Free shipping on all orders over $75🎄

I have three children under the age of four. This was not entirely on purpose. The original plan was to have two, but the second one brought a twin sister, so three it was.

As I cart my small herd of children around in a stroller only slightly smaller than our car, people have many questions. “Are they twins?” “Are they all yours?” “Why are you stealing my coffee?” “Can you tell your children to stop touching me?” So many questions.

From those expecting a first or second baby, the most common one is: “What’s it like to have so many small children?” At first, I would smile and say it is hectic or that we are really busy. People would smile back and make their escape before I handed them a baby. It was the short answer, but not the right answer.

The longer I thought about it, the more I realized the perfect answer was right in front of me. Parenting young children can be summed up perfectly by only one thing: the mom purse.

What’s the mom purse, you ask? Well, it is that giant bag you see every mother carrying.

Let me describe it further. Despite the epic size of this bag, it is always overflowing with things. Also, the person carrying it can never find whatever thing she needs at the moment. You will often see her put it down and start pulling a strange assortment of things out in search of the one thing that seems to be perpetually at the bottom of the purse. These things can include but are not limited to snacks, toys, baby wipes, diapers, tiny pairs of underwear, assorted fast-food napkins, mints, dry shampoo, and probably a phone or wallet. (Those things are definitely at the bottom.)

If you have children, you probably own a mom purse and are nodding your head in recognition. Or maybe you are nodding because you are sleep deprived and about to fall asleep. Either way, you have seen these giant bags of new motherhood, whether they be in diaper bag form, backpack, or grocery bag.

So, why is a mom purse the best way to describe parenting young children?

First, it is always too full. As mentioned, mine is full of the necessities of taking young children out of the house. It has the minutia of daily life in it, from diapers to toys to a million tiny things my kids MUST bring on a five-second errand. It is also the keeper of the special occasion items: the tickets, the health cards, the birthday cards, the water bottles, the medicine for the dog. Unfortunately, also the vet bill for the dog.

You want rocks? I’ve got those. Twelve dandelion stickers? I have that, too! Need a tiny hummingbird toy? What color do you want?

Honestly, this is one reason moms are so tired. All these things seem tiny but begin to add up in weight quickly. After an hour out with the mom purse, my neck hurts, my back hurts, and I am sweating up a storm from all of the crap I carry around for everyone else.

We parents talk about how tired we are from chasing our kids around, but no one talks about how much we will be lifting every day. On any given day, I carry the mom purse for probably at least an hour and usually with a child on my hip. I lift children, carry groceries, wrestle babies while changing diapers, bend to pick up those toys I keep stepping on, and high-step over baby gates I am too lazy to open. The mom purse is just the beginning of all the stuff we moms physically do for other people. My family members are not the only ones benefiting from this arrangement—my chiropractor is doing quite well, too.

The physical toll of new motherhood is real, but the mental load is just as real. The purse is physically full of stuff, but my brain is also filled to the brim with information about other people. Those tickets I mentioned earlier? I am the one who has to remember to bring them and what time we need to leave to get there. I am not only the keeper of the health cards but the maker of appointments and usually the person attending them. That dog medicine? I went and got that. I made the appointment, too.

The point is, for every physical thing in the mom purse, there is a thought or action that had to be completed by the wearer of said purse. Why not delegate? Well, my husband does a lot of things, too. The problem with having such young kids is that they are just too little to do most of the things we need done. I can’t send my 4-year-old to the vet with our 65-pound chocolate lab. I can’t have my 1-year-olds carry their diapers. Men don’t typically carry purses, so sadly (due to a million gender norms I can’t get into now) women end up with most of the load. Parenting is heavy business, both physically and emotionally.

You will notice in that long list of the mom purse’s contents, there is almost no mention of the mother’s own things. Very observant! Have you had coffee today? It shows.

Anyway, there is no mention of the mother’s stuff because you can’t fit it in the purse. With all the things you carry for others, your stuff gradually gets pushed out. It happens so gradually you don’t even notice. You start out with a purse full of our own stuff and then one day, realize you are down to having only a couple of cards in our phone case. And wait, didn’t you also buy a bigger bag? Yes! You definitely bought a bigger bag so you could put your water bottle in it, but someone just keeps putting snacks in there and so your water bottle sits on the counter.

