My Biggest Regret...

There are so many moments in motherhood where we're simultaneously desperate for something to change and heartbroken that it's changing.

You can be desperate for them to sleep through the night, then miss the baby who needed you. You can be exhausted by school mornings, then suddenly realise they're walking into school without looking back. You can spend years thinking, “I can't wait until we're through this bit”, only to look back and realise you were waiting your way through a childhood.

This week I shared something that has been sitting with me for a while:

“My biggest regret is realising how much joy I missed while I was waiting for life to get easier.”

And maybe regret is too strong a word. I think it's more a realisation that, during a really painful season of my life, I got stuck in the story that life had to be impossibly difficult.

I've had conversations with friends who say they wish they'd been more present and cherished it all more, but they were in the depths of financial crisis, wondering whether they could put food on the table.

So I'm certainly not saying, “Enjoy every second! They're only little once!”

My message is this:

Your child will need very different things from you at different stages of their life.

Your baby might need physical availability. Your toddler needs you to hold a boundary while they scream. Your school-age child needs you to help them become independent without disappearing. Your teenager may need you to tolerate more distance without interpreting it as rejection.

The child changes. The relationship changes. Your role changes.

And there's always going to be something that's hard, and something that's wonderful.

But I keep coming back to this:

You can't cherish THEIR lives, if you're not cherishing your OWN.

Not loving every minute. Not pretending the hard bits are magical. Not stopping yourself wanting things to change.

Just being present enough in your own life to actually experience it, rather than constantly waiting for the next stage, more sleep, better behaviour or things to get easier.

That's exactly what happened for one of my clients, who I shared about this week.

She came to me dreading the teenage years because she didn't trust herself to handle what was coming. Through our work, she stopped trying to prepare for every possible teenage challenge and started building the relationship her daughter would need as she grew.

And somewhere along the way, something shifted.

She went from dreading the teenage years to wondering whether there would be a crazy hair phase or a boy band phase. 😂

She didn't suddenly know everything about teenagers.

She trusted herself to meet whatever came next.

That's the work I do inside THRIVE. Helping you understand your child, understand yourself, understand the patterns in your family and work out what needs to change so you can actually live the stage you're in.

If you know something needs to shift in your family and you're ready to do that work properly, I'd love to work with you.

Read some more about it, and fill out an enquiry form here.  You don't have to wait until this season is over to start feeling differently.