As I lie here in bed at night….

Feeling this terrible pain

The crushing weight of guilt

A mothers guilt tearing at my heart

Did I show ‘I love you’ today

Did I make you feel heard today

Did I make it clear how proud I am

Or did I not do enough?

I wanted to take you out today

To go and explore new shores

But tiredness overwhelmed me this day

And all I could muster was feeding for today

Did I disappoint you

Did I miss out on a day with you

Did I waste precious time I could have made memories with you

And then I’m reminded again of the pain

that feeling

The crushing weight of guilt

A mothers guilt tearing at my heart

You know you mean the world to me

Yet sometimes I can’t be strong

Sometimes I just need to rest

But I hope you know I love you true

I hope you know I’ll always try my best

And will keep doing so till my last breath….

Because you are my every breath ❤️❤️❤️

(NB. Not a poem as such, more thoughts going through my mind when I’m lying in bed and the house is quiet. I know my kids know I love them and that they are my everything but sometimes the guilt of not being able to do more with them (time, money etc), as well as sometimes, being so so tired that I just need to recharge in order to get going again, fills me with such guilt. As I quite frequently tell my friends, “you are not a machine”, I tell myself the same but that bloody ‘mum guilt’ still seeps in through the cracks….and today I realised I tend to feel it more on sunny days (we don’t get a lot of sunshine in the UK 🙄) ….”we should go out and enjoy the sunshine, we should make the most of it, we shouldn’t waste a day we can spend outdoors” but I’m learning to change the word “should” to “could” and it is helping a little 🙏🏼

I talked very openly with the kids today about how I’m feeling tired and explained my needed to rest at home.

Many of my mum friends suffer from mum guilt but they say they feel it less because there is a dad to help. I’m not sure I believe that because I think mum guilt exists whatever your in a relationship or not – it’s there if you have kids. But you know what……with or without a dad, ‘mum guilt’ needs to go and do one because we are all only trying to do our best and after all……we are not machines!!! So if you are feeling it too, know that you are not alone and I guess all we can do is just show up and be honest with our kids in the hope it will make them more understanding and compassionate as adults. ❤️