Buzz. My phone vibrates with a new text. I look down and read. “Oh my gosh. You’re never going to believe what M did last night!

She ate the freaking chapstick again and I lost it! I mean who eats chapstick? Apparently my daughter. And I just went ape. #momfail #worstmomever #willsheeverforgiveme

This is followed by: Sad face. Sad face with tears. Sad face.

As I read this, I can’t help but laugh. Of course, I feel bad for my friend, but seriously, the chapstick thing is comical. And truly makes me feel less of a #worstmomever for finding my son trying a taste of his own poop last summer. Twice. (He thought it was chocolate, I think.)

As I’m still trying to figure out what comfort to offer her, I scroll through Facebook just to see another mom post, “Am I the only mom that screams at her kids every day before school?” As I hit comment, to write the words NO in bold, I see four of my other friends have already commented within four minutes of her post. “Sheesh. I guess I’ll leave the #badmom confessions to them since they obviously like to yell at their kids before school. And I’m more of the peaceful type.”

As I start to text my friend back, my own son walks down the staircase just for me to see he has taken off the adorable, hipster outfit I picked out for him in exchange for his raggedy old baseball shirt with stains (oh the horror that a boy wants to wear sports clothes). “That’s it! I’m throwing away all of your clothes if you’re going to keep wearing that trash!! I mean seriously, out of every shirt, you pick that?!! Why do you refuse to look decent? And people always say boys are easier to dress. WRONG!”

My tone must be coming off in the ‘she’s lost it’ category because even my toddler feels the need to step in and say, “Whoa, mom. Settle down. And eat some poop. It works for me.”

Just kidding. He didn’t say that. But he put his hand on me. And now I realize, I’m having another #scarmychildforlife moment. I guess I shouldn’t be texting my friend to comfort her when I’m such a failure myself. I obviously know my children will only remember me getting onto them about their clothing when they speak at my funeral one day. I can hear my sons now.

“Yes. She was a decent mom. Except, she always got mad at us for wearing dirty clothes to school. She also sent sweet notes in our lunches and wrote customized bedtime songs for us every night and never missed any of our games in 18 years (I don’t actual do these things, but I know some of you reading this are THAT good), but we don’t remember any of that. We just remember her getting mad.”

When I write it, you can see how ridiculous it all sounds. But when the scenario is you, you hear your own children at your funeral singing your praises failures. Just admit it. You do. And you truly believe that even if you have 100 good moments in a day, the two bad moments you have define you as a mother.

I cannot begin to tell you the amount of times I have played the “No, I really yelled at them. You don’t get it. I was scary” game—a game that involves two moms trying to one up each other with explaining that they really were scary when they got mad. So much scarier than their friend could ever imagine.

“No, my eyes bulged.
Well, my voice sounded like Darth Vader.
Well I said, ‘Just get out!’
Well I took his Pokemon cards, and I put it them in the trash…”

Oh my goodness!!! Enough already. Don’t you get it?

We all have bad moments. And we ALL feel like it’s those bad moments that define us as mothers instead of the good ones. When in reality, I don’t think you get through motherhood without these moments. I know my mom had some bad moments, and I adore her. In fact, every mom I look up to tells me I shouldn’t. Because I wouldn’t believe what came out of their mouth when trying to get their kids out the door for soccer and swim…

I believe it. Sometimes in addition to being amazing, you lose it. Was there something more?

Oh yeah. I guess there is one more thing. An easy fix. Apologize and own up when you’re acting a fool. Model to your children what apologies look like. Then step out of the shame and get back to being the #bestmomthereeverwas because #yourockthatlikekimkrocksherdiamond.

Okay, I went too far with the hashtag. But you get the point. You’re a good mom. And don’t forget it.

 …

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