When You Slack at the Mom Thing

The last week or so I have point blank, slacked at this whole mom thing.

And it's killing me.

I've been pretty sick and glued to the sofa waiting for the hard days to pass, and here I have a bouncing toddler who just wants to play. A toddler who wants to go outside and enjoy what is the most amazing weather (YAY for Fall) and a toddler who wants to go on strolls for however long her little heart desires.

And then there I sit on the sofa, unable to do any of that. There I sit having to occasionally rely on Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood much more than I'd ever like to admit. Y'all know my stance on toddler television, I'm not a fan of it and think that little ones under two shouldn't really have any screen time. But since she's turned one I've been guilty of letting her watch about 30 minutes a day. And now that I'm sick, let's just say it's sadly a bit more than 30 minutes.

A lot more probably. Ugh.

It's a tough job to be supermom when you can barely take care of yourself at the moment. It's tough to get up and fix a healthy lunch for a kid who has decided that over the past couple of days that she doesn't want to eat anything.

Anything.

I blame that on what appears to be a sick little toddler that I now have who is fighting a runny nose, light cough and occasional low fever. So now it's a sick mama taking care of a sick toddler.

Anyone want to come and take care of us? We're taking applications! P.S. Mine isn't anything scary and it isn't contagious.

Being a mom isn't always easy. It never is whether you're a SAHM, WAHM or a mother who works away from the home. No matter what the situation, it's hard and it's even harder when you don't feel well. What really sucks is the own personal guilt we may feel just because we did let our kid watch too much TV and just because we did let them eat a whole thing of puffs for lunch. Guilt because we slacked at motherhood that day and because we were not Instagram perfect.

Why do we do that? Why do we beat ourselves up at not being "the best" all the time? Even when our child received unconditional love all day long from us and we somehow managed to take care of them enough for them to get by, why do we beat ourselves up?

I know why. It's because we want to be the best we can for our children. We want to do the best we can and provide them with the happiest, safest and healthiest upbringing we can. We want to be the best damn mother around.

And when we slack at it, it eats at us.

But it really shouldn't.

Because in the end, we are all just doing the best we can.

So for the moment, cheers to what is about to be another episode of Mickey while mama tries to get better. I'll take all the cuddles I can and thank goodness my toddler is handing those out like candy right now. She's helping take care of mama.

What makes you experience mom guilt?