The Ever-Changing Perfect Mom Standard

I completely lost it on my kids. Last Sunday. Twenty minutes before Sunday School. Twenty minutes before I had to teach Sunday School.

I yelled. I made them cry. I stomped out of the room.

And I told myself I was a horrible mother.

Has this ever happened to you?

I’ve been running from the “Horrible Mother” status and chasing the “Perfect Wife and Mom” status for years. And I totally believe it’s unattainable, because I keep changing the standard.

In the early years of our marriage, I felt that I was a good wife if I made cornbread every night at supper. Every night. (Can you tell I’m Southern?) My mom had cornbread at every meal, and her mom always had cornbread. No one ever told me I HAD to make cornbread, but I labeled it as the perfect wife standard.

Finally, one night, Stephen looked at the skillet of cornbread and said, “You know, I don’t really like cornbread.”

Goodbye cornbread.

I’ve done the same thing as a mom. For a time I felt that if I had pitchers of sweet tea (Can’t get away from being a Southern girl!)  and Kool-aid in the fridge, I was a good mama. I had to let go of that standard because we really didn’t need to be consuming that much sugar.

Last night I realized that I have another arbitrary standard of being a perfect mom.

A full towel closet. I feel that if my family has towels for their bath times, I am a good mama.

I’m sure my husband wishes I had higher standards on other things, like dusting the baseboards, keeping the dirty laundry pile below waist level, and mopping the floor more often.

Bless his heart. I let go of having a clean house as a perfect mom standard when the kids were toddlers. If it happened, great. But if I had to choose between happy kids and a clean house, the kids were going to win. Every time.

I would like my kids to always have clean school uniforms, but there are days when we pull them out of the dirty clothes hamper and rock on.

I would prefer to send them off to school with smiles on their faces, ready to face the day. But there are some mornings when tears and frustration win the battles.

I would definitely want to not lose my temper with my children, but it does happen.

I can’t let these things determine if I’m living under horrible mom judgment or in perfect mom bliss.

Sunday afternoon, hours after the blow-up and after we’d all asked forgiveness and cleared the air,  my youngest brought me a book she’d written and stapled together.

In this book, she gave four reasons.

1. You give me hugs when I’m upset.
2. You help me when I need it. You help me with homework.
3. You comfort me when I’m scared. When the tornado siren went off you comforted me.
4. You spend time with us. You play games with us.

Not a single mention of cornbread or sweet tea, or clean towels, or any other arbitrary standard I might have made up over the years. My girl loves me because she knows I love her. She knows this because I give her time, comfort, help, and hugs. And that’s the way I want it.

What about you? Do you have standards in mind that give you “Horrible Mother” or “Perfect Mother” status?

In honor of Mother’s Day, I would like to suggest that we stop judging ourselves based on ever-changing criteria that doesn’t really matter. Let’s choose a standard that matters in the long run. Let’s choose a standard that will impact our kids for the rest of their lives.

I want my kids to know that I love them, and I am for them.

That’s a perfect mom standard that will last.