Today did not go as planned...

Today did not go as planned. Today was Mason's first birthday. When I heard him wake up, I knew I would walk into his room singing "Happy Birthday". I did that. I knew I would end the day in tears, reminiscing over my growing little boy. I did end my day in tears... but not for the reason I thought I would.

I planned on spending my whole day being Super Mom. I was going to try harder than I ever had before. If I didn't, Mason might not know how much I love him, right?!? I went into his room upon him awakening and sang "Happy Birthday". I was welcomed by a smiling boy reaching up for me! We did the usual diaper change and went out to the kitchen for breakfast. And so began our day. Breakfast has become a fight. Who wants to sit still long enough to fill our bellies? After what seemed like forever of me trying to coax my son to eat, I finally gave up and started "playtime". We played with all of his new toys that he got a few days ago at his birthday party until his Daddy rolled out of bed. IN WALKS THE ROCKSTAR! As soon as Mason spots him, Mommy is immediately forgotten about. He worships his Daddy. I guess I can't blame him. I married a pretty cool guy that has turned into a pretty cool Dad. And when I get teased by well meaning family members about how I have a Daddy's Boy, I laugh it off and say "can you blame him?" But the truth is, it hurts.

It hurts that I try so hard to be the apple in Mason's eye, and I seem to fall short. The rational side of myself knows the same thing that I'm sure my Mom knew. We are the ones that are with them day in and day out. We are the ones that give most of the baths, feed most of the meals, play most of the time. We are there...  all.the.time. As much as our little ones love us, we are "old news". They drink in all the Daddy-Time they can because they know we will be there when the day is done. That is what the rational side of me would say. But sometimes I get so tired, I forget to be rational.

My husband and I chose to have our vacation around Mason's birthday so we could spend tons of family time together. We had lunch together,and then spent the beautiful afternoon at the lake splashing around and picking up rocks and blades of grass. It was perfect. Between the naps and quality time outside, before I knew it the day was almost over. As my Dad was cooking dinner for us, Mason and I were playing on the floor in his new tent. We were both in there, being goofy and throwing balloons at each other. As I tickled him and heard his beautiful laugh, I thought to myself: this is perfect. And then the unexpected happened. As I was chasing him across the kitchen floor, I accidentally nudged him too hard and he took a nosedive into the linoleum. There was a moment of complete silence as my whole household froze and then the screaming began. I scooped up my poor sad boy and hugged him close. Don't worry, Mommy is here.  And after a few seconds of me rocking him in my arms, he spotted his Daddy and pushed away from me. He crawled over to him, sobbing hysterically until he reached his destination. Don't worry, Daddy's got you. And then my tears arrived.

As my husband sat on the floor holding my crying son, I began crying myself. In that moment, I was reminded that Daddy was #1. I was just the woman that pushed her son's face into the linoleum. It didn't matter that I cut out pasta, bread and ice cream for the last half of the my pregnancy due to gestational diabetes...It didn't matter that I spend every waking moment worrying about his well being, making his baby food from scratch or playing with him on the floor. At that moment, I felt like a failure. On the day of my son's first birthday, I sat on the kitchen floor sobbing like a child because I felt like I had failed at the one job that I care about in life.

The title of my blog is "Laughing My Way Through Mommyland"... Sometimes life is too hard to laugh. Sometimes you just have to cry a little bit. I cried because that's how much I truly love my son and care about our bond. But what I learned last night, was being a Mom isn't about how I feel sometimes. It isn't about how I thought parenthood would be. It's about Mason and what he needs. At that moment, he needed more than his Mom's embrace to make him feel better. He needed his Daddy and that's okay. So that's when I sucked it up. I excused myself and cried for a couple more minutes and then got over it. I had dinner with my family and continued to play with my son as if nothing had ever happened. Because he had already forgotten about his stumble and I should forget about mine.

So today did not go completely as planned. But it was a good day. My sweet boy awoke happy and went to sleep just as happy. I didn't sit down and write a letter to my "1-year-old" as I thought I would that night. My mind was elsewhere. I wrote this instead which, in the moment, I needed more. I will still write my love letter to him but he may be 1-year-and-3-days-old. That's okay. Parenthood is about bending and sometimes giving into the perfect image that we think we need to have. I've learned that tonight.

So now, my imperfect day is over. When Mason gave me his goodnight kisses in the darkness of his room, nothing else mattered in that moment. Our love spoke volumes.