My Village of Moms
Dr. Braden riding bikes with her sister, Merissa, on a beach trip.
I’m a very busy person. It stems from a few factors: One, I enjoy meeting and helping people. It gives me a sense of validation and satisfaction. Two, I have a lot of different interests and want to follow all of them in their various directions to a high degree. Three, I have a really hard time saying no. So, I will say yes to new commitments and opportunities even when I don’t really have the bandwidth. At the moment, now that I have something like 6 jobs, and 5 kids, and a new company, I am again overwhelmed by all the looming deadlines.
I’ve been in this place before; when I was in high school, I would have play practice or cheerleading practice and still come home and have to do homework and assignments for honors level classes. Needless to say, my grades suffered at times. I wanted to be in all the activities and to perform at a high academic level, but I was drowning. I would come home at night sometimes and cry in the shower.
Big Sister to the Rescue
Recently, I realized that I can’t keep going that way (not that I’m currently crying in the shower, but the overwhelm is similar). I was doing some self-talk, reminding myself that not everyone does as many things as I do, and that I could be kind to myself and ask for some help.
I needed someone to help me work on just the basic “mom management” tasks: Sorting through emails, responding to LinkedIn messages, managing my kids’ field trip and lunchbox schedule. I needed someone who could do all this AND set boundaries and say “no!” on my behalf.
Enter my amazing older sister Merissa. I had an executive assistant previously, but she wasn’t able to continue, so I told Merissa I could hire her at the same rate to organize my email and get all those small, but important, tasks done.
Merissa and I share some traits, but she can focus, prioritize, and set boundaries much better than me. She has 6 kids of her own, so she knows the joy and the struggle of managing a big household with lots of different activities.
Plus, she knows my kids, which makes a big difference to all of us. It means she can contact them directly about important deadlines. She can read their newsletters and register for that event and buy the special sweatshirt and pay for the school dance so I don’t forget to. It is game-changing to have someone in my circle who understands and supports me so well.
Working with Merissa is magical because she knows me—completely. We grew up together; she’s known me my whole life. She has the full context of my life, and I don’t have to explain myself to her. She’s able to be objective when I’m struggling to find the priority.
The Old Cliché is True
People always say, “It takes a village to raise a child.” But I don’t think anyone really considers where that phrase originates, historically. Long ago, when we were still living in small villages, or even family units as hunter-gatherers, the tasks of “being a mom” were communal. Women helped each other as a rule: sisters and mothers, yes, but also friends and godmothers and grandmothers and cousins and neighbors. Women cared for each other’s children, and tended to sick friends together, and saved an extra helping of food for the mom who was pregnant and had given most of her meal to her three other children. Women picked up the slack for each other. It was a given.
So, I’m leaning on the moms in my own village. I’ve enlisted my sister to help me manage my kids and my emails. I’ve also enlisted another mom I’ve known a long time to help me write these blog posts. Because I’m currently a little in the weeds, and I need my village of moms to step up and help me out.
That’s what we have to remember in our very busy, fractured modern lives, that we can still lean on each other and use the power of the collective to help us get everything done. I find so much comfort and strength in this community.
