A Mommy Minute: Holding it all together…..For your children's sake!!

By Jessica Byrd

I promised myself when I started this blog, that it wouldn’t be filled of fluff stories. As a Christian I get asked plenty of times, and sometimes ask myself, Why does God allow terrible things to happen? The answer is far fetched and God unfortunately is not the God of this world Satin is. I must admit I have witnessed some strong mothers!!! I have witnessed and experienced mothers tearing down inside, but smiling around their children. Crying while their children are sleep, but make it their business to read a bedtime story every night. I will never forget the first time my two year old saw me cry, I just couldn’t hold it in any longer, and the tears came rolling down. “Mommy what’s wrong”, my daughter said in deep concern, “Mommy is sad Lailah” I responded. At first, I was so embarrassed, and I questioned what effect this may have on my child, seeing her MOMMY cry, because as a mother, the world wants us to suppress our feelings. We are the one person in the house who is supposed to have it all together..NEWSFLASH we don’t.  It really bothers me when people say you’re too emotional. Yes, not knowing how to control your emotions can have a negative effect, but I have realized having emotions is one of the greatest things about me. I hurt, I cry, I get sad, and yes I am emotional!! When my daughter saw me cry, it could've been one of the best bonding moments we’ve ever had. Right there in that moment I had to explain to a toddler what being sad means, and why she shouldn’t waste her tears just to get her way.

“Lailah people cry sometimes when they’re sad, sad means they can be hurt, and being hurt can cause pain, and that’s why some people may cry” I explained

“So mommy you hurt, you hurt mommy?” she responded

“Yes mommy is sad at this moment, that’s why you see tears, so why do you cry Lailah” I asked

“I don’t know” she answered

“It’s important to cry when you’re sad, and talk to mommy, not cry just because you want something” I remarked.

This conversation ended with a huge hug, and a understanding between a toddler and a 29 year old woman. Therefore, as parents we have to hold it together for our children, we are their examples, but we also have to have realistic expectations of ourselves. We don’t escape our children, we explain to our children. We are all people, we all have emotions, no matter if you’re a parent, a child, a grandparent, or a spouse.

** In other news the Outdoor Adventure Center located in 1802 Atwater, Michigan opened up today. I love their tagline, “ Bringing up North downtown” Think having an outdoor experience in an indoor environment, make sure to check it out and bring your children. There will be a Mom's Club playdate soon here also, so stay tuned!


 











 










  
Jessica M. Byrd is the parent of a two and one year old. 

She is the founder of Metro Detroit Mom's Club and believes 

every mother should live a life on purpose!

Life Of A Fatherless Child

Guest Blogger: Miyona Perry

IG: @23withnodegree & @missmiyona1019

Website: www.23withnodegree.com 

After examining my life and those around me – via social media and such, I’ve noticed a heartbreaking trend: the absence of a father.

Now while it’s very courageous of a woman to take on the role and responsibility of the both parents, it’s time we start to get real and raw about this.

A father is the first encounter for both a son and daughter, outside of the nurturing contact with the mother. The father is there to be the stronghold, a provider. He is the one who guides the family, leads the family. He is the one who gives his daughter the confidence & high self-esteem she will later value and carry within herself. He is the one who shows his son how to ride a bike, pray, play basketball, etc. The father is truly the pillar of the family, he sets the TONE – now if the lead of the house is absent, what are we left with? Follow me, if we are supposed to be following this mold of: Christ | Husband | Wife | Children in which Christ is supposed to be on the head of the Husband, the head of the Husband is now onto the Wife, etc & that mold is now broken, what are we left with?

We are now left with women who are now pissed and angry for allowing their self to deal with someone they thought wouldn’t leave; Sons who look towards the streets or outside influences (the media constantly feeding their minds with crap) and daughters who are looking for a void (please don’t lie and say this isn’t true).

