Late-Night Ramblings of a Tired Parent

Tonight is one of those nights where I can't sleep. It is most likely because I stayed up too late watching an intense television show, and decided to watch one too many episodes of said show. Once I finally decided it was time to go to bed I shut off the TV, Roku, went upstairs, and climbed into bed. Not five minutes later, Reece started crying.

I tried putting her pacifier in her hand so she could have it if she wanted it, and that didn't work. So, I covered her with her blanket and gave her a kiss on the forehead. It didn't work. With her sad little cry in my ears and her cute, chubby arms reaching up to me I couldn't help myself. I picked her up and her little arms immediately locked around my neck like two magnets that finally found their opposite ends. After she tossed and turned, and kicked me in the face, Reece finally found a spot where she was comfortable. She ended up on her side, facing me, with one hand frozen mid-hair twirl, and the other arm reaching out with her hand on my cheek. It was adorable. I took her pudgy little hand from my cheek, gave it a kiss, and scooted back to take a look at my sweet, sleeping girl.

Her blonde hair was a mess from not only being asleep since 8:00pm, but from being in her stroller or car seat almost all day. Her pajamas didn't match because I couldn't wrestle her out of her onesie to get her pajama shirt on. So her white pants covered in butterflies and flowers are paired with a brown striped onesie instead of a pink shirt that says "Daddy's Girl". Her little nose has crusties all around the outside because her cold is hanging on just enough so that her nose still runs a little bit. But she is perfect. She is absolutely perfect.

She has ten fingers and ten toes. She has two beautiful blue eyes. She has twelve teeth and cute little lips. She has an admirably shaped nose. She has a sweet temperament and a strong will. She's smart and undeniably mischievous. She has an attitude that will take you by surprise and she knows how to stand up for herself around all her boy cousins. She is my baby, and she is perfect.

As I laid there and thought about all of that, I was completely love-drunk on her perfection and beauty, and the undying and unconditional love that she has for me as her mom. And then it hit me. Parenting makes you a better person. Being around these sweet, pure, perfect babies kind of rubs off on you.

1. Parenting makes you more patient. Some of you may be scoffing at this and thinking, "A hard day with my kids makes me lose my patience faster than anything else!" And while this may be true, it's working for your benefit. We don't put ourselves in easy situations to help become more patient. We put ourselves in situations where our patience is tried and tested. We give birth to alarm clocks that go off at all times of the night and are wired without a snooze button. We give our children small sized pieces of food so that they can pick them up and eat them. But they can also pick them up and throw them. These are not fun things, but they test our patience. And if we choose to react the right way, we will grow and become a better person.

2. Parenting teaches us that it is okay to be imperfect. The unconditional love of a child is almost incomparable. They don't care if you put their diaper on backwards and then forget to put their pants back on. They don't care if you put them in mismatched clothes. They don't care if you put yourself in mismatched clothes. We are never going to be perfect. We most likely won't live up to the dream of being a "perfect parent." But we can learn to not get down on our imperfections. We can learn to take them in stride and see the good that can come from them.

3. Parenting teaches us how to love. We all think we know what love is when the little boy chases you on the playground, pushes you down, and sticks his tongue out at you. And then we are sure we knew what love is when we're sixteen and get our first kiss. But that moment is then trumped when we find the man we want to marry and we say "I do." "Now," we think, "I know what love is." But then we experience the love felt when pregnant. An entirely new kind of love. We think this is the ultimate definition. But then we experience the love that we have for our child outside the womb, and the love they have for us. Our children are capable of such a pure love, and being their parents gives us the privilege of seeing and feeling that love.

So, even though sometimes we have days like I had today where we get to be that parent at the store who had the screaming child, we can't forget that parenting makes us better people. Even though sometimes your hair gets pulled, a diaper is filled, and your piano sheet music gets thrown to the floor (to get terribly mixed up, of course) within a matter of thirty seconds, these little monsters children are a gift.

And of course I can say all of this and be so optimistic about being a mom when my daughter is asleep because she's not doing toddler things. Because it isn't until morning when she will be back to the every day routine: Waking up early, unrolling toilet paper, emptying the bookshelf, sending random text messages from my phone, unrolling toilet paper, prank calling my parents, smearing peanut butter and jelly all over the high chair and in her hair, and unrolling some more toilet paper.

You know what else she does every day? Proves to me that being a mom is the best thing ever.