’s unexpected, it messes your outfit, it can be inconvenient. Seems the seasons have changed and you didn’t even know that it was happening.

Like the actual seasons you experience, you have magical days and then you have down right gloomy days. Some days in Winter I love, but then there are some days when it just rains all the time and I hate winter. I have realized parenting is not dissimilar to this.

I often say to my husband, man it is so hard at the moment. I know it is just a season and it will pass, but right now it is really hard.

My days revolve around my children, around my husband. If I am not with them, I am constantly thinking of them. I suspect this season doesn’t end. Whilst I am a mum and a wife, I am sure I will always be thinking of my family. Some days they are much needier than others, some days require more patience, more tolerance and more sleep.

A friend explained it so well to me, she said “ I absolutely adore my kids, they are awesome and I love them so much, I just hate the whole parenting side of things.’

I have realized that with four children, even with the same DNA they are so different. I read parenting books, blogs and listen to people give advice, but it is never relevant to all four of my kids. Each child is so different and they need their own individual manual.

Sometimes when I go places, before I get out of the car, I just sit. I take a deep breath, give myself a pep talk and say. ‘You got this.’

You have days when you look at your kid and you think to yourself ‘I love you, but I just don’t like you so much right now.’

Does that thought alone make me a terrible mother?

It’s such a crazy journey, this parenting gig. It’s a roller coaster of emotions. One day I just sat on my bed and cried, my husband asked what’s wrong and all I could say was I don’t know, but I just don’t feel like me anymore.

The days aren’t all doom and gloom, there are those days when the sun shines bright and it’s a good season. There are glorious moments, when you look at your child and wonder how even though you feel like you don’t have it together and you don’t have any idea what you are doing. Somehow your little person is actually doing ok.

What I have realised the most in this parenting business, is that we don’t suffer these seasons alone. There are other mums out there who are also feeling a similar way.

As mums we need to celebrate those amazing times we have, but we also need to have people in our lives we can have those difficult conversations with. The ones where we raise our hands and say, today was horrendous.

Being a super mum is realising that you aren’t super human. We actually do feel things, sometimes too much. Sometimes we feel like we are being pulled in every which way. Sometimes we feel like we are stuffing up. Sometimes we need someone to tell us that even though it’s raining today, tomorrow the showers are clearing and the sun is coming out.

For mums today who felt the rain on the face, hang in there. I heard that the showers are easing and the sun will be coming out soon.

When I was a little girl I had a doll I dragged around with me. When I helped with the washing, my baby would come with me and lie quietly on the grass next to me having tummy time – because I was a dutiful make believe parent, who understood the importance of making sure my doll didn’t get a flat head. It was easy; I loved hanging out with my baby and doing the washing. When the time came for parenting – I was going to be ready, it was going to be simple, and I was going to love it. Every minute of it.

I was so very wrong.

“Once upon a time, I was the perfect parent. Then I had children. The end. (quote by Motherhood and more.)

I deeply love my children, all four of them. They make me laugh, they make my heart full and make me feel like I have achieved greatness in the short seven and a half years I have been a mother.

But nobody told me how hard it would be. Sometimes the journey itself to falling pregnant is hard. Pregnancy itself is certainly hard enough. The birth is hard.

Before we even become a parent we have these expectations of how we will be. We will have a wonderful water birth, with no drugs and then exclusively breast-feed this beautiful child who has routine from day dot.

Even if we are a little more realistic about it, I am not sure we are ever prepared for what is coming our way.

You have this little person, and you are the whole world to them.

When you are alone with your child for the first time, there is this overwhelming responsibility that kicks in. You have to keep this little being alive.

I was ready for parenting; I was ready for the social coffee dates, and swimming lessons. The multitude of playgroups, mother’s groups and play dates I would be a part of. We were going to have quite the life. She would of course have ample tummy time whilst I joyfully hung the washing out on the line.

Well no one told me. She didn’t like to sleep; she liked to feed every hour on the hour. My boobs hurt. I was lonely. My hormones were horrendous. My house was a mess. My body had changed. The tiredness you experience as a parent is nothing you can be prepared for.

Being a mum while it is so gratifying is honestly the hardest thing I have ever done. I have four children so people constantly surround me, yet I have never felt so lonely.

I find that I am a walking talking Play School episode; everything and I mean anything can be turned into a song.

My fourth child hardly had any tummy time, because my third child would take the babies clothes off if she ever got the chance.

I love my children, all four of them, but I am fairly sure my fourth is going to have a flat head.

When you have four children if one gets sick it can be straight up near a month before the household is germ free. There is nothing more exciting about staying at home with children who are miserable.

Those coffee dates I had planned became too hard to even imagine. The thought of taking a two year old to a public place became too overwhelming.

My washing is endless; there is nothing joyful about hanging it out.

I never thought that I would be the mum that calls her husband with tears running down her face, because I just cant handle and I want my mum.

There is no such thing as a perfect parent.

Somedays we need to remind ourselves that we are doing the best that we can, if today doesn’t go to plan then we try again tomorrow. Be kind to yourself. Let your children make you laugh, go and visit your mum if you need to.

This parenting gig is hard work, but nothing worth having ever comes easy.