Maybe we didn't 'enjoy every moment,' but we did the best we could

— -- (Editor's note: This article originally appeared on Babble.com. It has been reprinted here with permission. The Walt Disney Company is the parent company of both ABC News and Babble.)

My “baby” is turning 3 years old this summer, which is causing me to feel all the feels. And while I can still convince her to cuddle with me and let me rock her to sleep, I know this bittersweet time with her is fleeting.

On top of my sadness to say goodbye to the baby stages, I am haunted by the fact that the last nine years of my life spent having children has really flown by -- just like everybody said they would. For the first time since I started this journey, I’m staring down having all of my children in school this fall. Just thinking about it makes me do that horrified hands-to-the-face emoji in my head. I feel like I blinked and nine years flew by. Yet, I’ve also lived a thousand lifetimes since then. Having four kids back to back will do that to you, I guess.

I’m grateful to have reached the point I have as a mom. But I have to admit that deep down, I wonder if everyone who warned me to “soak up every minute” was actually right. I’m left here with my stretch marks and sagging stomach, and memories of a time when I was everything to my babies, wondering where on earth the time went.

Part of me would do anything to feel the weight of a newborn on my chest just one more time, while another part of me remains thankful that I actually get to sleep at night, instead of getting woken up every two hours like some kind of torture experiment.

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I’m veering dangerously into “crazy old lady at the grocery store commenting on your cart of kids” territory, but the truth is, I am haunted by the fear that I didn’t enjoy it enough or cherish the little moment more. Honestly, I’m not sure I soaked up every minute I could have. Shoot, I barely remember the minutes; I’m pretty sure I was just trying to survive them.

So moms out there in the same weird boat as I am, let’s stay strong. As we straddle that murky middle part of parenthood where we’re looking forward to the teen years with a little bit of fear, while looking back on the baby years wondering how on earth we survived them, let’s know we did the very best we could. And that has to count for something, right?

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I feel like if I let myself get carried away, it would be all too easy to get swept away in a sea of regret about the baby and toddler years. All those cherished moments I missed while wishing it was bedtime so I can have a minute to myself. All those instances I spoke impatiently to my sweet toddlers who just wanted to be near me. All those days I complained to my husband. Why didn’t I focus more on the good instead of the bad? Why didn’t I realize that my life really wouldn’t be this way forever?

Well, because at the time, it’s freaking hard to see any other way -- that’s why. Because at the time, I was doing everything I could just to hang on. Because in those moments, I was so exhausted and depleted in every sense that my eyeballs ached. Literally ached, people. I know you are nodding in your head right now because you’ve felt that way, too.

So yes, sure, I do wish I was a better person. Perhaps a more saintly, Mother Theresa-like version of myself as a mother of young kids. I wish I would have cherished every moment and sailed through the lack of sleep with a smile on my face. But I didn’t.

I did what I could. Some days, that meant shutting myself in a bathroom to cry or ignoring my kids while I was glued to my phone, desperate for any outside interaction with the world. Some days that meant sighing and huffing and puffing and saying, “Just a minute!” 10 bazillion times. (And yes, maybe yelling “Are you kidding me?” when the toddler managed to somehow get poop in her eyebrows.)

I’m not exactly proud of those days. But somewhere in the haze of memories, mixed in with exhaustion and clock-watching until my husband’s truck turned the road, are the moments I have to remind myself that existed, too.

The times I let bedtime lapse simply because I wanted to hold my sweet sleeping babe just a minute longer. The times I really did skip the dishes to plop down on the floor and play with my kids. The times we made each other belly laugh, like actually laugh-until-your-stomach-hurts laugh. The times of crayon-scribbled cards handed proudly to me, flowers shyly picked, dimpled arms clasped tightly around my neck. The times of reading just one more story, walking one more lap around the house, convincing myself it’s kind of peaceful to see the moon instead of sleep, the times, both large and small, when I was the mother my children needed.

Because those are the moments, my fellow mothers, that we can remember as the ones that mattered. Not the times when we weren’t “enjoying” every moment of diaper blow-outs or mastitis fevers or toddler tantrums. It’s not all worth remembering, so I guess I’ll just have to stick to those fuzzy newborn baby memories and hope I did my best the rest of the time.