Find a Backscratcher

You scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours. Yes, that’s the old bargain. Some days there is just no one willing or able to scratch your back. It itches like crazy! You try to get your three-year-old to help you, but no luck as her little fingernails are soft and mostly useless against the itch! You wait for another person to show up. Your husband has been working hard all day. You can hardly ask him. Your teen comes in. You ask him, “Can you please scratch my back?” and he does a little in the wrong place or close but the itch seems to move––always out of your reach. After a while your eyes begin to jerk. You go find a stick or a coat hanger and you try to reach that itch. Argh!

How do you find a backscratcher?

Mamas Need Help

Most moms have some itches they cannot reach and I am talking here about the things at home that they need done, but cannot manage.

There are times as a mom when you must find someone to help you. You may be able to get all your chores done and not the kids schooling. You may get the schooling and miss the laundry. Your kitchen floor is not the one people talk of that is so clean you can eat off it, is it? Mine neither.

Mamas need mentors. Mamas need support through hard times, new, and tough-to-navigate experiences.

Moms need guidance. We need help with work and parenting and teaching and training. What most people do when they cannot do some job is to hire it done. As Moms though we are supposed to be wonder-women. There is nothing we can’t or won’t do to keep our homes and houses going. Money may be tight and some of these things don’t seem to be necessities.

Here is where we need to think again. As my dad used to say, “Mama, there are times when a luxury becomes a necessity.”

An overburdened mother can be a danger to herself and her whole household. She may get depressed, and if she gets no relief she may become ill. She could break down and suffer emotional or mental distress. She may become angry and lose self-control. Exhaustion can lead to marital problems. Asking for help is the best option, the safest and the cheapest.

There have been times when I hired a woman to come to help me with cleaning and laundry. When I have company I tell my guests how they can help. Almost always, they are happy to lend a hand.

An overburdened mother can be a danger to herself and her whole household. She may get depressed, and if she gets no relief she may become ill. She could break down and suffer emotional or mental distress. She may become angry and lose self-control. Exhaustion can lead to marital problems. Asking for help is the best option, the safest and the cheapest.Click To Tweet

My mother, who raised nine children, was a capable woman, but she hired a lady to come in once a week and do ironing, change sheets, and scrub bathrooms. What a blessing it was to her.

I have hired work done at a reduced price and included a family dinner at the end of the evening. I have also bartered work. Since I don’t want to pick blackberries in the chiggers, stickers, and heat I have traded blackberries for cobblers. (Works fine for me since I like to cook.) 

You garden for me, I’ll preserve for you. Find friends who can work with you on a job. I once had a canning buddy. Work is easier when you have a friend to share it. I know how to dry, freeze, can food, and make jellies and pickles. I can trade that expertise for fresh garden stuff that I have no time or talent for growing myself. Trade jars of pickles for cucumbers––jam for strawberries.

Whatever your needy place is with work, household chores, cooking, sewing, laundering, decluttering, there are people who will do those jobs for cash or barter. Can you trade your skill for another’s skill?

Some of us don’t want to admit we are not “Supermom.” We struggle because we won’t search out the assistance we need.

Ways Mama Can Find Help

Pray for God to provide the help you need.

Lean in on your husband for backup.

Find a Christian counselor. 

Search out free or minimally priced services. 

Find a mom who will swap babysitting. 

Speak up for money in your budget to meet your needs. 

Save for entertainment, outings, or things needed.

Trade, barter or bargain for the help or items you need.

Lean on family members.

Turn to friends, fellow church members, or neighbors.

Find friends you can depend on and who need your help also. A mama gets lonely somedays and needs another woman to visit with if only over the facebook chat or a phone call. A mama needs company––camaraderie. But friends cannot be used to fill a woman’s needfulness unless the filling and giving is a two-way street. Friendship is too valuable to treat lightly. A heart must give back emotional support, hope, faith, even fun. 

Be a friend. Show concern and true caring. You need someone who can scratch your back; but you won’t get a satisfying scratching that finds that seriously itchy spot, if you aren’t first a good back scratcher yourself.

Elece Hollis is a mom of seven and a grandmother to twenty-four. She and her husband Ron live on a farm in Oklahoma where they tend cows and an orchard of pecan trees. Elece is an avid photographer and a lover of all thing home and family. She has written many magazines articles and stories, worked on over twenty-five freelance book projects. She also writes poetry and a column for stay-at-home moms. Find her blog elecehollis.com and keep an eye out for her next book What’s Good About Home!

 

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