Your purse is so full of other people’s crap you no longer have any space for your stuff . . . in YOUR purse. If there is a better metaphor for parenting young children, I haven’t found it.

All the time and space you used to have for yourself is pushed out by the time and space you now have to devote to other people. (Other people who are not very grateful, might I add.) Small children have a surprising number of things that can’t be left at home. So, what happens? You start to re-evaluate your necessities. I don’t really need my rewards cards, you think. I could just buy a drink when I get there. I don’t really need keys because I can just climb to the third-story window. I need my cardio today anyway.

Sure, you become much more minimalist, but you also start to lose yourself in all the things and needs of others. You pare yourself down to the bare minimum because someone else needs something. This reframing of ourselves as secondary to our own lives is one of the hardest things I have faced in new motherhood. From conversations I have had with other new parents, it seems to happen to all of us at one time or another. Some people go along with it joyfully, some grudgingly, and others fight it tooth and nail. We have to make space in our lives for ourselves, just like we have to carve out space in our purses for our keys, and it can involve some trial and error to figure it out.

So, if parenting young children is like this big, heavy purse that hurts your back and steals your life, why do people do it? Well, mostly because it’s too late once the kids arrive. Also, people don’t like it when you toss your children at them in the store and say, “Your turn!”

No, just kidding. It’s because your life is full but in all sorts of ways. Your life is full of stuff, yes, but, like the mom purse, it is overflowing with all sorts of other things, too.

Your life is full of the daily routines that come with having small children. The dressing, feeding, and playing.

Your life is full of their favorite games, stories, and songs.

Your life is full of the funny things you do together, the days that make you want to pull your hair out and the days that make you marvel at this tiny creature you created.

Your life is full of the hugs, the snuggles, and the squeals of laughter when you dance around the house with them. It’s full of the tantrums, and the tiny shoes, and the 478 pictures of your kid’s eye from when you accidentally left your phone unattended while making dinner.

Parenting young children is the best and the worst of the mom purse. Yes, the purse is heavy, but you carry it every day and you get stronger.

You get overwhelmed with the stuff, but you also get overwhelmed by the love. You get pushed to the side in your life, but if you’re lucky, it can give you a whole new perspective into what you really want and need. Most importantly, your life is full of, well, life. Your mom purse is full of stuff because you are living life with your family.

So, to those that ask me what life is like with many small children, the short answer is: it is fuller than my mom purse at the park. The weight might wreck my back at times, but it is mostly worth it.

You may also like:

This is Motherhood When Nobody is Watching

I Am the Keeper

A Mother’s Mind Never Rests Because We Carry the Mental Load

So God Made a Mother book by Leslie Means

If you liked this, you'll love our new book, SO GOD MADE A MOTHER available now!

Order Now

Liz Parker-Cook

Liz is a mother of three children under four and has the dark circles under her eyes to prove it. She is also a high school music teacher, which is much louder than parenting but has much fewer dirty diapers. When she gets any time to herself she writes on her blog: Newbiemomsite.com. She lives in Toronto with her husband, children, and dog. 

There’s Still Magic in These Tween Years

In: Motherhood, Tween
Tween girl walking into ocean waves

The water shimmers atop the electric-blue pool. The clock blinks 94 degrees. It is July 10th weather showing off. A friend asked me to watch her son. He is nine, like my son, and the two of them get along—swimmingly. They throw towels askew and fast-step-crash into the water, goggles on, challenging each other to do this and that. Nine-year-old boys, so alive. My 11-year-old daughter and I stand and squint, placing towels neatly on our beach chairs.  She looks from face to face, like assembly line quality control. A friend—her eyes ask . . . now plead—any friend.  I...

Keep Reading

Sharing Our Grief Frees Our Hearts

In: Grief, Loss, Motherhood
Two women holding hands over a hospital bed, color photo

Almost 18 years ago, we lost our first child. It was unexpected. It was public. It was traumatic. It was a moment in time that even to this day, burns with a scorching flame, running like a reel in my memory and igniting a pain deeper than anything I’ve ever known into the empty corners of my heart. And while time has marched on in beautiful ways—healthy children who I get to watch grow up, an incredible marriage with the love of my life, a gratitude for all the milestones each year brings—I still can’t help but hold space for the...

