Finding a Balance Between My Children & Myself

The pendulum sometimes swings too far in one direction. And that's okay. It should.

It's something I actually think I'm fairly good at, balancing two of the bigger priorities in my life—my children and myself. Even with having a third baby in the last year, I feel like I’ve finally reached a point in my life where I’m very in tune with my intuition and I’m not afraid to act on it. For example, I’m not afraid to decline an invitation for no other reason than my bandwidth feels too spread thin. Other times, maybe I don’t even feel spread thin at all, but my gut tells me that I just want to be home with my babies and husband that evening. These days, that gut feeling—whichever way it is swaying me—is strong. And it always wins.

Just like any other part of life where you’re trying to achieve balance, the pendulum of prioritizing your children vs. yourself can start hovering more in one direction. And that’s normal. In fact, I believe it should do that at times.

When I had just had Patrick one year ago, I wanted to move out to the middle of nowhere, live on a farm, and have more babies. No really, I did. (But to be clear, my farm would consist of only some chickens and a flower garden. Maybe honey bees.)

It was just this idea of being away from all the distractions of life and really pouring into my family—it was truly all I desired. I didn’t give one little care about clothing or material things at that time… even though I am sure I had to post it on my socials back then just to keep up with partnerships and livelihood in general. Because I’ll tell you one thing… having a new baby almost six years after I had last had a baby really put things into perspective to me. Time felt slow when Watson and Rosie were babies and toddlers. But then at almost 6 and 7.5 years old, I realized time actually had flown by. And here I was holding a new baby again… a chance to do it all over, knowing I’m going to blink and this baby will be going to kindergarten.

And as time passed and baby Pat grew weeks older, I self-admittedly would cry every night. But for the exact opposite reason that I shed tears when our oldest was a newborn—back when I felt run ragged, isolated, and missing my pre-baby life. Quite the opposite, actually. I would cry just because Patrick was another day older. Like truly, it made me so sad that another day would pass. It sounds ridiculous, but I wanted so desperately to freeze time. I get that a lot of this was hormonal, but even now as I write this, I feel tears welling up in my eyes over the thought of how much I wish I could go back to those first postpartum weeks. I would do it in a nano second if I could.

But of course as time continued, as time does, I began finding “the old me” again. To be clear, I wasn’t out searching for her. I was very content in my new postpartum life. Though as life started feeling more routined again, feeling the pendulum start to swing a little more in that direction just naturally happened. I started prioritizing myself more. I figured out a schedule for the baby and found myself with time to do a workout during nap time. As a result, I was able to wear some of my pre-baby clothing and I started finding joy in shopping again. I then wanted to occasionally do things in the evenings with my girlfriends—a chance to get dressed up and feel the warmth of friendship in a fun and exciting setting.

Throughout my 8.5 years of motherhood, there have been ebbs and flows like this. Times the pendulum was more weighted to prioritizing my children and then there have been times I really focused on myself, sometimes at the expense of missing my kids and the guilt that comes with that. But you know what, both of those experiences together are what create the balance.

There was this one night away that I recently had. It was a work trip where I was gone for just 24 hours, but I got to stay in a hotel room all by myself and it was magical. Truly, I felt like a queen waking up to silence, which was a nice contrast to how guilty I felt leaving all three children with my husband. Luckily, he and I both work for ourselves, so we have a lot of flexibility in our days and equally share the parenting tasks. So he urged me to go. In fact, when I came home, I was in such a good mood from my refreshing night away that he said, “We need to send you away more often!!”

It was a nice reminder to prioritize moments like that when I can, but also, I can honestly say that I find so much peace and harmony in my life from being home with my family. Sure, the little bursts of “me time” are life-giving and important, but I think you also just have to embrace each stage of life you’re in, knowing these phases change quicker than we could imagine.

Speaking of peace, when I got pregnant with Patrick, I felt this peace within me. Something about being pregnant gave me authority to decline invitations and to not feel like I needed to be everywhere at once. This practice is something I’ve held onto since then. When it comes to invitations to anything, whether it be an optional work event or a mahjong night with girlfriends, I ask myself, “Will this situation bring me peace or take away from my peace?” And I unapologetically act on that. What’s that saying? “If it’s not a hell yes then it’s a hell no.” Yep. That one.

In summary, I think you’ve got to hit the extremes of both ends in order to find the balance. You’ve got to welcome spending an entire day running from one children’s birthday party to the next. But also, you’ve got to prioritize doing whatever it is that makes you, you. Maybe that’s just stepping out for a quick manicure/pedicure or maybe it’s a fun girls weekend. And even though having someone else care for your children while you’re away will always come with a certain degree of guilt, you will always come back a better version of yourself. And maybe they’ll even tell you what Brandon told me last month… “We’ve got to send you away more often!”

x

Megan