Motherhood is teaching me many things – humility, the importance of humor, how stinky little feet can be, and how fast time flies.
Yesterday I walked to pick Gabe up from preschool. It’s only a mile away and on a nice day, I like to walk for a little fresh air and exercise. I had Theo in the Ergo and it was a little walk that took less than 20 minutes on the way to pick Gabe up.
On the way home, however, it took us 45 minutes to walk one mile. I found myself getting frustrated and wanting to rush Gabe along instead of stopping to pick grass or crunch leaves or stop in the shade for a minute to cool down. We had nowhere in particular to be, but I just felt this need to rush rush rush.
I’d keep my eyes set down the sidewalk a block or two away, but then Gabe would see something interesting, stop, bend over and peer at whatever it was. I was still holding his hand, which meant my arm was pulled backward at an uncomfortable angle.
It reminded me of a few weeks ago when I lost my car keys so I ran to Gabe’s school and walked home with him. My sister was watching the baby so I could get Gabe, and she was going to be late to work if we didn’t walk home quickly. Being late is stressful, but causing someone else to be late stresses me out even more, so I pulled Gabe along. I rushed him too much (he’s so sleepy after a 6-hour day at school), and he ended up falling and scraping his knee. He sobbed on the sidewalk, clutching his little knee. I stooped down to hug him and comfort him. I felt awful that my impatience and my hurry to get somewhere caused my little boy pain.
I realized that Gabe was teaching me another lesson – that when you have kids, you can’t focus even a block down the road. You have to just focus where you are, on what you are doing this exact moment or else you’ll stumble.
As I am wont to do, I found a metaphor in this – instead of focusing months or years away, I need to focus on where we are now. With both the heartachingly good and the hair-pullingly hard – I should pay attention to what is happening now instead of worrying how I’ll ever survive another 12-hour-day alone with two children as they both sob uncontrollably or, on the other hand, how heartbroken I’ll be when Gabe no longer wants to curl up in my lap for cuddling and no longer tells me how I’m his best friend before bed.
As I’ve been reforming my social media and phone habits (more on that another day), I’ve realized the effect my being distracted has on my kids, but my little metaphor musings yesterday brought a new desire to really slow down and go at their pace instead of my own.
Slow down, you move too fast
You got to make their childhood last
(Thanks for allowing me another moment of introspection. I promise I’ll lay off this stuff for awhile.)
Beautiful post, friend. I like your introspective posts, for whatever it’s worth and I love that Gabe calls you his best friend. How adorable.
Great post, great insight. Looking forward to your wisdom on backing away from social media, too.
I need to remember this. I feel like I’m constantly rushing. Life is just so HARD and so FULL sometimes. I try in little ways, like by putting my phone out of sight. It means I miss calls and text messages, but Natalie is so worth it. I know I’ll continue to learn this lesson over and over again as she grows.
Why, oh why, are you aplogizing for writing this?? What a beautiful post. One I would like to share with all my preschoolers’ parents!! <3 Gorgeous.
I have a 3.3 year old. She can’t walk a block without complaining she can’t walk any more, and continually runs in front of my legs and cries to be picked up. But she can walk or run long distances when she wants to. I’m frustrated because for now she misses the beauty in walking, wind in your face, the feeling of the body moving in rhythm, watching the changing scene and cast of characters as we go. As yet, I’ve failed to teach this. The only way she walks happily is if we borrow a dog.
Some days I feel like I have the slowness of toddlers/preschoolers down. It’s just using up time in the day the day so who cares if it takes 20 minutes to get dressed and 10 minutes to get buckled into the car. Other days it DRIVES ME CRAZY. I feel like this is one of the main trials in this stage of my life, managing every day to find the patience to just wait around for my three year old to do whatever he needs to do to get from place to place. Rushing him through things just results in tears and screaming for everyone and the days where I run out of patience by 10am are the worst.
I like these posts too, and can relate. I get very worried about what Max’s sleep will be like that night, or what I will feel like when he is 5 and doesn’t want to hold my hand or… whatever other random thing I’m worried about. Surprisingly, none of this worry actually helps. Go figure.
I can relate on the rushing too… if all went according to plan all the time I’d have enough time to do it all, but nothing ever does (because baby, ha ha) and then I am rushing around trying to make up for it.