And my 8-year-old taught a grown woman what that really means.
Hey love,
I came across a post the other day that stopped me in my tracks. It told the story of a daughter sitting beside her mother’s hospital bed. The mother said, “I lived my whole life not for myself. For you. I gave everything. And you’re not even grateful.” and the daughter, calm, tired, clear, replied: “You didn’t give. You made a deal. Without my consent.”
You can read the full story here, but here’s what it stirred in me: That quiet ache of generations of women who gave everything except permission, for themselves or their children, to live fully. It reminded me of a day that quietly changed everything for me as a mother.
🕊 The Story 
When my youngest, Shyla, was in kindergarten, I got called in to meet with her teacher. At the time, I had just started traveling for my work with Access Consciousness, and this meeting was scheduled right in the middle of that new season of my life.
I didn’t have childcare that day, so I brought my 8-year-old, Talia-sky, with me. The three of us sat at one of those tiny round tables meant for 5-year-olds. The teacher handed Talia some crayons to keep her busy while she spoke to me about Shyla’s “delay” in reading.
But her words weren’t what caught me; it was her tone. There was something sharp underneath it, something like judgment hiding behind “concern.” Then she asked if I traveled for work. I said yes, and that’s when it came out: A full-blown monologue about how children need their mothers, how my travel could be the reason for Shyla’s delay, how fathers “aren’t equipped” to fill that gap.
I sat there stunned, doing everything in me not to say what I really wanted to say. Before I could form a reply, Talia, who had apparently been following the conversation far more than the teacher realized, looked up from her crayons, locked eyes with the woman, and said: “I love that my mom travels. Other moms go to offices, but my mom FaceTimes me and shows me zebras in the wild in Africa. It makes me want to travel and see the world when I grow up.”
Silence. The teacher blinked, speechless.
And in that moment, my 8-year-old taught a woman with 30 years in education what it means to model possibility, not sacrifice.
📷 What Talia was seeing... 
💫 The Shift
That was the day something clicked for me. I realized I could either keep living to meet other people’s definitions of “good mother” or I could become the kind of woman who shows her kids what’s possible beyond those definitions.
It’s not that I don’t still have moments of guilt or comparison; those times I scroll and see moms who never miss a game, a recital, a single thing. It’s that I know what I’m giving my kids goes deeper than perfect attendance. I’m not asking them to live in repayment for my sacrifice.
I’m showing them what it looks like to create a life they won’t need to recover from.
🌿 Add a Little Wonder: The Conscious Contract Breaker
If you’ve ever felt like you’re failing your kids by choosing you, try this:
1. Ask this question: “Did I agree to this guilt… or was it silently handed down to me?”
2. Break the unconscious contract: Say, even out loud: “I choose to parent from presence, not from performance. I release the need to earn my worth through sacrifice.”
3. Tap into your why: What are your kids learning from watching you choose you? Write it down. Keep it close. That’s the legacy.
We don’t need more martyr-mothers. We need living women, women who model aliveness, curiosity, and choice.
Because that’s what our kids will remember, and that’s what they’ll one day thank us for.
With love, (and a suitcase half-packed for the next adventure)
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