If I could go back, I wouldn't try to be a perfect mom.

I'd try to be a more aware one.

That's the difference I understand now. Not perfection. Not control. Not having all the answers. Awareness.

For years, I thought being a good mother meant getting it right all the time. Staying calm. Being patient. Knowing exactly what to say when emotions were running high. I believed that if I loved my daughters enough, worked hard enough, and sacrificed enough, I could somehow protect them from every imperfect part of me.

Looking back, I can see how impossible that expectation was.

Motherhood doesn't come with a handbook, despite the billions of opinions available online. There isn't a chapter that explains how to raise children while you're still trying to understand yourself. There isn't a guide that tells you what to do when you're navigating your own mental health while simultaneously teaching tiny humans how to manage theirs.

The truth is, I wasn't raising my daughters from a place of complete healing. I was raising them while I was still healing myself.

At the time, I didn't fully understand that. Like many mothers, I was focused on survival. There were lunches to pack, bills to pay, schedules to manage, rides to give, and two girls who needed me. Life keeps moving whether you're having a good day or a difficult one. Children still need comfort when you're overwhelmed. They still need guidance when you're questioning yourself. They still need consistency when your own emotions feel anything but consistent.

Living with bipolar disorder and borderline personality disorder added another layer to motherhood that I wasn't always prepared for. Bipolar disorder can affect mood, energy, motivation, and emotional stability. Borderline personality disorder can make emotions feel louder, faster, and harder to regulate. While everyone experiences those conditions differently, for me it often meant feeling things intensely and trying to figure out how to navigate those feelings while also being the person my daughters relied on.

Some days I showed up exactly how I wanted to. I was patient, present, engaged, and connected. Those were the days that matched the version of motherhood I had imagined in my head. Then there were other days. Days where I felt overwhelmed before the morning was even over. Days where stress piled up faster than I could process it. Days where my reactions happened before my awareness had a chance to catch up.

For a long time, I viewed those moments as evidence that I was failing.

Now I see them differently.

I wasn't failing.

I was functioning with the tools I had at the time.

That doesn't mean every reaction was healthy. It doesn't mean every decision was perfect. It simply means I was doing the best I could with the knowledge, emotional skills, and self-awareness I had available then. The mother I was did not have access to the version of me sitting here today. She didn't know what I know now. She hadn't learned what I've learned. She hadn't spent years in therapy, completed DBT, or developed the awareness that eventually changed everything.

Awareness is one of those words people throw around a lot, but I don't think we talk enough about what it actually means. Awareness isn't just recognizing your emotions. It's recognizing your patterns. It's understanding what triggers you. It's noticing your tone before it changes the entire direction of a conversation. It's realizing that your nervous system is becoming overwhelmed before you reach a breaking point.

Most importantly, awareness creates choice.

Before awareness, I often felt like I was living inside my reactions. Something would happen, emotions would take over, and by the time I understood what was going on, the moment had already passed. Then came the guilt. The replaying. The endless mental review of everything I wished I had handled differently.

I spent years believing guilt was proof that I cared.

The reality is that guilt and growth are not the same thing.

Guilt keeps you staring at the past. Growth helps you learn from it.

I wish I had understood that sooner.

For years, I thought accountability meant beating myself up. I thought being a good mother required carrying every mistake forever. What I've learned instead is that accountability isn't punishment. Accountability is awareness followed by action. It's being willing to acknowledge where you fell short and then making a conscious effort to do better moving forward.

That's where real growth happens.

Not in perfection.

Not in shame.

In awareness.

One of the biggest misconceptions about parenting is that children need perfect parents. They don't. Children need safe parents. They need honest parents. They need parents who are willing to learn, apologize, repair, and grow. They need adults who model what accountability actually looks like.

That lesson changed the way I view motherhood.

For a long time, I thought mistakes were what damaged relationships. Now I think avoidance does far more damage. Relationships aren't strengthened because nothing ever goes wrong. They're strengthened because people are willing to come back together after something does.

That's where repair comes in.

Repair is one of the most powerful skills I've learned, both as a mother and as a person. Repair is being able to say, "I wish I had handled that differently." Repair is being able to acknowledge someone's feelings without immediately defending yourself. Repair is understanding that love isn't measured by how rarely you make mistakes, but by what you do after one happens.

The older my daughters get, the more I appreciate that lesson.

Our conversations today look very different than they did when they were younger. There's more honesty. More depth. More vulnerability. We've talked about emotions, misunderstandings, difficult moments, and experiences from different perspectives. Some of those conversations have been uncomfortable. Some have been healing. Most have been both.

What I've discovered is that healing doesn't always happen in therapy offices or self-help books. Sometimes it happens sitting across from the people you love most, listening to their experiences with an open heart.

And maybe that's the biggest lesson motherhood has taught me.

The goal was never perfection.

The goal was growth.

The mother I was loved her daughters fiercely. She got some things right. She got some things wrong. She worried constantly and carried more than she knew how to put down.

The mother I'm becoming still isn't perfect. She still has difficult days. She still gets overwhelmed. She still makes mistakes.

The difference is that now she understands herself better. She knows how to pause. She knows how to repair. She knows that awareness matters more than perfection and that growth matters more than guilt.

Most importantly, she knows that being a good mother isn't about never falling short.

It's about continuing to learn, grow, and show up anyway.

And for the first time in a very long time, that feels like enough.

~Tj 🩷