Keep Reading

God Had Different Plans

In: Faith, Motherhood
Silhouette of family swinging child between two parents

As I sip my twice-reheated coffee holding one baby and watching another run laps around the messy living room, I catch bits and pieces of the Good Morning America news broadcast. My mind drifts off for a second to the dreams I once had of being the one on the screen. Live from New York City with hair and makeup fixed before 6 a.m. I really believed that would be me. I just knew I’d be the one telling the mama with unwashed hair and tired eyes about the world events that happened overnight while she rocked babies and pumped milk....

Keep Reading

My Baby Had Laryngomalacia

In: Baby, Motherhood
Mother holding baby on her shoulder

Life’s funny, isn’t it? Just when you think you’ve got the whole motherhood thing figured out, the universe throws a curveball. And, oh boy, did it throw me one with my second baby. There I was, feeling like a seasoned mom with my firstborn—a healthy, vivacious toddler who was 16 months old. Our breastfeeding journey had its hiccups, an early tongue-tie diagnosis that did little to deter our bond. Fourteen months of nurturing, nighttime cuddles, and feeling powerful, like my body was doing exactly what it was meant to do. Enter my second baby. A fresh chapter, a new story....

Keep Reading

Please Stop Comparing Kids

In: Motherhood
Mom and kids in sunlight

Let me begin with this important message: Please refrain from comparing children, especially when it pertains to their growth and development. If you happen to notice differences in a child’s height, weight, or appetite compared to another, that’s perfectly fine. Your observations are appreciated. However, I kindly request that you avoid openly discussing these comparisons as such conversations can inadvertently distress a parent who may already be grappling with concerns about their child’s growth trajectory. Trust me, I say this from personal experience. Recently, at a dinner gathering, a couple casually remarked that someone’s 1-year-old child appeared larger both in...

Keep Reading

This Will Not Last Forever

In: Faith, Motherhood
Woman looking at sunset

“This will not last forever,” I wrote those words on the unfinished walls above my daughter’s changing table. For some reason, it got very tiring to change her diapers. Nearly three years later, the words are still there though the changing table no longer is under them. While my house is still unfinished so I occasionally see those words, that stage of changing diapers for her has moved on. She did grow up, and I got a break. Now I do it for her baby brother. I have been reminding myself of the seasons of life again. Everything comes and...

Keep Reading

You Made Me Love Christmas

In: Motherhood
Family in pajamas near Christmas tree, color photo

Hi kids, this is a thank you note of sorts . . . I’m about to tell you something strange. Something you may not “get” yet, but I hope you do eventually. I used to dread Christmas. I know, isn’t that weird? Most kids and a lot of adults have countdowns and decorations and music, but I had a countdown in my mind of when it would be over. To me, it wasn’t a happy time. From the age of about eight (right about where you all are now) Christmas, for me, became like a job of sorts. Long before...

Keep Reading

She is an Anonymom

In: Living, Motherhood
Mother standing at sink holding a baby on her hip

She stands alone in the church kitchen, frantically scrubbing pots and pans while the grieving huddle around the fellowship hall, and she slips out the back door before anyone comes in. She is an anonymom. She gets out of her car and picks up the trash thrown into the ditch alongside the country road. She is an anonymom. She sits on the park bench, watching her children play. In the meantime, she continually scans the whole playground, keeping track of everyone’s littles, because that is what moms do. She is an anonymom. RELATED: Can We Restore “the Village” Our Parents...

Keep Reading

I Come Alive at Christmas

In: Motherhood
Kitchen decorated for Christmas

It’s time again. Time for the lights and the trees and candy canes and tiny porcelain village homes. It’s time to shake off all that this year has thrown at me and come alive again. My favorite time of year is here and it’s time to make some magic. My mom started the magic of Christmas for me when I was little, and I was infatuated with the joy that it brought to so many people. Loved ones come together and everything sparkles and people who don’t normally come to church are willing to join us in the pews. Everything...

Keep Reading

Brothers Fight Hard and Love Harder

In: Kids, Motherhood
Two boys play outside, one lifting the other on his back

The last few years have been a whirlwind. My head has sometimes been left spinning; we have moved continents with three boys, three and under at the time. Set up home and remained sufficiently organized despite the complete chaos to ensure everyone was where they were meant to be on most days. Living in a primarily hockey town, the winters are filled with coffee catch-ups at the arena, so it was no surprise when my youngest declared his intention to play hockey like his school friends. Fully aware that he had never held a hockey stick or slapped a puck,...

Keep Reading