Welcoming Small Victories: Keeping the "me" in Mommy

Welcoming Small Victories: keeping the "me" in Mommy (via CreativeClementine.com)


I'm on my way to rejoining the blogosphere! Honest. And in the spirit of starting small, I thought I'd share something I've been doing at home to maintain my sanity.

If you know me at all, you know I'm a doer. A planner, yes, but also a doer. I haaaate not being able to do the things I dream up in my head. I see a box in a stupid place and I move it. I see a shelf that needs rearranging and I rearrange it. I see a messy dropzone that needs a system and I fix it. It's not always that the things are super important, I just need to do things.

So imagine my dismay this summer, in a brand new home, a hot pregnant mess with swollen feet, realizing there were things I couldn't do. I thought keeping my feet up was going to kill me. I couldn't paint the walls. I couldn't reassemble my bookshelves. I couldn't rearrange the baby's room. There were a bunch of major, high priority things to be done that I just couldn't do alone. And I was alone often enough for that to start making me loopy.

If it sounds sad, it kinda was.  

I needed a solution to the blahs I was experiencing by being unable to lift heavy objects or stay on my feet for too long or breathe in too many (beloved!) paint fumes. I was discouraged from doing anything, simply because I couldn't do everything. So we introduced "Small Victories".


A photo posted by C.Lem (@creativeclementine) on



In my world, small victories are small manageable projects that take minimal effort to hammer out, but give me a boost when I'm bummed that the big things can't be done. Sometimes they are tasks or crafts, sometimes they are purchases. New seasonal flowers for the porch? Small victory! Pictures finally framed? Small victory! Pathway cleared in the messy storage area?  Small victory!  These things tend to occur in otherwise chaotic conditions, but they are itty-bitty happy accomplishments that keep me inspired and give my brain a break from overflowing with unrealized inspiration.

Now that I'm home with baby, and surrounded by the same nagging urges to "get shit done" almost 24/7, these small victories are crucial. I'm a making and doing person by nature--with a higher than usual chance of my hormones bumming me out post-partum--in a situation that mostly keeps me from doing the things I would usually do to feel like myself.
 

A photo posted by C.Lem (@creativeclementine) on



I love being a mom--more than I expected, even. This little guy is adorable and snuggly and straight up awesome. But to be the best mom I can be I need to keep a firm grasp on what makes me function. Small victories are my little way of remembering that I'm a person with her own interests underneath this fluffy mom exterior. My hormones and sleep deprivation are already going to remove parts of me from the equation from time to time. I never ever want to feel like parenthood is somehow holding me back from being myself, so I wanted to get a jump on that hormonal risk.

Small victories may not always be "blog worthy"... and that's absolutely okay with me. My priority is keeping myself afloat, not stressing myself out to get a good blog post out of things.  And lets be honest: I'm not at a point in new-mom blogging where I could manage both the doing and the blog photo taking and editing process. Sometimes I know when to pick my battles; I'm good with admitting I'm not great at being both a mom and a blogger just yet--and motherhood is clearly more important. So. While I figure all of this fun stuff out behind the blog scenes, you can follow along on Instagram with the hashtag #clemssmallvictories.



Love love love!

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1 comments

  1. Small Victories are sometimes the most meaningful. I will thoroughly enjoy watching #clemssmallvictories and I'm sure be inspired to stay on top of my Get Shit Done list!
    PS. I loved the post with your Holey sock ;)

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