Mom Stop Carrying Everything
Yeah I mean that literally. I have taken a stand that I don’t carry my kids book bags, lunch boxes, folded laundry, their karate uniforms, or their baseball gear. (Oh, also their emotional load)
I’ll tell you why.
Because it’s their responsibility. It needs to be practiced ALL. THE. TIME. Right from the beginning.
Do you know what happens when we start carrying stuff for our kids, for our husband?
They rely on us. They expect us too.
(Is this coming off a little bratty?)That’s not my intention I just want to get really clear that we love to offer help to our husband and kids, but that doesn’t mean that it turns into our load to carry.
If we carry stuff for our kids and our husbands when does it stop? When we stop, we feel guilty and feel like we should have helped them with this that or the other thing.
WE start feeling responsible for their responsibilities!
That’s when the emotional load Mommas carry begins. Little bits at a time, until its unbearable.
Inadvertently by offering to help our kids(and husband) we’ve taken on their responsibilities.
We love them SO SO much and would do anything and everything for them. Because we do sometimes (and maybe don’t have clear boundaries) we then are expected to forever and always do it.
What happens then is our sweet husband and children become dependent on us, and are insecure in their own abilities because we haven’t given them a chance to figure things out on their own.
You know that spider man quote “With power comes great responsibility”. Well the same is true on the flip side if we take their responsibilities away we have taken away their power. They feel completely disempowered.
We have inadvertently(oh I like this word today) made them in some ways “helpless”. Oh I don’t think the husbands will like this word. But stay with me here. It’s not that they aren’t capable. They TOTALLLY are. If they married us we know that they are capable of SO SO much.
But we have knocked their legs out from under them. We have become the powerhouse we are, and by doing so we have taken away our families ability to do for themselves.
So to make this emotional load shift. We have to do three things.
Take Inventory of Responsibilities
Yes I’ll speak more to this point in my YouTube video that comes out this week. But we want to write it ALLLLLL out. Everything that needs to be done in a our home, in our family. Get all of the crazy out on paper and decide who is in charge of what. Who is responsible to feed the dog? Who is responsible for grocery shopping? Meal planning? Mowing? If it’s all you…. Let’s make a shift
2. Delegate & Communicate those responsibilities
Okay this is where the shift comes from. We can see all the things that need be done. What can you delegate out? What can you just cross right out? Communicate effectively what you expect from your family and then….
3. Let Go
This is where a lot of thought work needs to come. When we let go we are letting go of expectations. This is the hard part momma because we are letting go of that perfectionism that you hold onto so tight. We are allowing our family to forget things, miss out on things, or mess up (aka natural consequences). We are allowing out kid to show up to practice without his glove and deal with the natural consequences. We are allowing ourselves to be perceived as imperfect.
This is where I shine as your life coach. This is where we get to do the work to make the emotional and physichal weight load shift that you so so desperately need.
Mommas, I don’t know what you’re trying to prove to who. But you don’t need to anymore. You are enough.
You don’t need to do everything for everyone. You don’t need to carry everything alone. You have a partner, you have a family…. Start using them. Start letting go of doing everything perfect. Let your family make mistakes, let them mess up.
Do the work, so you can be free again. So we can feel balance and joy once again. So we can enjoy that beautiful imperfect family once again. Please believe me when I say this, balance and emotional freedom is available to you. I’m here to help.
