Have you lost yourself in being a WAHM? How to make yourself a priority and be more than a mom

Hey mama. In this episode, I wanna talk to you about making yourself a priority. Again, how, as a mother and a spouse, someone who runs their own business, you can sometimes forget to take care of your own needs and your own wants and making yourself and those needs of priority. Again. Is extremely important and we're gonna dive right into how to make yourself a priority again, and some tips to figure out what you need to do to be a priority to yourself again, and value your own self worth.

Hey, mama. Are you struggling with how to make time for yourself as a work from home? Mom, are you drowning? Laundry and digs, poopy diapers and kids, but constantly screaming. Mom, even though they're five feet away from you. I get it. I'm Jess, and this is caught up in motherhood, or I wanna help you set priorities, create boundaries, ask for help.

Read some time management systems in your life. So you can put yourself worth first. You can show up for you without sacrificing motherhood and without the guilt. So if you are ready to be caught up in motherhood, then go grab a fresh cup of coffee and that laundry basket sitting in the corner. Don't worry.

I've got mine too. And listen in to today's episode,

I have multiple client calls. My youngest just will not take a nap. And, oh my gosh, is that egg in my hair. Oh. And don't even ask me what's for dinner tonight. This day has just gotten away from me. I am so behind. I should just cancel drinks with my friends tonight. There is just no way that I can go out tonight.

I just can't do it. Does any of this sound familiar? Did you just cringe or nod your head? Yep. That's just how it goes. No time for you, mama. Well, I wanna tell you that this is exactly the time to go out for drinks with your friends or get that pedicure. Just don't cancel again. You mama deserve to be a priority.

When I first became a mom, I was told you have to make sacrifices to be a parent. That's just how it. You have to sell the fun sports car and stop going to the salon because you're a mom now and things are different. As a new mom. I believed them. I sold my VH charger, my beautiful muscle car that would've made my grandfather proud to know that I owned.

I even started a subscription hair dye box, so I could do my own hair. And I painted my own to. Terribly by the way, my nieces totally could do a better job than me all because I was told mothers need to make sacrifices. And somehow in my head, I translated that to be that if I was a good mom, I had to make sacrifices.

Otherwise I wasn't good enough. No boy was I wrong, but I had to learn it the hard way. When I first left corporate, my VA business, wasn't really taking off yet. And I felt the pressure to reduce our bills and spending any way I could. So no more daycare check, saving a hundred dollars on my car payment every month.

Check no more, $200 to the salon once a quarter check, not to mention all the other savings that come with working from home gas insurance, just a little bit eating out over lunch breaks, coffee stops and so on, but I didn't see all of this. As things that were contributing to my own self worth, I didn't see how getting my hair or my nails done had really made me feel better and helped me value myself more.

I didn't see that it showed myself how important I was to me to do the things that make me. Now, I'm not talking vanity stuff here. I mean, confidence and relaxation and my own happiness. These are the things that make me happy. And, oh my goodness. The salon I used to go to, it was so relaxing. They had that spa radio station playing a waterfall feature.

My absolute favorite Aveda tea and shoulder massages. When you're getting your hair wash. It was like a recharging moment for me. And the best part was it was two hours every quarter where I got to just relax and not be needed by anybody. And I loved it. It wasn't until this went away, that I found out how much I needed this little recharging period, this, this little break from being needed and being a wife, a mother caretaker.

Uh, self-employed and having clients boxing me all the time, I didn't realize I needed that little bit of a break until it was gone. I needed that me time. And without that reoccurring appointment, once a quarter, I found myself not making my needs a priority. I was always going from one task to another doing all the things I had decided I had to do, but not doing the things I wanted to do that to do list as I'm sure for you is nonstop.

It never ends cross one thing off. Add three to the bottom, right? Have you ever felt that way? You're just so deep into doing all the things and managing that to do list and taking care of your family, your business, the house that just one day you walk past the mirror and you look at yourself and you actually see who's on the other side of that mirror.

And you say, who is that? That's not me. What happened? Well, if you've had that moment and you're not sure what to do about it, I have a simple solution for you. Make yourself a priority again. I see you rolling your eyes at me and saying, Jess, I know easier said than done. And I get it. Trust me. I do. I have totally been there.

So let's go over what you can do first. Okay. First. Accept the statement, make yourself a priority. Tell yourself I am a priority. I am worthy of my own time to do the things that I want. What I need is important. Your happiness is still important. You can be a good mom. Take care of your kids. Run your business, have a loving marriage and value yourself all at the same time you can be done.

And it just takes some self-awareness practice and follow through. There are going to be things you are going to have to give up eventually or things that are going to need to change. And that's okay. But make these changes from a place of acceptance, not a place of fear, or I have to. Your life is forever changing your business, your kids, and with each of these changes, your priorities are going to change and that's okay.

You just need to accept these changes. Like I said, uh, from a place of acceptance, not from a place of fear or I have to, so this is what I want you to do first, grab a piece of. And write down all the things you sacrificed to be a good mom, all the things you stopped doing for yourself, write them all down.

