🌼 Parenting a 15-year-old, a 10-year-old, and a 1-year-old can feel like I’m handing each of them a different piece of me.
Not the whole thing.
Just what I have to give in that moment.
And that is the part that feels hard to say out loud.
The guilt that comes with it.
The anxiety of always feeling like I should be doing more, showing up more, slowing down more.
But I am still working on that.
And if you are too… you are not alone.
Three Kids. Three Completely Different Worlds.
My kids are 15, 10, and 1.
Fourteen years between my oldest and my youngest.
And some days that gap feels like I am parenting in three completely different universes at the same time.
My oldest is 15 now.
He is becoming someone I genuinely admire.
He taught himself guitar — and not in a slow, figuring it out kind of way. He hears a song and he just… plays it. Like the music is already somewhere inside him and his hands already know what to do.
It blows my mind every single time.
And all he wants in those moments is for me to stop and watch.
Five minutes.
That is all he is asking for.
And I am trying to get better at giving him that. At putting everything else down and just being there while he plays. Because he does not need me the way he used to. He needs me differently now — to talk things through with him, to guide him, to show up for the conversations that matter.
That version of mom is something I am still learning how to be for him.
My daughter is 10.
She wants mom and me time. Girlie things. She wants to talk.
And she is starting to hit that puberty age, which means her emotions are bigger and her need for me feels more tender right now.
She deserves a mom who can slow down and just be with her in that.
Some of our best moments happen when her baby brother is napping and it is just the two of us for a little while.
If I am not already too exhausted by then.
And that is the honest part.
Sometimes the window opens… and I am already running on empty.
Relearning Everything in an Older Body
Having a baby when your other kids are 10 and 15 is something I did not fully understand until I was living it.
It is like starting over.
Relearning all of it — the sleep deprivation, the feeding, the constant motion of a baby who has somewhere important to be at all times.
But doing it in a body that is older.
I am 35 this year.
And between my age and the back injury I am still healing from, some days I feel the weight of that more than I expected.
I do not have the energy I imagined I would.
And my body is not capable of doing what it used to.
The running. The chasing. The getting down on the floor and just going without thinking twice about it.
I have to be more careful now.
Even picking him up off the ground is something I still struggle with.
Every movement has to be intentional.
If someone is close by, I will usually ask them to pick him up and hand him to me — just so I do not aggravate anything or make things worse.
My chiropractor has actually told me to try not to pick him up too much while I am going through decompression therapy.
Which is so much easier said than done when you have a one year old who wants his mama.
And I think I had to grieve that a little quietly.
→ When I Couldn’t Lift My Baby: My Postpartum Back Injury
The Surprise I Did Not See Coming
But here is the thing about that age gap that I did not expect.
It has also been a gift.
My older two understand more than little kids would.
They help. They step in. They watch their brother when I need a moment. They handle responsibilities around the house without me having to manage every single thing.
And watching the three of them together…
that is one of my favorite things in the whole world.
My daughter has made it her personal mission to make that baby giggle.
Not to help me.
Because she is completely obsessed with his laugh.
Honestly… same. 😂
And Then There Is My Marriage
I want to be honest about this part too.
My older two are from my first marriage.
So when my husband came into our lives, he did not just choose me.
He chose all of us.
And watching him show up for three kids — two that came with me and one we fought so hard to bring into this world together — is something I do not take lightly.
Because when you are stretched across three kids at completely different stages, with a healing body and a full life…
your marriage needs you too.
And that is hard when there is not much left at the end of the day.
We have our hard moments. Our head bumps. That is real.
But we also know how to read each other.
When one of us needs space, we give it.
When one of us needs closeness, we find it — a movie together, a game, just being in the same room without the noise.
We pick each other up.
And I do not take that for granted.
What I Want You to Know
If you are in a season where you feel stretched across your kids… pulled in too many directions… like you are giving pieces of yourself but never the whole thing…
I want you to hear this.
That feeling does not mean you are failing.
It means you are a mom who cares deeply about every single one of them.
You are doing what you can with what you have.
And some days, that is everything.
It is enough.
You are enough.
✨ Thank you for letting me share this part of our story.
Are you parenting kids at different stages right now? I would love to hear what that looks like for you.
With love,
Rachel (RaiRai 💛)
You Might Also Enjoy
→ The Version of Me I’m Still Becoming
→ Why We Chose Homeschooling When I Wasn’t Sure I Could Do It
→ For My IVF Baby, Now That He’s One
→ When I Couldn’t Lift My Baby: My Postpartum Back Injury
This post is based on my personal experience as a mom sharing what this season has actually felt like. Every family looks different.
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