This is my problem: somewhere along the lines we stop REQUIRING. We stop requiring our men to be fathers, we stop requiring on behalf of ourselves as women to uphold a standard. We start to get a little bit more laxed in how we approach relationships. As we tend to require less, the more men stop stepping up. It seems to me (just my opinion) that after the 70s era, things got a little shaky. We started to go into the drug era and all hell has broken loose. As a result of the crack / cocaine epidemic, families were truly destroyed and broken. Let’s not forget factoring in the aftermath of the mentality embedded in our black men thanks to Willie Lynch (shout out to you – you did a number on us), the term family really hasn’t hold any term of value since then. But, before I get into my “black panther moment” let me try to keep this as concise as possible…

Because of this shift & the man not being around, things are out of order. We are creating generational curses. When are we going to stop pointing the blame at others and look at our own lives. We can no longer force our children to reap the rotten fruit of our bad seeds that we’ve sown. Why must we continue to do this to ourselves?

I see no one out here getting being sick and tired of BEING sick and tired and getting the heart of the issue which is ourselves. We need to hold responsibility. Sis, so because YOU chose to not heal from past wounds and playing this “poker face” role, allowing yourself to keep repeating the same relationships (just with a different person), you now want your child to feel your pain? You now want your child to feel, see, & hold onto what your hurt is and allow them to go through the SAME thing? Bro, because you decided not to deal with your wounds of being a fatherless child and instead wanted to direct that energy into living and building into your ego, you’re going to let your son go out here into the world empty as you did? Instead of pouring into HIM the way you always wanted?

The hurt, the guilt of our parents mistakes we have to let go of. This is only making matters worse. We have young girls out here on Instagram and Vine twerkin & cussin’, YOUNG boys (toddlers) out here holding baby bottles as 40 ounces, pretending to be a “man” by yelling at someone… & the people who are videotaping it, are LAUGHING & we think this is OKAY?! All because WE chose NOT to heal? We sing our hearts out to K. Michelle’s, “Can’t Raise A Man” not knowing that it’s OUR fault why we have grown boys out here walking the streets and getting into relationships – all because the guy WE chose, chose not to be involved. This trend of hurt, this generational thing of absence is all pathological and it has to STOP somewhere.

There’s even fatherless children in “two-family” households. Just because we SEE that the father is there doesn’t mean he’s emotionally and spiritually there. So while we’re all rooting for marriage, or rather forcing ourselves to love the idea of a person, we’re creating and setting bad examples there as well.

This is all to say this: we need to 1) get back to the basics of true premise of family and this cannot be obtained until we 2) get our lives together and get it together through Christ. Here we are torturing ourselves, living in our hurt and misery, THINKING it’s not hurting anymore, when in fact, the same hurt we mask, shows up in EVERY area of our lives. We need to get real with ourselves because with every generation…it gets w o r s e. Men are AFRAID to cry, to be open, to love & love hard because of their past. Women are afraid of being their self because they think that someone will love on them more if they projected a different persona. Do y’all see this? Is this NOT frightening to know we are all walking around like dead zombies because we kill our spirit man, blow by blow because of unattended wounds? This boils down to a) not being open to discussing mental health & counseling and b) losing the Center of ourselves which should be a spiritual connection with our Father. We would rather go about our lives and consume our time with crap, “make-pretending” (got that from Mo’Nique in Precious) than to get in the core and start looking in the mirror.

I cry everyday because a lot of the pain I see in people’s eyes could have been prevented had they gotten the help they needed. Granted, it’s never too late to allow God to mend and heal those wounds the proper way but still, we let all this extra noise blind our eyes and ears to the real. Life has taught me that until you get right within yourself, NOTHING else can fall into place. We have to get OUT of our feelings and learn how to heal.

I encourage you guys to start a self-love journey & really shun away all of this extra stuff and get to the essence of who YOU are! How can you be a successful person if you’re broken inside? How can you handle mentally college or the real world if you are b r o k e n.






Sorry for the very lengthy post. If you made it this far through the post, thank you! Feel free to comment!

