Permission to be a mother

I see it all too often (and have done it myself!)

Business mum’s on facebook apologising for taking longer to reply to e-mails because they are busy with their kids. Apologising for taking longer to complete an order due to their children being sick. Apologising for taking a “break” from their business or blogging etc to have some family time.

I’ve recently been thinking a lot about this as I work on sorting out the balance between business & mothering and thought – It is time we stop apologising and give ourselves permission to be mothers.

In the end – our family and our kids come first. I think most of our fans on facebook and customers understand that because they are mum’s themselves. We all want more time with our children.

Sometimes as a small business owner you can feel that if you don’t post a facebook status update…or don’t write a blog post…or don’t showcase a new product photo etc…that you will start losing business or people will ‘unlike’ our facebook page. So we stay on the never ending merry-go-round that never seems to stop.

However everyday in my newsfeed I see many (too many to keep up with!) inspiring posts and products and status updates. It doesn’t bother me if some of my favourite pages/businesses don’t post anything!

Life goes on with and without our blog posts and facebook photos and e-mail replies.

Don’t get me wrong. I do think customer service is so important to good business practice and if there is a reason why you will be having delays in e-mail replies then by all means it makes sense to say so. Or perhaps if you are a store that offers next day shipping etc then again I understand why immediate response is expected.

However I’m talking about the expectations of small business mum’s replying to all e-mails within a 24hour period (or less!).

Sometimes as much as you want to…and as much as you plan to….your little people just take EVERYTHING out of you. At the end of the day you sometimes don’t have the time….nor energy…nor motivation to then go and sit at the computer and reply e-mails.

This is ok. Motherhood comes first. Our sanity and health comes first.

I’m not sure if this is the best “business” advice….but I love this quote from Loralee Lewis:

“No other success can compensate for failure in the home”

I am telling myself this as much as I am sharing these thoughts with you.

There will always be clients, and facebook fans. However I only have this time now with my children at this age to be there with them.

And although everyone on facebook or e-mail may not notice me being absent….my children WILL notice my absence.

So women – let’s give ourselves permission to be mothers!

Do you struggle with the balance between motherhood & business/working?

How do you manage your competing priorities?