Keep your mama friendships guilt free

I have been so blessed to have several amazing groups of girlfriends, most of whom are mamas. I have a handful of dear friends from high school, sorority line and big sisters who have become like family, my college international housemates, my college friends whose spouses have become my husband's friends, beloved friends from our time in family housing at UNC, my Code Brown Crew from UNC Pediatric Residency, the mamas from the parenting group my husband and I started 3 years ago, and my family - I count my mother, mother-in-law, and great aunt as three of my best friends - these women fill my life with advice and love and accept my text messages and incoming calls day or night. I love, love, love them!

I truly believe that it takes a village to raise a family and it takes a tribe of girlfriends to keep a mama sane and thriving. Over time I have come to realize that it is impossible to be everything to someone and as such I have been able to find over time that all of the different qualities my girlfriends have make for some diverse, sound, and priceless advice. I have never been a one-best-friend type of girl even though I wanted to be and instead do much better with a cadre of lady friends. 

As our lives have ebbed and flowed, sometimes the calls are more frequent, sometimes months or even  years go by without communication. But the love is always there. After months of not speaking I have done consults on sick kiddos, talked to family members who had medical questions, done an emergency contraception consult for an adolescent volunteer visiting the United Arab Emirates (it is dangerous in many countries to have unmarried sex). I have walked with friends through infertility, infant loss, miscarriages, marriage challenges, spousal communication issues, school issues, health issues, you name it. 

As my life has become busier I have been doing more lately to immediately send a text when one of them crosses my mind. Just a quick "you ran across my mind, it's been so long, sending you a big ole hug. How are you and the family?!?". Which leads to a flurry of updates before we have to run. And if I really feel compelled and have some alone time in the car, I pick up the phone and call. Some of those impromptu catch up calls have been life changing for me and for the other ladies. 

I have incorporated a saying recently when the inevitable "I am so sorry it's been so long" is uttered. I quickly say something like "Girl!!! Our lives are so busy ain't nobody got time for mama guilt! Call or text me when I run across your mind and I'll do the same for you!" and then we laugh and continue to catch up in the few minutes we have.

So to all of the mamas out there. Call or text your friends when they run across your mind. When you talk, carry on where you need to. If you feel the need to apologize for it being so long, be gentle and forgiving with yourself and stop yourself! Let's minimize the guilt we have in our lives and do what we can when we can unapologetically. If your friend apologizes, tell her you refuse to have any guilt in your relationship when life is already so complicated and you promise to do what you can when you can to stay in touch. Here's to keeping your mama friendships guilt free and full of love! 

How do you keep in touch with your friends? How do you minimize guilt in your relationships? Please comment below!

Forty years and counting......

Random ponderings on turning forty........

• There is genuine sadness and mourning when a favorite piece of makeup is discontinued.......it has taken me years to perfect the “easy, 5-minute, naked-face” look. Now I have to start that one piece over again and it genuinely hurts me..... 
• Alternatives to having a kid: 1) purchase $12,500 worth of organic produce and just pile it up in your living room. Leave to rot. Periodically stomp through it wearing Peppa Pig rain boots and a set of PJ Masks jams. Sometimes pretend to clean it up with a set of tiny wooden cleaning tools. When it starts to smell, scream at your spouse that it is his or her fault that the mess is there. Then toss in an emphatic “you hurt me, you’re not my best friend anymore!!” when he/she denies it. 2) drive to a bank on a tiny pink tricycle with streamers, rob it using only the threat of violence with your ridiculously fast-growing finger- and toenails, then take the pile of cash you claw away from the teller and just light it on fire in the middle of your living room. Repeat monthly. At least 10,000 USD should equivocate the experience of parenting. 3) buy some clothes that you really love, but get them two sizes smaller than your fit. Then look at them hanging in your closet every day while you pull on big shapeless scrubs, or Lycra yoga pants stained with unknown substances and with a forgotten mermaid sticker on the bum. Tell yourself that someday you will wear those again, but know that you won’t. In fact, you never did. Also, download an audio file of Honey Boo Boo complaining about a lack of syrup on her hot dogs and play that on an endless loop in the background. You know, just to sharpen your mind. 
• There are many trade-offs for waiting until later in life and marriage to have a kid. For example, with the presumed extra patience afforded by years of taking so much crap from the external world comes creaky, swollen and painful joints, stretching to their limits with every game of “pretend to be a floor worm with me!” or kneeling on the bathroom floor next to the bathtub, eating invisible cake slices out of bathtub toys with all of her rubber duck friends. But, when your kid makes you some fake strawberry shortcake out of a washcloth and some Paw Patrol purple body wash and hands it to you in a plastic cup with a star-shaped hole in the bottom, you eat that shit. Heck, I’m just happy to be invited to the party. 
• Alone time is the greatest gift the universe has to bestow upon me. There is never enough of it, and it nourishes my soul for when it gets people-y out there. The kid gets the majority of my energy, followed by job and hubs, mostly in equal proportions. Regeneration time is critical, and I’m learning to not feel guilty about it. 
• The more that I age, the more that I learn to stand up for myself and what I believe in a more fierce and unapologetic way. Being told how to use my voice by any number of different people with different agendas and issues is becoming harder to stomach. I genuinely appreciate differing opinions and polite discourse (the more animated, the better!), but when people try to strong-arm their issues and life views on me with tone-policing and gaslighting, well, Iam done sitting back and taking it, especially in my own personal space. I’m too old for that noise.
• Work-life balance is impossible (at least for me). It’s never balanced. One thing is always outweighing something else. It’s more about trying to keep my head above water, occasionally being really good at one thing or another, oftentimes just getting by, and hopefully not letting anybody die on my watch. There is also reminding myself that most of the time, the job I’m doing is good enough, and I’m learning to be okay with that. Being a doctor isn’t for the weak of heart. And being a mom isn’t for the weak of head. Sometimes my heart prevails in medicine and I cry. Sometimes my head prevails in parenting and I cry. It’s all so, so hard. But also pretty badass and (mostly) rewarding. And being a wife is a delicate and ever-moving target of balancing head and heart. Sometimes this is the hardest job, loving the one you’re with and nurturing that commitment. 
•  My husband and I have had an awful lot of loss in recent years, to include both of my parents, and his mother. Raising our daughter without these loved ancestors has brought on a lot of pain in such unexpected moments. She never got to meet them, and yet we see each of them in her nearly every day. Nature is a remarkable thing, perpetuating itself in this way. I wasn’t sure that I wanted to do this whole parenting thing for a myriad of reasons, but catching glimpses of my mom and dad again every now and again in my daughter’s face or voice is about as spiritual as it gets for me. I embrace this fully. 
• I’m truly happy to see forty, and I hope to have sixty more. I do love this life, including the joy, the pain, the humor, the tears, the angst, the stress, the happiness, the closeness and the love. Each new day is not guaranteed. The first forty (wow!) have been pretty damn good. Looking forward to what comes next.......