Today's episode is a short meet and greet with me, Jackie, the host of the Simply Freeing Podcast. We'll discuss the honest truth that motherhood is hard and often causes us to feel stuck and unfulfilled. I hope you'll be encouraged by my story and that it causes you to begin thinking about what you can do to take action in your own life if you're feeling stuck.
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This episode walks you through
The reason why this podcast was created.
The importance of simplicity in all aspects of motherhood.
Why motherhood is hard at all life stages and the mindset that we should have during it.
Why we often come to a breaking point in motherhood and discover something has to change.
Jackie gives some insight into her personality, her original dreams of being a working, out of the house mom, some insight into life before becoming more minimalistic and how her life was impacted in a negative way as her family grew because of that.
Through her story we discuss:
Why our personality impacts why we are often extremely dissatisfied and enter into survival mode in our motherhood, especially as more children are added to our family.
Why we might be caught off guard and discouraged when our “dreams” come true.
What life might look like when clutter in your home take the focus away from what truly matters.
Why we’re always comparing our life to others.
What it looks like when you’re running a race to reach a goal that you may not even want.
Don’t have time to listen? Here’s the episode all typed out
Simply Freeing? Motherhood doesn’t feel simply freeing when you’re on autopilot in a home filled with chaos, stress and a ton of pressure. In order to survive the chaos we NEED the right strategies and mindset to embrace the simple and enjoy the few short years we have with our kids. I believe that we are called to see that we CAN rise up, get out of our head, shut out the expectations of the world and what mom life is supposed to be like and change what’s not working so that motherhood is fulfilling. Join me as we discuss all things motherhood, homeschooling, minimalism, faith and health. My mission is to help you embrace simplicity and find freedom in your motherhood. I’m Jackie from Whole9Family and this is the “Simply Freeing” Podcast.
Hello friends! I'm so excited to be recording our very first episode! This is something that has been on my mind and heart for a while but the technical aspect of podcasting overwhelmed me so much but now that I'm on the other side and I've figured it all out it's...simply freeing! See what I did there? ;-)
In all seriousness, I can’t wait to connect with you here through this podcast. I have such a heart for equipping moms to love where they’re at in life no matter what stage they are in. The little years of parenting are physically draining and the later years are emotionally draining. It’s a hard job that can easily keep you running on empty. As of the time of this recording, my kids are 2, 4, 8 and 13 but thankfully my youngest is out of diapers which is amazing! It does go by quickly but it only feels that way when you get to the other side. It’s kind of annoying to hear people say, “Enjoy them! It goes by so fast!” When you’re on your 8th cup of coffee and can barely function. Lots of grace is needed for those of you with little Itty bitty babies.
Consider today to be a really short meet and greet. Let’s get started! I came up with the name for this podcast, Simply Freeing, because I’m really into simplifying everything and the reason why I’m into that is because I believe that it is extremely hard to survive in motherhood if you don’t simplify. Now, just to give you a little bit of background on my personality, I am super go with the flow and laid back. Now that works if you have maybe up to 2 children but once more children are added to the family, things start to break down and get real chaotic. There is a way to experience freedom and really enjoy your motherhood but simplicity is really the key to all of it!
My husband Jon and I met shortly before I graduated high school and got married after dating for 3 years. It’s funny that I have 4 kids now because I don’t have any siblings. As a child, I was always feeling lonely, begging my parents to have another baby. I remember feeling so jealous over friends that had siblings. I just loved the idea of a full, lively home.
When I would go over my friend’s house as a kid, I remember watching my friends carry their baby sisters around. I was just obsessed with holding babies. And it wasn’t just babies...I loved hanging out with my friends who had older siblings too.
So often I would look at my friend's lives and dream about what my life would be like if I had a sibling too and this got me thinking because as an adult, whether you are an only child like me or not, motherhood isn't all that different...
We want what we don't have. We're dreaming of a life that's going to make things better for us and if we come to a place of true contentment where we're actually satisfied with what we have, jealousy will still rear it's ugly head. We all want to be a different version of ourselves. Right? ;-) The structured moms want to be fun and spontaneous. The perfectionistic moms can't help but wonder what it would be like to be less regimented. The laid back, unstructured moms, like me, think that their life would be better if they were structured. In reality, we're all just looking for balance but we don’t know how to get there. We're looking at the characteristics of others and trying to justify why we can and can't do certain things.
