The Guilt is REAL

The overwhelming feeling I’ve had this entire week is guilt – not gratitude or Christmas cheer – GUILT. Between the mom guilt and the family guilt, I can’t seem to get the thought out of my head that I’m letting someone down because of my actions, my choices, my opinions. Why is it that as moms, wives, sisters, daughters, coworkers, friends, we put the pressure on ourselves to be perfect in every role?

My sister/daughter guilt crept up yesterday as heated group text messages were flying about schedules for staying with our mom in the hospital day and night for the next month (she suffered a stroke the week of Thanksgiving and has been in the hospital ever since). All of it stemming from our own feelings about the entire situation and the uncertainty of what lies ahead. We’re worried about our mom’s recovery because there’s so many unknowns right now, like if she’ll fully recover, if she’ll have deficits and if she does, how severe they’ll be. We’re worried about our dad’s health as he copes with his sudden, life-changing reality. We’re still trying to live out our normal, everyday with jobs and families. We’re stressed, tired and just plain burnt out.

As my phone continued to ding incessantly with new text alerts, I started to feel angry and annoyed. I started comparing my reality with my sisters’ and it just didn’t seem fair. And so, I added in my two cents which boiled down to:

• 24/7 coverage is not sustainable
• Mom would want us to take care of ourselves and our families
• We trust the care she’s getting so maybe it’s okay to not have someone at her bedside (particularly at night when she’s sleeping)
• I can’t commit to all the time they were proposing simply because I am the only one with a toddler and the only one still trying to build up my career. And for both of those reasons, I am the only one who doesn’t have the luxury of taking a nap because I’m tired from spending the night in the hospital (unless I can squeeze it in when Mackenzie naps) and not bringing my A-game to work.

All the while, I was feeling major guilt around prioritizing myself over my mom and not being willing to sacrifice my time to help my sisters out. Maybe it’s wrong of me to do. Maybe it makes me a bad person in some people’s minds. Maybe it just makes me human.

Because a lot of the mom guilt I felt this week, stemmed from me having to spend  6 hours during the day on Sunday, spend the night on Christmas and the next morning doing my “shift” at the hospital. All the missed time I could have spent with Mackenzie. See, my mom guilt is 95% about my time with her. I can appreciate the occasional date nights with the hubs, and meeting up with friends for dinner/drinks. I love doing those things and I know how important it is to invest in those relationships. But in those moments, I also find myself counting down the time until I get to snuggle up with my L.O. Call me obsessed, call me crazy. It’s just how I roll.

But then I got to thinking of it in a positive light. All that time I was away, she was getting quality one-on-one time with her daddy. He was getting the chance to bond with his daughter without me looking over his shoulder. He got to parent in his own way.  They were making their own special memories together. And that is beautiful.

So, ladies, the next time you start feeling the guilt, give yourself a little grace and a little comfort in knowing that we’re all imperfect and that’s okay. Don’t let your guilt take away the joy in the millions of other little moments. Remember what matters most – you’re doing your best and your best is enough.