Connect What is the most rewarding part of being a mom?

Watching them spread their wings, fall, and then get back up again. Over and over again. To keep allowing yourself to grow from mistakes, to keep finding it within to get back up again and move forward, it's the biggest reward for me. That they know they are human. They can strive for greatness, and they can also allow themselves not to always seek perfection. While this is the most rewarding for me as a mom, it is also the hardest thing to do. So I let them watch me do the same thing.

What is the biggest lesson motherhood has taught you?

The biggest lesson in motherhood for me has been to allow them to fail. That is NOT in my instinct. Everything inside me screams. Finding that discretion and balance to know when to step in, and when to step back. This has been both my biggest lesson and my biggest challenge. Even into these growing college years, I find myself still learning this lesson. What is 100% always true? The love I have for my boys is the biggest love I have ever known. It is also painfully hard to let them grow up.

What would you do with $20,000?

I would 100% use the money to pay down their college loans. That would be the best gift I could imagine for myself. As a full-time working mom in the nonprofit/social work world, there hasn't always been enough to cover what they needed for college. This is not a story I sit alone in. To be in the midst of so many moms, all who struggle, all who love, all who succeed, and sometimes fail, is an honor.