Blessings,
-Miyona ♥

The Mom's Club: Workshop

If you Google “what makes a good entrepreneur” you’ll find pages and pages of articles describing in great detail the habits, business practices, money handling skills etc. of a business owner complete with examples, charts and diagrams painting the picture of the perfect entrepreneur. Most (if not all) of these articles conclude with the promise that by following those steps, adopting those behaviors and habits, and putting those business practices to use, you’ll become the next small business man/woman turned millionaire. But there’s one thing these articles didn’t include as an ideal attribute of an entrepreneur: being a mom. Many will agree that when considering the qualifications of a CEO, having children is rarely considered as a plus, but more as a hindrance. More often than not, women feel that they have too separate their motherhood from their professional life but there are a select group of women who beg to differ—Momprenuers.

Jesssica Byrd, Founder of The Mom's Club

The A Team caught up with Jessica Byrd, a local Momprenuer who found her passion as a working mom and founded a new organization in Detroit, Michigan called The Mom’s Club. Jessica says she created The Mom’s Club to interact with young professional mothers and provide them with the tools, necessities, and environment to better raise their children. Jessica hosted her first annual Mom’s Club Workshop this past weekend at The Garden Theatre and it was an amazing experience. 

Our host, Ambrea Curry spoke with Jessica before the workshop began to find out more about The Mom’s Club and what we could expect from the workshop. Despite her pre-event jitters Jessica was more than excited about her first Mom’s Club Workshop experience mainly because of the speakers, Loretta Morman who she felt the women could easily relate to and Dr. Eddie Connor Jr. who she described as the perfect gentleman to speak to women with sons. Jessica’s hopes for The Mom’s Club Workshop were that the women could take the information provided and grow as individuals but especially as parents, “If I can save a mother, then this event was a success." 

The workshop focused on talking to children about self-esteem, peer pressure and identity and the first guest speaker, Loretta Morman, author of Hello My Name is BEAUTIFUL, empowerment speaker, etiquette teacher and counselor for young girls, dove right in with great tips for raising a strong woman emphasizing that, “A strong woman creates a stronger society.” Morman encouraged the moms in attendance to be real with themselves and their daughters about the issues you face as a woman trying to find your way through life. She also spoke passionately about how important it is that Moms don’t pretend everything is okay when it isn’t in attempt to protect their daughters from what may seem like a harsh reality.

To conclude her presentation, Loretta also gave the Moms some positive behaviors to practice with their daughters like affirmations, “I Am” statements and teaching them empathy. To conclude, Loretta urged the Moms to get to know their daughters and give them room to become what they want to become in life and not what we (moms) want them to become; she left them with the reminder that, “God gave you your child to raise, not control.”

The next guest speaker was Dr. Eddie Connor Jr., college professor, international speaker, author of five books, and founder of the Boys to Books mentorship program. He gave a powerful presentation on the importance of literacy, how a young man can reach his purpose and how to counteract the negative image of the Black Man in the media. He shared with the Moms his amazing story of coming from a divorced home in Detroit and battling stage four Cancer to becoming the successful man that stood in front of us. Out of the entire workshop a powerful moment occurred when Dr. Connor called up two young men in the audience and gave them what every young man needs:

1.     A book - because we all know what they say about a black man and a book.

2.      A wallet – “to understand investment and money management.”

3.      A belt – “to hold up sagging pants and sagging dreams/goals.”

4.      A watch- to understand that “time is NOT money” and once its gone— it’s gone.

5.     A Tie – to remind them that they are “tied to success”.

6.     A Mentor – because “you cannot be a man if you don’t see a man.”

Dr. Eddie Connor Jr. inspired the Moms to raise young men of standard even if there isn’t a father present.

            I am not a mother myself but the discussions, presentations, exercises and information shared during the workshop from the guest speakers as well as the participating Moms sounded like ideal advice for raising a child in today’s society as well as a great foundation for future child rearing. This workshop was one of many monthly activities including a Mommy Meet & Greet and a Play Date that took place at the Detroit Science Center; next on the agenda for The Mom’s Club is a Mommy’s Day Out. If you would like to become a part of The Mom’s Club and participate in activities like these with Moms like you, contact Jessica Byrd (mrsjessicamarieb@gmail.com) for your membership application!

Here are some extra shots from The Mom's Club Workshop! To see more photos as well as the full interview with Amrea and Jessica, subscribe to The A Team Talks Show YouTube Channel!
-Ayana

Check out the interview here.