Are You Unseen?

We are living in a culture of narcissism: Take All The Selfies (I’m guilty of this), Blog All The Emotions (also quite guilty of this, obviously), and social media is the Ultimate Me Platform: MY opinion, MY stuff, MY kids, MY perfectly crafted life for you to view as I want you to view me.

So in our world of LOOK AT ME, why do we feel so unseen?

We all want to be clever hashtags, and instagram influencers, and have people see our photos as perfection, and our words as holy witticism. But maybe the parts of us that feel the least noticed are what ache for true recognition.

In motherhood, some of the hardest parts are the unseen ones:

Sleepless nights with fussy babies and leaky boobs or sticky bottles with formula powder on the counter, OR sleepless nights with feisty toddlers, OR sleepless nights with kid nightmares and sips of water, or just HOLY CRAP SO MANY SLEEPLESS NIGHTS…

Then there is the expectation that we must do the hustle for everything: doctor appointment for one kid, dentist appointment for another, grab that gallon of milk because we’re out, then the classroom needs help for a last minute project, oh but don’t forget about spirit week and dress up days, and did you pack snacks? Did you include their gloves? Can you run this errand after you drop off that kid, and can you just do one more thing? I literally was in my car for five hours on a Monday recently, jostling to and from foster school, bio kid schools, and getting groceries. Seriously, FIVE HOURS, guys.

This isn’t just in parenting, of course; with relationships, or marriage, or partnership, or friendship, don’t so many conflicts come from when you don’t feel seen? I’m not talking about the hi-how-are-ya-good-to-see-you… I’m talking about being seen in the hard, vulnerable, yuck moments. Being seen and being known. Things like, “I see you are overcoming a lot of big things. I see your hard work. I see the effort you are putting into this ginormous struggle”.

Does this fit you at all?

I ruined a date night recently. Like utterly destroyed it – at least the first half. I had been crumpled down to my knees by 10am with the demands of everyone’s emotional needs, massive headache throughout the day, plus the mounting stress that just gathers in a busy week when you slam into a difficult Friday. We sat in a coffee shop that evening while I cried and swore and scared the barista as they gently set a latte near my shaking hands and (hopefully) avoided my fiery-cry-eyes. I was overwhelmed by the expectation that every spinning plate needed to be handled with such finesse – the challenges of our biological children, the challenge of being foster parents, and the challenge of working on a difficult relationship with a family member. That evening in a relatively quiet coffee shop with other ears listening in, I had to smash some plates – figuratively of course. But there is no use for grace if we can’t give ourselves some when the plates start to fall.

It wasn’t my best evening, and I’m sorry for that. But I think we were able to step out of the muck of me being a crying, swearing sailor with a latte, and saw it as a really hard day, with big things to talk about, and recognizing that we are doing High Level Challenging Crap right now.

Do you feel like you’re being seen only for the screw ups instead of the hard work?

I recently identified some big issues in a relationship, and brought it up to the person. And their response? It was dismissive. It was disheartening. It was continuing the path of, “I’m choosing not to see you.”

It sucked. But I’m dusting off my hands and sticking with the people who do see me. My husband that still went to the movies with me after my swearing-latte-date, and still talked through hard stuff in the car, and we still work as a team as the next Massively Hard Challenge comes our way. And my gal pals, that ship me swiss cake roll boxes to cheer me on, or write me notes out of the blue that are ripe with sob-worthy-encouragement and love. Or people that show up with baked goods and home cooked meals. People that see you in the hard stuff, also know what helps to encourage you. It’s important to see both sides of someone.

Do you have your people that truly see you? When you post and share and like, are you doing it for your own recognition, or is it to challenge and uplift and encourage others? Are you sharing bits of your heart out of camaraderie or comparison? And if you could lay them all out, what parts of you have that ache to be seen?

If you get one thing from this post, I hope it’s that you see what’s real. I hope you look to the people you love and see those achey parts that need a tender hand. I hope you don’t see the facades that we post and like and create for the sake of masking what really matters.

~M