Here's to a new year

Lately I have become aware of a problem I have. May I share it with you? Since you cannot object, you get to hear about it anyway.
I love being a mom. I have dreamed of being a mom since I was a young girl who could carry around a baby and sing it lullabies. At the age of 8 when my siblings began having kids, I saw my dream taking shape before my eyes but for my siblings. I loved being an aunt. I still love being an aunt.
I looked at my oldest siblings and determined that they were great parents and made the whole thing look easy. Making decisions for your kids and sticking with them and knowing the goals they were working towards. It seemed so easy.
Then I became a parent. I thought life was hard trying to figure out why my baby was crying, how to get her to sleep unswaddled, how to soothe her irritated and teething gums and how to finally get more sleep at night now that I had something that interrupted my sleep.
Little did I know, those were easy problems.
I never knew I might struggle sticking up for my rules and boundaries for my kids. I never thought I would struggle just doing what is best for my family and not trying to please other people over them.
Sometimes I hate the fact that I want other people to like me. I hate that I am willing to compromise myself or my family because I don't want others to think me unfriendly, bossy, cranky or just plain rude. What I perceive as myself being unfriendly, bossy, cranky or rude could just be seen as having firm boundaries. And the fact is that I've never had anyone accuse me of being those things, but in my eyes I accuse myself for them. If I am involving others in my family's activities I just can't help but want to please the others instead of making sure that my family's needs are being met. D-U-M-B.

But no more! No more, I say!! I am vowing to be true to myself, to my husband, to my children and to those things that are most important to me and to my family. I will not compromise myself or my family anymore just to please others and make them like me. I won't be perfect at this, I just want to be better. I need to be an example to my children who may grow up to be just like me. I want more for them. I want them to be more confident than I am. And so, I vow for my 33rd year to be a more confident me. And now that I've said it, I'm holding myself to it. I hope you will too because I will need all the help I can get.

Flashback to young Alysa. And a seriously awesome perm.