My normal morning goes like this.
Wake up to one or both children calling for me. Go and deduce which child is calling. Enter room of said child.
All at once that child wants snuggles, hugs, kisses, to be carried, to be wrapped like a burrito in his blanket, to have his feet tickled “slow not fast”. And with a foggy brain I attempt to meet at least a few of these and get him up.
Next child, same thing, with just a few less words because, you know, not verbal yet. Picked up, snuggled, kisses, raspberries, etc, and then up we go.
This is how we start about our day. And I’m willing to wager that a lot of other moms have mornings that look very much the same.
And as the day progresses, there are more sweet calls for snuggles, more little cries to be picked up, more kisses, more hugs, more raspberries, more wrestling, more piggy-back rides, more physical touch.
I don’t know about you, but the last time I took the Five Love Languages test, I think “physical touch” got about a two. Very last on my list.
By the time I’ve done 11-12 hours of this, there’s a pretty good chance that I’m just done. Done being snuggled, done being kissed, done having anyone or anything anywhere near my personal space. Some days it takes a Herculean effort to not lock myself in a closet.
Sometime I think God might be giggling just a little over His refining plan of having the majority of the others in my home be ones whose greatest love language need is physical touch. I’m trying to laugh too.
My poor husband. I’ve learned over time to (sometimes) separate the need for touch from my children (which is always on OVERLOAD) and the need for affection from my husband. I can usually meet him with a hug and kiss, but there are days where the idea of anyone even breathing near me feels like a nail on a chalkboard. I am so thankful for the gracious man I married.
I know I’m not the only one. I’ve heard moms mention this subject before, desperate to figure out how to have just a little bit of space to breathe. One mom I know stood in front of our moms group and said that one of the main reasons she loved to come was because she knew she could have some personal space for a few hours, free of someone attempting to jump on her or lay all over her or try to take her shirt off. I hear that.
I know that we are all made so differently, and some of us have much higher needs for physical touch. I see people post on their social media about how much they love the snuggles from their children and that they could snuggle all day, reveling in their little-ness and the sweet cuddle time. Don’t get me wrong, I do love snuggles from my boys, and I do delight in them being little. But I do reach a point in my day when my touch-tank is full to the brim and threatening to burst.
I don’t really have any solutions to this quandary either. You could demand your children stop touching you (which I have done temporarily on more than one occasion) but something tells me that if I didn’t willingly supply the cuddles, my stubborn and determined children would probably take them by sheer force. You could plead with your husband to leave you alone when he’s home with you, but I don’t think that’s right either. Who really knows.
All I can say is that if you are this mom, you are definitely not alone. I’m here too, wondering if they sell an adult-size hamster wheel that I could lock myself in but still perform all my daily duties as a wife and mom and praying often for God to show me how to navigate the waters of littles who need their momma’s love even when Momma isn’t feeling it.
Give yourself some grace and space, mom. Get that pedicure. Buy that hamster wheel. And do that praying, because God knows exactly what your needs are, as well as your kiddos. Let Him guide you through this crazy hard refining process.
And seriously, if you find that hamster wheel, let me know. Help a sister out.
