It Will Be There Tomorrow

When you're on the verge of yelling or losing your mind, remember: most things? They don't have a deadline of TODAY.

For the longest time— and I’m talking more than a decade and a half of parenting— I simply refused to do the one thing that, looking back, would have made the biggest difference in not only my own mental health, but the life of my family: I refused to rest.

I’m not talking about building in a set rhythm of refresh, though there was most certainly that. While we had a daily rest time that I doggedly clung to even in the busiest of seasons, it was the bigger need for stepping back that I couldn’t abide. You know the day: the one where things go so south that it feels unredeemable. The one where you can’t say anything right, and your kids are so out of sorts that there’s no way to wrestle it all back into shape. The one where circumstance after circumstance pops up the thwart your plans and even your mood. The one where you just want to freeze time and restart, and maybe, maybe this time things will go your way.

I can’t tell you how many of those days I pushed through as a younger wife and mother. Baby was up all night with reflux? You can do this. Siblings in that “oil and water” season, dishwasher broken, and phone exploding with texts from extended family wanting you to weigh in on the latest drama? Keep going. Fifteen interruptions from your husband as he completes a home project while you’re attempting to get through math? Find a way to get through.

I wish I could say I did all this with a smile and grace, but you and I both know that even if that’s how we start out in the face of obstacles, our human frailty shows through eventually. I would end up snappy, irritated, and less than pleasant, but by golly, I had done what I had set out to do. I had won!

But of course, I hadn’t won. Not anything worth claiming as a prize, anyhow. I had shown my kids the worst side of me, and I had likely steamrolled anyone and everyone else I came across (husband included) in the process. It wasn’t a daily thing, but it was my go-to on those inevitable days when push came to shove: I wasn’t being knocked over, I would shove right back.

I don’t know exactly where things shifted. Maybe it was when I came into my 40s and the spit and fire of my earlier decades began to wane just a little. Possibly it was after my 6th baby, given fact that more kids equals more opportunities for chaos, and I was simply tired. I’d like to think it was at whatever point where wisdom gained from experience, trumped the desire to get back up and go another round with the impossible, so we’ll go with that. Whenever, whyever, one day I realized something very, very powerful:

It will be there tomorrow.

Yes, there are appointments that must be kept. There are corners that can’t be cut, obligations to be met. But standing where I am today, I can assure you that these things are far more rare and far less pressing that your today-focused brain wants you to believe.

It will be there tomorrow.

With few exceptions, the plans were that you were rushing everyone over will be there tomorrow. The school work you were on the verge of shrieking at your teenager over? There tomorrow, for sure. The playdate with friends? Reschedule for tomorrow. Your routine for the day, now overshadowed by whatever hard emotions or hurt that you or a kid is feeling? Put it off until tomorrow.

If the world is too much. If you’re going to fall apart if you keep going. If your kids are looking at you with eyes that say, “it’s too much.” If you’re interrupted again and again. If you can’t remember where you left the coffee you just reheated for the fourth time…

It will be there tomorrow.

Grab a blanket, throw it over the kitchen table, and stash every pillow in the house under there. Get a flashlight and a read-aloud and make a memory.

Pop some popcorn, hook your computer up to your t.v., and watch old family video clips.

Text your husband that you’re going dark for a few hours, leave your phone on the charger, and go outside with your kids.

Tell your kids to go put on their fanciest dress-up clothes, put on some music in the living room, and have a dance party.

Declare that it’s time for pjs (even if it’s noon), and give everyone permission to go and do whatever their own individual quiet pursuit might be.

You really don’t have to power through those days that make you want to scream. You can if you still have grace in your cup, if you can do it while not being the person you least want your kids to remember. But remember, the world will be there tomorrow. Today, give yourself the gift of knowing when to say when. It’s a gift that we have as homemakers, and one we honestly don’t use enough.

In Christ,

Heather