I am a "good enough" parent

With Mother's Day around the corner, I thought it was a good time to write a post dedicated to all of us parents. A term I have heard quite a few times lately is "good enough parent."  The first time I heard it, I didn't like it very much.  It sounded kind of like a cop out, but the more I heard it, the more it has grown on me.  So, this post is dedicated to all of us "good enough" parents out there, myself included.

When I got pregnant with my first child, I had all of these ideas about the kind of parent I would become.  I knew what my expectations would be and exactly how my children would behave.  And then, 9+ months later, my daughter came into this world, beet red and screaming at the world and reality hit.  I realized very quickly, even as an infant, that she was her own little person and while I could teach her right from wrong and try to mold her into the child I would like her to be, she would always just be her.  Fast forward 5-years and we added Collis to the mix.  He is my wild child who breaks all the rules.   Another 2+ years and we added baby Grayson. Now, I am a stay at home Mom, with three children, (7, 2 and 3 months) who spends a lot of the time with my husband at work or gone completely on training exercises or deployments.  I have definitely learned what it means to be a "good enough" parent.

To me, what a "good enough" parent means is that we each do the best we can.  We are imperfect.  We don't always have it together 100%, but we keep trying. Being a "good enough" parent to me means:

·         My daughter sometimes gets dressed out of the dryer because I haven't managed to fold the clothes, but she does have clean clothes at least.

·         The school sometimes has to call to remind me that I forgot to turn in the permission form for the school field trip, so I stop what I'm doing and run it up there.

·         Collis may still be wearing PJs at dinner time if we haven't left the house, but he is dressed at least (most of the time)

·         Lunch may sometimes consist of a hot dog and canned fruit, but they are fed.

·         I sometimes yell too much, but I am working on it.  I also spend time talking softly and telling my children I love them.

·         My near 3-year old is not potty trained, mostly because it is a battle I don't have the energy to fight all the time.

·         I can't always stop what I am doing to give them 100% of my attention.  However, when Collis wanted to sit in my lap for me to read "Where the Wild Things Are" in the middle of writing this post, I did.

·         Sometimes Collis is horrible in the store and I just shrug my shoulders to other people that give me dirty looks.

So, this is dedicated to all the other "good enough" moms (and dads) out there. We aren't perfect, but we are trying our best to be the parents our kids deserve. We take it day by day and moment by moment. I hope that each of you have a wonderful Mother's Day and know that you are "good enough".