Send Snacks and Silence: Raising Two Little Boys

There are days I feel like I ran a marathon…

but I never left my house.

If you’re raising a 6-year-old and a 3.5-year-old at the same time, you already know:

this season is beautiful, loud, chaotic, funny, overwhelming, and exhausting — often all before noon.

My oldest is in that phase where he has opinions about everything.

How the food is cut.

Where he’s sitting.

What his brother is doing.

What I said.

What I meant when I said it.

And my youngest?

He is half wild, half sweet, and 100% emotionally invested in every moment of the day.

He needs snacks, hugs, space, attention, independence, and assistance — sometimes all at once.

Put them together and suddenly my living room becomes:

a wrestling ring, a therapy office, a snack bar, and a courtroom.

I am the judge.

The referee.

The chef.

The mediator.

The comforter.

The disciplinarian.

The safe place.

And by the end of the day, I am tired in a way sleep doesn’t fix.

What no one really prepares you for is how mentally loud this season of motherhood is.

It’s not just the noise.

It’s the constant decision-making.

The emotional coaching.

The breaking up arguments.

The answering of 4,000 questions.

The reminding.

The repeating.

The staying calm when your nervous system is screaming for quiet.

There is love — so much love.

There is laughter.

There are moments I want to bottle up forever.

And there is also the part of me that sits on the edge of my bed at night and whispers,

“Wow… that took everything I had today.”

Some days I feel touched-out.

Some days I feel overstimulated.

Some days I wonder if I handled everything the right way.

And then I remember:

I am carrying two growing nervous systems,

two developing hearts,

two little humans learning the world —

while trying to keep my own heart steady, too.

This season is heavy.

And holy.

And hard.

If you are in it too, I see you.

The mom hiding in the bathroom for 4 minutes of quiet.

The mom reheating her coffee for the third time.

The mom wondering how she’s both grateful and overwhelmed at the same time.

You are not failing.

You are doing one of the hardest, most sacred jobs there is.

And one day, the house will be quieter.

The toys will be gone.

The chaos will soften.

But today, in this loud, messy, exhausting middle —

you are building something that matters.

Even when it wears you out.