What Happened When I Stopped Trying to Crack the Code

"When I was growing up, I didn't dream about my future wedding, I dreamed about my future family; how I would have a bunch of kids, a wonderful husband and I would stay home like my mom did."

Fast forward 20 years and I've arrived, or I should feel that I have. I'm married to a wonderful husband and father, I'm blessed to be able to stay home and we have a sweet and funny 1 year  old, but a few months ago, I didn't feel like things were going well because we were constantly trying to "get through things" with Graham. For example, we had to get through phases like "he's not eating", "he has reflux", "he's teething", "he's not sleeping", "he's crawling in bed", "he's climbing on everything", etc. I sadly felt like I wasn't enjoying life at all because there was always a hurdle to overcome or a solution to be found. I felt like we didn't have ordinary days because we were constantly trying to crack the code, solve the problem, get him through this and that phase. Was I alone here? One night, I told my husband that I was so bothered by this that if I was someone else, someone who didn't have my morals and standards to be there and take care of my family, that I would walk away. Maybe I was depressed? Too high strung?

Some parents I've talked to think that the infant stage is the hardest stage because your children can't tell you what they need, but for us, it began around Graham's 4th month. Parenting suddenly got hard when our son experienced the dreaded 4 month sleep regression and I took it upon myself to research countless hours on what the problem could be and how to "fix it". We then discovered that he was probably suffering from reflux so I then searched again for a solution to that problem. Looking back, those weren't as big of hurdles as they seemed at the time, but once I decided to stop looking for solutions and solve every problem or difficulty we came across, I started to enjoy my child again. I stopped seeing him as a math problem waiting to be cracked and started to realize that life is bumpy, and it's all how you enjoy the ride. 

A little background on myself for a second, I grew up in a small family that didn't get together with extended family much if at all after we all got into high school, so most holidays and celebrations were my parents, my brother and myself. We had routines, and nothing changed. Things in my family were planned, and predictable. That's how I grew up, so that's what I expected out of life. Then...I got married. I married into this wonderful, large, whimsical family that makes plans last minute, visits with little notice, and really just goes with the flow. I still find myself dazed sometimes by the business of a large family and the unpredictability of plans with said family, but I do love it. Sometimes I think God blessed me with this crazy family because he knew that I would need to get real and understand that life isn't planned and predictable all the time. I surely have learned that since becoming a parent, and now that I'm starting to embrace my in-laws way of life, I'm starting to really enjoy the little things much more.

I've become more laid back about nap schedules and bedtimes, bottle quantities and Graham's exploration, and it's like a whole new ball game. But don't worry, I haven't gone too crazy on those things just yet, but it seems to work for our family, and I also find myself feeling less stressed to meet every time frame or reach every milestone. We're able to stay later at family gatherings (well...a little later) and if nap time is an hour later because he's having a good time, that's fine. Once I stopped trying to Google everything and hurdle over every bump, life got simpler and we all got happier. 

Happy Living & God's Blessings!

J.M.