Learning How To Be A Family (cont'd)

y.

As I thought about this, it occurred to me that just because you get married and have children, it may not automatically make it easy to be part of a family. The roles and responsibilities that go along with being a member of a family may be completely alien to anything you have ever known. I think this may especially be true for people, such as myself, who grew up with a level of dysfunction in the home, where roles and responsibilities were blurred.

I breathed in a little easier as I continued to think about the ramifications of this idea. The thought crossed my mind, “Maybe I’m being too hard on myself at times”. Maybe I am. I definitely do not feel confident at all times about my performance as a wife and as a mother. Although, I do admit that I am far more critical of my role as a mother. I have filled my head with expectations of everything I think I should be able to accomplish and feel; when these expectations meet with the chaos of everyday life in a home with two children under two years old I am left standing with half completed tasks and feelings of guilt and disappointment in myself. Instead of viewing my new roles as a learning process, I have committed myself to focusing on the failures instead of the beautiful process of learning how to be a good mother and head of a growing family.

Not only am I missing out on many, many opportunities to learn and develop, but I am also missing out on the feelings of success that stem from the myriad small situations which I have been able to handle effectively. It is in these small, often-overlooked situations that I can really see how far I’ve come in adopting, and adapting to, this new role. Words and actions which may have been alien to me prior to motherhood have now become effortless and they are to be counted among the successes of this learning process.

If I view this as a set of skills to hone over time, then I can also allow myself to make mistakes. Mistakes do not become innate short-comings to feel guilt and shame about that will never change, but instead they become obstacles to be overcome over time. I have to allow for myself to be a novice and to seek out advice and help from other women who have life experience that has given them valuable wisdom. I have to be able to laugh at myself when the house is a mess and the children are cranky and all I want to do is eat some chocolate. I have to accept that these roles as part of a family are ever-changing and as such, I must provide space and time for myself to change and grow along with them. I have to recognize that my husband and children will experience the same growth and development in their own unique ways. The person I am will have a great influence on how my relationship with my husband evolves, who my children ultimately become and how we choose to define “family”. I have to understand that being part of a family is a learning process, and we’ve really only just begun.

Melissa is a stay-at-home mom to Angelina, 22 months and Nathaniel, 3 months. She is a New York City native now writing and residing in Richmond, VA.