Ahh, motherhood – before our little ones were even a twinkle in our eye, we’re regaled with stories about how it’s the greatest and most fulfilling thing that will ever happen to us and that we will be full of love and joy and happiness. It’s not that those things aren’t true exactly, it’s more that they are usually not true ALL the time. I expected the sleepless nights, the constant crying (the kids’, not mine), the scraped knees and the hurt feelings. What I didn’t expect was the never ending, rolling to-do list happening in my head, the stress of juggling work, health, my relationship, etc. with motherhood, the constant crying (mine, not theirs! LOL) and, most of all, the pressure to do it all perfectly. We are so hard on ourselves and have such high expectations, some self-imposed, some externally imposed. And I think Mother’s Day is the perfect time to reflect on that and give ourselves the gift of grace.
Back a few years ago, during the height of the pandemic, I started a (now-defunct) blog, that was mainly centered around my love of obstacle course racing (OCRs) but wove in the weird, funny and challenging things I encountered during that time. One post, in particular, focused on the concept of showing ourselves grace – which, despite the post being written years ago, feels very apropos as we approach Mother’s Day. If you can forgive the older references, I’d like to share that post with you.
Oh heyyy there, you may not remember me…we met just over a year ago when I thought it would be a really fantastic idea to begin writing about my experiences with and love of OCRs and my love affair with my gym. I was riding high for a couple of months, oversharing, being awkward and imparting my OCR words of wisdom until the entire world shut down…and there weren’t any OCRs…or gyms…and I kind of stopped working out…and started drinking more…and turned 40. Whether any of those things are related to one another, I can’t say, but I think I speak for everyone when I say it was one heck of a year!
There have been signs of hope – vaccines, nicer weather and the slow reopening of the world. I was getting so hopeful - I had even gotten to participate in my first race since this time last year - and then my kid tested positive for Covid, so he, my other son and I all started our 10-day quarantine…and then 5 days into that, my other son tested positive so our quarantine was extended by another 6 days. As I write this, we are on day 10 and I am the last uninfected (wo)man standing in this house. I had started getting really down again because I was so busy coordinating distance learning, psychotically disinfecting, attempting to be even minimally productive at my job and feeding my children, what seemed like 70 times a day, that I wasn’t working out. I wasn’t even moving my body a little bit. My mental health was suffering big-time and as I began getting frustrated and disappointed in myself and so stressed that my inner Hulk was threatening to burst out, I remembered a phrase that I have been using frequently – Two Steps Forward, One Step Back. (Disclaimer: I mostly use this phrase when trying to justify my actions to my therapist when I have directly contradicted her advice to me.)
 | As an attempted perfectionist, this notion of allowing for missteps feels really uncomfortable at first. Why should I be striving for anything less than full forward motion? But that’s exactly what makes it so powerful – it encourages you to make that forward progress while still allowing room for mistakes and missteps and for you to just, you know, BE HUMAN, without it derailing you from your goals completely. |
This concept can be difficult though because it requires both grace and mindfulness (two things I am notoriously bad at.) We tend to be our own worst enemies – if I have an evening cocktail and then it messes with my sleep that night causing me to not wake up and work out, well, I’m an undisciplined idiot. If my friend tells me the same story, I tell her that she had one hell of a day and deserved that drink to decompress…and one missed workout is not the end of the world, just get back at it the next day. We need to show ourselves, at the very least, the same amount of grace that we are more than willing to show others.
Mindfulness comes into play because we need to recognize the positive, healthy actions we take each day and give ourselves credit for those “two steps forward.” We are always so focused on the negative that, unless we conquered some amazing feat that day, when it comes time to total up all of our actions from the day, we always come out in the red. We nitpick all of the little things we should or shouldn’t have done but we fail to recognize all of the little positive, productive choices we made that day. For example, instead of just openly sobbing IN FRONT of my children as I did on Thursday, on Friday I snuck away and cried alone in my room without them having any clue – positive decision! (Side note: the side effects of isolation are real and no joke, my friends, especially for an extrovert like me!!) But seriously, be mindful of your actions throughout the day and be sure to take note of the positive ones.
As I now sit here putting the finishing touches this post, I have completed the full 16 (ugh) day quarantine and I survived, not only without getting Covid, but also without permanently scarring my children (I think), smashing anything or gaining 15 pounds. In my book, that’s like 15 steps forward! And while I wasn’t exactly living my best life for those 2+ weeks, from the moment I was finally released back into the wild, I notched up my workouts, I prioritized spending time with the people I care about most and I have increased my productivity tenfold, and it feels so good! I’m approaching it with a zest that I didn’t have prior to the quarantine. Maybe sometimes that one step back actually helps us to gain some perspective; it helps break us out of complacency and realize what it truly important to us.
This Mother’s Day, as hard as it may be, try to give yourself the gift of grace, be mindful of all of the everyday wins and remember that two steps forward, one step back is still progress...you're doing great!