Now add your spouse and children to the mix and you'll quickly realize that you’re so caught up in your family’s needs that you don't even have the energy or mental capacity to think about what you want or who you are on most days.
Thinking back, I should have been relishing in the fact that I lived in peace and quiet as a kid instead of obsessing over wanting a sibling. Who knew that my dreams of having a full, lively home would come true big time. As each child entered the world, my life turned upside down...literally. I lived most of my life just riding the waves. Like I said before, my personality is super go with the flow and laid back. It takes a lot to make me cry, get me annoyed or fired up. I'm a pretty chill person. Don't misunderstand my RBF. I'm just relaxing. Google it if you don’t know what that means! ;-)
Being so chill didn't serve me well as each of my children entered the world. Chaos came rushing into my home faster than I could blink. I loved each of my kids so much. I poured my heart and soul into them but it drained me. To others, I looked so happy but underneath the surface, I was happily running a race that I couldn't possibly win if I tried. I was just trying to survive, especially as a new mom. It was really hard.
Life was happening and my dreams of having this amazing family was coming true but I didn't have the time, brainpower or desire in the middle of the chaos to step back and think about who I was as a person. Who was I created to be? What was my purpose in my marriage and my family? We went to church and were pretty active there. I had a strong faith in God but I couldn't truly cultivate that because I was always running...
To work and back. Drop the baby off. Pick the baby up. Make dinner last minute because, oh crap, Jon is actually coming home early today. Because I had to maintain this life that I desperately wanted. I chose this. I got what I wanted...now what? No one gives you that answer.
Things in our life got chaotic, financial stress entered and our marriage was like a swinging pendulum of loving and hating each other. Long work hours for each of us was the norm... Initially, I worked part time as a NYC public school teacher. I was subbing and taking some temporary positions here and there in order to try and get a full time position. That was my goal. We were in an apartment with one child and a ton of crap and the obvious answer for us was to move to a bigger home with more space. (This was way before I became minimalistic which I’ll share more about later.) But Not just any home...a home that would fit our bedroom furniture because that furniture was given to me by my grandmother. Obviously my relationship with her would be severed if I sold that furniture in order to get a smaller, more affordable home.
So...we found our dream home in queens, NY very close to where my parents lived. Our furniture fit and we were happy. I began working full time in the school system. I made a commitment to work full time, otherwise we wouldn't have been able to get a home in New York City.
Each time I said yes to something that brought me closer to “living the dream,” I said no to something else. Here I was...I had a mortgage to pay, a teaching job in a great part of the city to work to pay for our mortgage, lots of vacation time and my mom as my baby sitter. This is simply freeing right? Motherhood isn't simply freeing...What is simply freeing about a life of chaos, stress and overwhelm? Nothing!
Keep in mind that the intent of me discussing this is in no way pointed at those that just have no choice but to keep working, This is more about climbing the ladder to reach a goal that you may not even realize what you are saying yes to. I cared more about maintaining the life that I wanted and what other people thought of me more than loving the actual life I worked so hard to create.
All around me, I was bombarded with messages of what I needed, of how my life should look as a mom and what I needed to do to maintain that! My cluttered house totally reflected this mindset because I couldn’t do it all. Perhaps you can relate - if so, you‘d probably say my life was normal. I was running the New York City rat race like most of the people around me. It took me a while to realize that I was just running a race and I really wasn’t happy even though I got the goal that I was working towards. I achieved that goal and I still wasn’t happy.
But all that changed when I got pregnant again for the second time. All of a sudden I was flooded with these new emotions thinking about how I could possibly sustain this crazy, busy life with 2 children? Something had to change. I want you to think about that for a second. Is that where you are too? Not necessarily NYC but somewhere where you don't really want to be? It took me a while to realize what I had gotten myself into and it was a hard pill to swallow.
I think a lot of us come to a breaking point in motherhood where we sort of wake up. What the heck am I doing? What am I trying to achieve? Is this what I want? These breaking points usually happen when we get totally burnt out or there’s a pretty big life change. My breaking point was during my 2nd pregnancy. It actually was the catalyst for so many major changes in my life....resigning from my job, homeschooling and a big move. These were all things I never really wanted at first. I can’t wait to share more about that in the next episode!
Thank you so much for joining me today on the Simply Freeing Podcast. To learn more about me and the resources I’ve created to help you in your motherhood, head to whole9family.com See you next time!