One.More.Day.One.More.Hug.

Recently there was an instance where I had to be exceptionally strong. Back up, bite the lip,  fight through the emotions so that I would make a sound decision based on the knowledge and information combined with my gut, versus emotion. When I was going through this I was actually recalling an instance back in my 20s when I was gearing up for this client presentation and it was so nerve-racking. My manager who was more seasoned than I seem to be fidgeting a bit next to me and it was so unlike her. I didn’t want to pry but at the same time it was so unnerving that I felt like I needed to know why she was on edge.

As it turned out she was suffering from severe morning sickness and she didn’t want to say anything because as I understand it now it would have distracted her from this client meeting  that was about to happen in the room. While I understood to some degree why she was trying to shut it off it was so funny because she actually turned to me and said please stop being nice to me! I remember in that moment I did not take offense because some part of me understood exactly where she was coming from. She didn’t want to open the book the floodgates. Instead, she needed to get through this presentation and kind of fight mind over matter. In this case it was her mind combating her actual physical feeling of being sick.

This turned out to be a lesson that I learned and subconsciously started to carry through my life and apply it to different circumstances. I’ll give an example. Recently, I started  a different schedule and it was going to be a big change in my household where daddy was kind of stepping up and mommy was not going to be around at the same time she normally was for the past year and a half. When kids are young, or year and a half might as well be six years to them. I like to think I am a seasoned mom therefore I of course am in charge of all the prep work leading up to this point of hiring sitters and writing down schedules and preferences and names of the baseball field‘s and all the things that go into helping someone grasp, even temporarily, the reins on your household. But it also involves setting the emotional stage for what was going to be for my kids a very significant change. Now, I made sure not to delve too far into it because we didn’t want to start creating a scene over something that may not have been anything at all.

But it was in those moments where I was emailing teachers and giving them a heads up just asking them to keep an open line of communication if they happen to notice something different in my kids. For instance, I knew that my husband dropping off my just turned five-year-old at preschool was going to very much rattle him but if I could let all the interested parties know that, then they would be able to help us with the transition to make it go smoothly. I knew my eight-year-old would be impacted, I just wasn’t exactly sure how and I realized one morning that I grossly underestimated him. He was being so brave, so grown-up, and so courageous that I realized I had not allowed him the time to be upset about it. It is not something I possibly could’ve learned before I was in the moment. He was very upset about going to school suddenly and when I finally got it out of him his response was, “I don’t see you as much anymore.’ GASP! Arrow directly into my heart.

The lesson that I learned in that moment was that it was my job to just be a little more brave than he felt he could be or even lots more brave than he felt like he could be. I held him in my arms and he was tearing up and holding on to me very, very tightly. The bus had rolled up and I knew I had to pick the perfect or most perfect words possible in order to be able to calm him down enough to get through the day. But I decided to tell him was exactly what I was thinking and that was me simply asking him if that I could be just a little more brave today than he was yesterday… could he do the same?

I think sometimes in life when we are in these moments it’s just requiring us to be just a tiny bit more brave but it doesn’t mean we have to be brave forever. It’s just that moment that will take us through to the next event or meeting or errand or drop off. We can still  break down and cry at the end of the day. We are allowed to. WE are human. The mountain of to do’s can be at times this endless  list. It’s daunting. My to do list right now for the next two weeks – just responsibilities at home – runs a total of 58 items. If I tackled everything at once like I was asking my son to, you would find me running down the highway towards the next exit with an endless happy hour followed by checking myself into an endless stay at a hotel. ALL. BY. MYSELF. It’s insurmountable. So why would we ask ourselves to accomplish anything different than what we could do in just that one more moment? It’s unfair and unreasonable. But what IS reasonable is being real and honest. Take note of how you calm your friend, child, etc down. Are you abiding by the same advice you give others? So easy to give others advice, right? But remember. Be brave. Just for that single moment. Let the next moment worry about the one after that.