The house is finally quiet. The dishes lay dirty all around the kitchen. The clothes lay scattered all over the bedrooms; clean and unclean intermixed. You have no idea which is which, and neither do the kids. There are pillows and blankets piled in the family room left over from the fun that was had earlier in the day as the kids tried to create a fort. They say it was so fun, which was surprising when all you seemed to hear were arguments back and froth the entire time. Siblings are always best friends and worst enemies at the same time it seems.
As you reflect on your day you realized that time passed and you aren’t sure what you even did. Did you read to the kids? Did you play with the kids? Did you spend too much time playing Candy Crush? Did you spend too much time catching up on all the Facebook gossip? Did you spend too much time trying to recover from the 2 year olds melt down? Did you take a nap only to wake up to hopefulness that everyone and everything survived?
Was the hug you gave the toddler enough to make sure she knows you love her? Was that moment you chatted with your kids after school long enough to make sure they know you are truly interested in what they did? Were you genuine enough during bedtime routine or was it all too rushed and you were just ready to be done?
Today, you may ask, “Was I a good enough mother?” “Did I do enough for my children today?”
Yes. The answer is yes. Your efforts in loving your children, providing for your children, and recovering from toddler, school age, and teenage melt downs, is perfect. They love you for who you are, just like you love them for who they are. They appreciate your efforts, just as you appreciate their efforts. They watch and notice the small things you do – even if it seems impossible that that is true on most days. Their world exists because you make sure that they’re taken care of, no matter how little or big they are. They rely on you more than you know, and their love is bursting for you.