This is gonna be a really nice brain dump for you. Just get it all out. Okay. I'm not telling you to be resentful or hurtful or angry in this moment, but if you need to feel those emotions, feel them acknowledge them. And then accept them because those are your feelings over the past, we are moving forward and we are gonna have positive feelings and we are going to take those things that were wrong, that we did in the past, not putting ourselves as priority and we're going to fix that going forward.

Okay. So accept the past. We can't do anything about it. I am an overthinker, so it's hard for me to , but except those things from your past. And say going forward, I am making myself a priority. Once you have it all out on paper, I want you to pick that one thing that would make you feel like more than a mom.

Again, that one thing that will make you feel like you again, pause me if you wanna do this right now, don't worry. I will wait right here with my coffee for you to finish this brain dump. Do you have that one thing that you wanna start doing again, for me recently, it was getting my nails done. I don't know why, but for some reason, no matter how many poopy diapers I change or how many times I get spit up on, I feel beautiful and confident and put together.

When I see my nails are done. Now, once you have that thing picked out, make the phone call and book it, put it on the calendar, do what you need to do. To make it happen. Then I want you to tell your husband, tell him you need his help and support to make sure you don't cancel this. And that it'll actually happens.

Why don't you just make the hair appointment at the expensive salon? Like I used to go to where they charge you $50. If you cancel within a 24 hour period, that alone was motivation enough for me when I was still going there. So I don't, I moved far away from that salon. Otherwise I'd still be going, but seriously, explain to your husband that you need to do something that's just for you from time to time, once a month at a minimum to start most likely, he's going to agree with you and being full support.

He's going to be on board because he loves you and he wants to see you happy. He wants those moments. that you probably had before kids before the career changed in being self-employed. I remember when my husband and I first were dating and first married before we had kids and all these things, one of our favorite things to do after work and dinner was to relax on the couch together.

He would play his games. I would read a book, I'm a big reader, and we got to spend that time together without. Interacting and being together. And that was just one of those things we loved to do. Now, my business that I'm running and the kids, those moments don't happen very often. And it's more on me because my kids go to bed.

And what am I doing? I'm sitting down in front of the computer. Doing work instead of sitting on that couch, reading a book and cuddling with my husband, like we used to do, and those are shifts that I made. And those are things that I'm working on trying to do less of working after the kids go to bed and trying to spend more time doing those things that we used to love doing together by telling your husband and having that open line of communication with him.

That you need to make yourself a priority and you value your self worth is important. I'm sure you can tell me at least one thing that he does that he loves and gets to do regularly. You wanna know why that is. He makes it a priority. My husband, after we get the voice to bed and the house is picked up.

Yes, he does help. He likes to play video games and some nights he gets to play for an hour. Others maybe too, but he knows that the big priority items are done for the day and he deserves to relax at the end of the day and do what makes him happy. And so do you, you deserve to relax at the end of the day and make your downtime a priority.

The laundry and the dryer can wait till tomorrow. That client project you need to finish will still be there in the morning during your normal business hours. And you can reorganize that play closet another day, take the time, and don't feel guilty for it. Tell yourself you are worth it. Your wants are important.

Hell, say it in front of a mirror or write it down. I know you've heard about affirmations before, so pick your preference and go do it. All right. So at this point, hopefully you've picked out that one thing you're going to do to show yourself you value yourself, right? You've done your, your brain dump.

You've made the phone call. If you need to schedule an appointment. I'm going to pretend that you're giving me an energetic. Yes. Now go put this on your calendar in two or three months. I want you to go back to your brain dump and pick something else off that list and add it to your calendar. Schedule that time, and don't cancel on yourself.

Tell your husband again and have him hold you accountable to value yourself. Again, it doesn't always have to be something that costs you money or be about going out. It could be having a glass of tea and reading a good book before. Or watching that show that you are so behind on that it's over and everyone's talking about it, but you're still over here on season one with your fingers and your ears, trying to get through episode two.

go do that. If that's what's going to make you happy and remember you are worth it, you do not need to sacrifice anything. You don't want to be a good mom. You are always. You are already a good mom. Once you have that brain dump done and you pick that first self-worth item, I would really love it. If you shared it with me in my Facebook group.

So we can support each other and show up for our own self worth.

Hey mama, thanks for hanging out with me today. I know you have a lot going on and I appreciate you taking the time to listen. Since this is one of my first episodes. I wanna invite you to join my launch team. Simply go to dress array.com/podcast and sign up. Don't worry. The Link's gonna be in the show notes too.

You're signed up. I'll send you an email with three simple things I'm asking people to do. That's it. By joining my launch team, you'll also be entered to win one of two swag boxes. Now these boxes have some fun podcasts, branded items, as well as other things provided by other entrepreneurs. That'll be perfect for any mom.

If you wanna see a sneak peek of what's inside, then follow me on Instagram at underscore Jess, I cannot wait to see who the two winners are going.