Lessons from Five Years of Motherhood

Yesterday, my oldest kiddo turned 5. Everyone warned me that time flies with kids, but damn, that was a blink. 

After the presents were opened and the cupcakes devoured and the kids snug in their beds, I had a chance to marinate in my thoughts about what the hell just happened??? And I kept coming back to the idea that, although parents are supposed to be the teachers, our kids—just by existing—teach us so much.  

Here's what five years of motherhood has taught me:

De-escalation is a superpower.

Those who have known me awhile know that, historically, I’ve been a bit of a hothead. My response to conflict has been to ratchet up the intensity, because something inside me desperately does not want to end up on the losing side of a disagreement. 

With kids, though, you can’t do that. You cannot win a fight with a toddler—they have endless reserves of tantrum power. Your only option is to de-escalate the situation. 

So when my kids have me frustrated to the gills, I don’t yell back. I pause and take a breath or two to bring my temperature down. I acknowledge their feelings, but also say we have to be in our “calm bodies” to talk things through. And then I wait. And then we talk. 

To my great surprise, this works for disagreements with adults, too. Getting angry, screaming, and continuously upping the insult ante never made my fights go away. They actually made them longer, and they left me mentally (and often physically) exhausted. 

So, instead, I do my best to de-escalate. And I’d probably never done it if I’d never been a mom. 

Caring about people who don't care about you is a waste.

I’ve always been sensitive to how other people think of and treat me. I’ve taken it personally when someone I wanted to befriend didn’t reciprocate; when an organization I wanted to join rejected me; or when people I trusted betrayed me. I carried grudges for years.

Then I noticed how Toddler TJ interacted with people. He’d walk up to another kid and try to play with them. If they showed no interest, he moved on. He seemed to inherently know that, if someone didn’t recognize he was worthy of friendship (or merely cooperative play) off the bat, their loss: He’d find someone else. 

If he could do it, why couldn’t I? And, frankly, how could I afford not to? There’s not enough time in the day or energy in my body for people who value me only as a punching bag, or who clearly don’t want me in their lives at all—even if we’ve known each other for decades. 

So I’ve started letting them go. Does it hurt? Yeah, at first. But then I remember Toddler TJ, and I remind myself: It’s their loss. 

Contrary to popular belief, no, you can't have it all.

I always wanted to be a mom, and I had a very clear vision for what my mom life would look like. I’d be as attentive as my own stay-at-home mom was, but also have a thriving professional life. I’d have a close-knit group of mom friends, just like my mom did, and our kids would be friends their entire lives. I’d have an amazing marriage featuring regular date nights and occasional trips just for us. 

After TJ was born, COVID gave me an excuse for not achieving much of that list. But after Maggie was born, the world was essentially back to normal yet I still fell short of my expectations. Mentally, those failures took me to a very dark place. 

To emerge, I had to admit that the life I envisioned was not feasible given the resources at hand. I could have a just-as-happy life, though, if I was willing to make tough choices on which expectations to keep and which to sacrifice. I needed to determine what was most important to now-me, not then-me, and that became my north-star for making my new set of expectations. As slacker-y as it sounds, I’ve found a lot of freedom in simply admitting to myself, “You can’t have it all.”

Kids will make you a kinder person.

OK so far I’ve explained that, pre-kids, I was (1) a hothead, (2) oversensitive, and (3) unrealistic in my life goals. Here’s one more endearing quality to add: I was a judgy, judgy bitch. 

Someone came into a nice restaurant in shabby clothes? Judgment. Someone canceled a lunch outing on me at the last minute? Judgment. Someone yelled at their kid in a store? Judgment. Someone cut me off in traffic? Judgment … and a middle finger. 

I did this to just about everyone, about everything, and it could make me incredibly mean. I never stopped to think, “y’know, maybe they’re having a bad day?” 

But now, I do. 

Maybe it’s because I’m now that person who goes to the nice restaurant in shabby clothes because I haven’t gotten around to the mountains of laundry in my house. Or the person who cancels lunch at the last minute because one of the kids popped a fever. Or the person who yells at their kid in a store because he’s been refusing to listen to me for six hours straight. Or the person who cuts you off in traffic because I’m trying to get Raffi on the radio as fast as possible to keep my daughter from crying and I just didn’t see you in my rearview mirror. 

But mostly, it’s because I want my kids to grow up to be better people than I’ve been. And I know they’re watching me to learn how.